O'Higgins's greatest office, however, was still before him. In 1796 he
was created Viceroy of Peru, and thus became the highest official
throughout the New World. No fairy story has ever produced a more
startling study of career and contrast than that which had fallen to the
lot of the erstwhile bare-footed Irish boy.
The remarkable history of the family of O'Higgins, however, does not end
even here. Ambrose O'Higgins was undoubtedly the most brilliant Viceroy
who had ever served Spain in the New World. The candle of this high
office, as it were, flamed up in a great, but transient, flicker ere it
was for ever extinguished, and it was O'Higgins who fed this flame. With
the passing of Ambrose O'Higgins we are confronted with the next
generation of his family. As the father had done in the interests of
regal Spain, so did the son in the service of the southern patriots.
Bernardo O'Higgins, indeed, was destined to accomplish yet greater
things in the cause of the Independence of South America. Ambrose
O'Higgins was one of Spain's last Viceroys; his son Bernardo became one
of the first Presidents of the New Republican World.
CHAPTER XII
THE COLONY OF CHILE
In Chile, as has been said, the conquest of the land was effected under
far more strenuous circumstances than those which applied to any other
part of South America, with the exception, perhaps, of the coasts in the
neighbourhood of the estuary of the River Plate.
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