The Hispanic Nations of the New World: A Chronicle of Our Southern Neighbors. William R. Shepherd

be secure and those of Brazil would be reduced to what were befitting a mere dependency. Yielding to the inevitable, the King decided to return to Portugal, leaving the young Crown Prince to act as Regent in the colony. A critical moment for the little country and its big dominion oversea had indubitably arrived. John understood the trend of the times, for on the eve of his departure he said to his son: "Pedro, if Brazil is to separate itself from Portugal, as seems likely, you take the crown yourself before any one else gets it!"

      Pedro was liberal in sentiment, popular among the Brazilians, and well-disposed toward the aspirations of the country for a larger measure of freedom, and yet not blind to the interests of the dynasty of Braganza. He readily listened to the urgent pleas of the leaders of the separatist party against obeying the repressive mandaes of the Cortes. Laws which abolished the central government of the colony and made the various provinces individually subject to Portugal he declined to notice. With equal promptness he refused to heed an order bidding him return to Portugal immediately. To a delegation of prominent Brazilians he said emphatically: "For the good of all and the general welfare of the nation, I shall stay." More than that, in May, 1822, he accepted from the municipality of Rio de Janeiro the title of "Perpetual and Constitutional Defender of Brazil," and in a series of proclamations urged the people of the country to begin the great work of emancipation by forcibly resisting, if needful, any attempt at coercion.

      Pedro now believed the moment had come to take the final step. While on a journey through the province of Sao Paulo, he was overtaken on the 7th of September, near a little stream called the Ypiranga, by messengers with dispatches from Portugal. Finding that the Cortes had annulled his acts and declared his ministers guilty of treason, Pedro forthwith proclaimed Brazil an independent state. The "cry of Ypiranga" was echoed with tremendous enthusiasm throughout the country. When Pedro appeared in the theater at Rio de Janeiro, a few days later, wearing on his arm a ribbon on which were inscribed the words "Independence or Death," he was given a tumultuous ovation. On the first day of December the youthful monarch assumed the title of Emperor, and Brazil thereupon took its place among the nations of America.