This is a recent addition to an important series, Spanish and Hispanic Biographies of the Nineteenth Century. Bustamante, gazeteer, lawyer, and insurgent had an exciting career during the Mexican struggle for independence from Spain, and died after the war of 1848, of ""passion of soul and patriotic sadness"". Alvarez's unpretentious biographical method is curiously effective and he has let his subject speak for himself through his writings. A pleasant bypath for those who have gotten beyond the obvious in history or Mexico.