the Diplomatic Corps, and, though there was much excitement
beforehand, when his remarks were boiled down, nothing was changed.
The Mexican is a past master at presenting the same condition under
some other expedient and disarmingly transparent disguise. The way
out of what we all considered a great difficulty is amazingly simple.
There will be no President elected! Huerta declares he will not be a
candidate, and no one else will have the necessary majority.
The plain English of it all is--Huerta at the head of the government as
full-fledged military dictator. After the formal statement of affairs
he turned to N. and begged him to assure Washington of his good faith;
and he reiterated that his sole aim was the pacification of Mexico.
He then became overpoweringly, embarrassingly polite--even tender. He
took N.’s arm and led him out to have a _copita_[3] in the face of the
assembled corps, having previously embraced him, saying, with playful
reminiscence, “I arrest you.” Such are the vicissitudes of representing
the Stars and Stripes in Mexico! People tell me Huerta’s speeches are
generally masterpieces of brevity, with something magnetic and human
about them. The English support has strengthened him, within and
without.
Sir L. and N. were snap-shotted together by indiscreet newspaper men as
they were leaving the _Palacio_. A _pièce à conviction_, if ever there
was one. Sir L. was laughingly apologetic for N.’s being “found so near
the body.”
Mrs. Lind left yesterday for the United States, and I have written to
the Governor, who may be lonely, to tell him how welcome he would be
if he likes to return to Mexico City. I can make him comfortable--in
a bedroom and study adjoining--and we would really like to see him.
However, he may not care to come up for another _fausse couche_, as
one of the colleagues called his first visit.
Everybody is expecting disorders on Sunday--Election Day. There is
very little difference between lawmakers and lawbreakers in Mexico. We
foreign devils can scarcely keep our faces straight when we hear the
word “elections.” Sunday is sure to find Huerta still in the saddle.
_October 25th._
Yesterday L----, confidential agent of Felix Diaz, appeared at
luncheon-time. He is a clever and plausible individual, angling for the
United States recognition for Diaz’s candidacy. A special train has
been offered Felix Diaz, but he is afraid, and not without reason, to
venture up into the unknown, so he will wait presidential results at
Vera Cruz, with its attractive harbor full of fast ships.
_Tuesday, 28th._
The great day of the elections--the 26th--passed off, not only without
disturbance, but without voters or votes! The candidates so talked of
during these last days were conspicuous by their absence. Felix Diaz
was afraid to come to the capital, though all “assurances”--whatever
that may mean--had been given him. In Vera Cruz he stayed at a
second-rate hotel, next door to the American Consulate--the Stars
and Stripes, doubtless, looking very comfortable from an accessible
roof-to-roof vantage-ground. He has missed, fatalistically, it would
seem, the occasions whereby he might have become ruler of Mexico. He
is a gentleman, rather in our sense of the word, and the name he bears
is linked to the many glories of Mexico, but this is, probably, his
political burial. Already opportunity has called him thrice--Vera Cruz,
in 1912; then Mexico City, in February, 1913; now again at Vera Cruz,
in October, 1913; and still another wields the destinies of Mexico.
The _chers collègues_ prophesy that we shall be here until next May,
when probably new elections will be held. The consensus of opinion is
that I might as well get the much-discussed drawing-room curtains and
the rest, though I can’t feel enthusiastic about ordering a lot of
things that may come in only as I go out. The dining-room continues
to strike me as a terribly bleak place, like all north rooms in the
tropics.
I must say that one has very little hunger at this height, where the
processes of digestion are much slower than at ordinary altitudes. When
one has eaten a soup of some sort, a dish of rice garnished with eggs,
bacon, and bananas (which any Mexican can do beautifully), or one of
the delicious light omelettes--_tortilla de huevos_--topped off by some
of the little, wild, fragrant strawberries almost perennial here, and
over which wine is poured as a microbe-killer, one’s “engine is stoked”
for twenty-four hours.
There have just been the usual parleyings about the brandy for the
turkey--the _guajolote_, the Indians call him--the ancestral bird
of Mexico. The Aztecs ate, and continue to eat, him; and good cooks
have the habit of giving him the following happy death: on the
morning of the day on which you are to eat him, you generally hear
him gobbling about. Then there is the demand for whisky or brandy
“_por el guajolote, pobrecito_.” The unfortunate (or fortunate) bird
is then allowed to drink himself to death. This is the effective
way of rendering him chewable, it being impossible to hang meats at
this altitude. The flesh becomes soft and white and juicy. But try a
gravel-fed _guajolote_ that has not gone to damnation!
The food question is difficult here, anyway, and personally I am
unable to wrestle with it. The far-famed tropical fruits of this
part of the world are most disappointing, with the exception of the
mango, with its clear, clean, slightly turpentiny taste. There are
many varieties of bananas, but scarcely a decent one to be had, such
as any Italian push-cart is stocked with in New York. The _chirimoya_
has a custard-like taste--the _chico zapote_, looking like a potato,
has also, to our palate, a very unpleasant, mushy consistency, and
everything is possessed of abnormally large seeds at the center. The
beautiful-looking, but tough, peaches that adorn our tables come from
California; also the large, rather withered grapes.
FOOTNOTES:
[2] _Tertulia_--evening party.
[3] A little drink.
III
Federal and Rebel excesses in the north--Some aspects
of social life--Mexico’s inner circle--Huerta’s growing
difficulties--Rabago--The “Feast of the Dead.”--Indian booths at the
Alameda--The Latin-American’s future.
_October 29th._
The Minister for Foreign Affairs is now in the drawing-room, from which
I have fled, having asked to confer with N. He has been frightened at
the intervention outlook and probably has come to try to find out what
Washington really has in store for Mexico. He said the other day that
the suspense was paralyzing to the nation.
The British vice-consul at Palacio Gomez, Mr. Cunard Cummings, came for
lunch. He has had a thorough experience with both rebels and Federals
at Torreon, and has terrible stories to tell of both sides. You don’t
change Mexican methods by draping them in different banners. In fact,
it isn’t the banner, here, but the kind of hand carrying it, that
makes the difference. He told us how one night the rebels shot up the
hospital in his town, crowded with wounded whom he and the doctors
had left fairly comfortable. The next morning, when he went back, his
attention was first caught by something dark and sticky dripping from
the balcony, as he went into the _patio_. Up-stairs a dreadful sight
was presented by the overturned cots, the broken medicine-bottles, and
last, but not least, the _human_ horrors.
Another tale is that of an ex-Deputy, de la Cadena, who walked up the
aisle of a church with clanking sword and spurs, seized the priest
officiating at Mass, and threw him and the sacred vessels out into the
street, to the consternation and terror of the humble worshipers.
Two federal military trains have been blown up during the last week.
Ninety persons were killed at one station and, the day before, one
hundred and two killed in the same way at Lulu station. It is certainly
a dance of death.
_October 30th._
Last night there was a very pleasant dinner at the German Legation,
at which I presided. I wore my black satin Spitzer dress, with the
white-and-silver hanging sleeves, which was much admired. Everybody’s
clothes are known here and people are thankful to see something new.
The Belgian minister was on one side of me, and the Japanese on the
other. Von Hintze was opposite, with Lady C. on his right, and Señora
de Rul, wearing magnificent pearls and a high-necked dress, on his
left. Three of the officers of the _Hertha_ were there, giving rise to
uncomplicated jokes about “Hertha” and “Huerta.” Of course conversation
about _la situación_ twisted through the various courses. The opinion
is that there are enough warring elements in town to provide a sort of
spontaneous combustion, without the aid of any outside happenings.
Moheno had evidently got word of the Cabinet meeting in Washington,
when he came to see N., yesterday. He was most profuse in protestations
of friendship, personal and political. They are all a bit worried and
perhaps will be amenable to negotiations.
_October 31st._
Yesterday there was a luncheon at May’s in honor of the Belgians who
have come to get the much-talked-of railroad concession--a little
matter of five thousand kilometers. Everything is beautifully done at
his house, and he has many lovely works of art. The table was a mass
of small, yellow chrysanthemums in a beautiful, old English porcelain
_surtout de table_, having a yellow _fond_; the food was the triumph
of a French _chef_ over Mexican material. But, like all houses facing
north, the May’s house seemed desperately chilly when one came in out
of the bright, fresh autumn day. Simon, the clever French _Inspecteur
des Finances_, came in only when lunch was nearly over. His wife had
been in tears most of the time, and we were all a bit jumpy--as there
were rumors of a raid on the bank, and we feared that he and the other
directors might have been asked for their money or their lives. I
invited them all for tea on Monday. Graux, the chief engineer, has a
handsome English wife.
When I see the fully furnished _salons_ of others, I long for my Lares
and Penates, so safe in Vienna; though, I must say, the drawing-room
has begun to look very homelike and comfortable, with its deep chairs,
broad writing-desk, small tables, reading-lamps, palms, photographs,
books, and bibelots.
In the afternoon we went to a small tea in another world than the
political. It was given by Madame de Riba, nee Garcia Pimentel, of the
inner circle of the aristocrats, where _el gobierno_ is looked at from
more or less of a distance, and where foreigners seldom penetrate.
They are the delightful, charming people one sees in the same set
all over the world, and remind me of the “cousinage” of the “first
society” of Vienna. They constantly intermarry, and, though they
travel, they rarely make foreign alliances, and are apt to return to
their own country, which, despite its political uncertainties, is more
beautiful than any other. There are many works of art left in Mexico
from the old Spanish days, and in such houses one finds them. The
handsome, agreeable, amiable women, moreover, wear Paris clothes and
Cartier-set jewels; the men are dressed by London tailors. The scene
yesterday suggested any European capital, and that inner circle where
beauty, wealth, and distinction abide. The members of this inner circle
are all in favor of the paternal form of government. They themselves
exercise a more or less beneficent sway over the laborers on their big
estates; and they realize from experience the necessity of a highly
centralized government in this country, where, of the fifteen millions
of inhabitants, thirteen million are Indians, and the other two million
_gachupines_, _mestizos_, foreigners of various sorts. Huerta once told
N. that the _gachupines_ had spoiled a good race. He casts the stone
back as far as Cortés--rather a novel idea!
The bull-fight contingent from Spain arrives to-day. There is great
excitement, and with such a spur we all feel that business ought to
improve. Lack of money is the crux of the whole situation in Mexico,
and, with the United States frowning on any nation that even hints
at a loan, the case seems desperate. Any one, however, can afford a
bull-fight ticket. If not for the more expensive seats _en sombra_
(in the shade), the people get a _boleto de sol_, where they simmer
blissfully in the sunny half of the Ring.
I inclose a newspaper cutting about Bonilla, who was in hiding here.
He is celebrated for his blunders--_bonilladas_, they are called. As
a delicate expression of his thanks, on his arrival at Washington,
he sent N. an open telegram announcing his safe arrival and ending
with messages of gratitude neatly calculated to make trouble for his
benefactor in both capitals.
I am finding myself very well off here, in the center of daily
occurrences of vital interest. A full plate of life! One of its
sweetnesses, doubtless, is that I don’t know how long it will last.
My tea-service is the only thing I really miss. A tent of a night I
know--but the tea hour comes every day!
_November 2nd._
Last night came what is practically an ultimatum from Washington to
Huerta. He is to get out, he, and all his friends, or--intervention. N.
was at the palace until one o’clock in the morning. It is asking Huerta
to commit political suicide, and he, unfortunately, does not feel
so inclined. Also, he has a conviction that he is a sort of “Man of
Destiny” who can bring peace to Mexico. N. tried to convince him of the
complete impossibility of standing up against the United States, and
urged him again and again to give way. I was troubled during the night
by visions of intervention, further devastation of this beautiful land,
and the precious blood of my own people.
I am reading a Spanish book on the war of 1847, published in 1848. The
reasons why battles were lost sound immensely familiar--generals not
coming up with reinforcements, or the commissary not materializing, or
the troops deserting. It is all so like what we are reading now in the
newspapers! No _tempora mutantur_ here.
_November 3rd._
If Huerta feels himself in his last ditch, with this threat of
intervention, he may answer “_que vengan_.” The upper classes here seem
to feel that it is what we intend and feel that if “’twere done, ’twere
well ’twere done quickly,” before the country is ruined. The bitter
pill will be sugar-coated by thoughts of the prosperity to follow.
A---- came this morning, and, after a long conversation about Mexico’s
troubles, cried: “Come in immediately and clear up this impossible
situation, or leave us alone. Nothing is safe; nothing is sacred!” His
large sugar interests are in the Zapatista country, and he is pretty
well ruined by their destruction. If we come in, the military part is,
perhaps, the least of it; a huge administrative job would follow--Cuba
and the Philippines are mere child’s play to it.
A rather cryptic letter came from Mr. Lind this morning. We gather that
he is thinking of leaving, as he feels that he can’t do anything! He
has learned, as somebody said, enough Spanish to say nothing in it. I
think, however, it is as difficult for the United States to withdraw
him as it was embarrassing to send him. Also a letter came from
Burnside, from Vera Cruz, telling of the war-ships and their positions
in the harbor. He predicts a migration north for all of us, at an early
date--but who knows?
_November 4th._
More battle-ships are announced. We shall have, according to to-day’s
paper, about 6,000 men at Vera Cruz. Box-cars are being sent to the
frontier; it must all mean preparation for some definite stroke on the
part of the United States. I feel that I am seeing life from a very big
angle. In spite of the underlying excitement here, outwardly things
take their usual course. Now we motor out to Tlalpam with the Belgian
minister, to lunch at Percival’s. It is a wondrous, glistening day,
and the swift run over the smooth, straight road toward the enchanting
hills which form its near background will be pure joy. The mountains
have a way of changing their aspect as one motors along, even with
one’s eye on them. From being a breath, an emanation, they become blue,
purple realities of matchless beauty--dark shadows pinned to them with
spears of light.
The extremely delicate negotiations N. has been having with the
President’s private secretary, Rabago, concerning Huerta’s possible
resignation, have leaked out, not from Mexico, but from the United
States, and, we suspect, _via_ Vera Cruz. At the somewhat early hour
of two in the morning the press correspondents began to come to the
Embassy. It is now 11.30 and they have been coming ever since.
N., of course, denies categorically having negotiations on hand. Mr.
Bryan, we see by the morning newspaper, is reported as looking very
pleased at the aspect of the Mexican situation, on account of the
aforesaid negotiations. The correspondents here must be heaven-born.
Their scent is unerring. If there is anything even dreamed of they
appear in shoals; when things are in abeyance you wouldn’t know there
was one in town. They try, naturally, to read something political into
everything that happens. For instance, the officers of the German
training-ship invited several of the ministers to take a little
trip to Vera Cruz, and the German, Russian, and Norwegian ministers
accepted--which is why the newspapers had it that there was a meeting
of plenipotentiaries at Vera Cruz. They are on a hunting trip for two
days and will return to-morrow.
Felix Diaz has at last been landed at Havana (much to the relief, I
imagine, of the captain of the U. S. S. _Wheeling_, on which ship he
sought refuge) and his political curtain has been rung down on this
especial act.
_November 5th._
Rabago is a very clever man, endowed to a high degree with the
peculiarly caustic type of Latin-American wit, whose natural object
here seems always to be Mexico’s kaleidoscopic government. His paper
_El Mañana_ did more than anything else to kill Madero by perseveringly
reflecting his weaknesses in a mirror of ridicule. On account of his
opposition to the Maderos and his Porfirista sympathies he was taken up
by the aristocratic class and has been of immense service to Huerta, a
sort of bridge between him and them. But how far the advice to resign,
which he swears that he has urged on Huerta, will be followed remains
to be seen. Huerta has a deep, strange, Indian psychology entirely
unfamiliar to us, which is at work on the situation, and the results
cannot be predicted.
It was amusing to see the various ministers arrive at the Embassy,
one after the other, to assure N. that there had been no conference
of ministers at Vera Cruz with Mr. Lind. They intend to uphold the
protocol, and wouldn’t be caught flirting with an unknown official
quantity behind N.’s back for anything in the world.... Huerta easily
gets suspicious and I dare say the whole proceeding is spoiled. N. goes
to-day with the ultimatum to the President himself, and we shall see
what we shall see. It is all very uncertain, but intensely interesting,
in the magnetic, highly colored, Latin-American way. It makes London,
Paris, and New York seem very banal.
Just home, after leaving N. at the _Palacio_, where the answer to the
ultimatum is supposed to be forthcoming. All the clerks are here, in
readiness to get off despatches.
On my way back I stopped at the Alameda for a belated look at the
booths stocked with the articles appropriate, according to Aztec ideas,
for All Saints’ Day and the Feast of the Dead. Countless Indians,
picturesque and mysterious, flood into the city, build their booths,
stay a few days, and then silently ebb away, unseen until the next
occasion--Christmas. Great bunches of a yellow flower--_cinco llagas_,
“Flower of Death,” the Indians call it--are everywhere for sale, to be
placed afterward on the evanescent graves. Toy death’s-heads and small
toy coffins of all sorts abound. A favorite device is one whereby a
string is pulled, the dead man raises his head, and when one lets go
he falls back with a rattling sound. It is all a bit _macabre_, sold
by these imperturbable Indians of the plateau, who are far from being
a jovial race. Pulque and their other drinks often induce silence and
melancholy rather than hilarity. They never sing nor whistle in the
streets. They almost never dance. If they go through a few figures
it is mostly in a solemn manner and on the occasion of some church
festival, when they dance and gesticulate, strangely garlanded, in the
_patio_ of the church itself.
The Alameda is a handsome park in the very middle of the town, and
marks the site of the old Aztec _tianguiz_, or market-place. Fountains
and flowers abound, and it is lavishly planted with beautiful
eucalyptus and palms; an excellent band plays daily. The _pajarera_
(aviary) around which the children cluster is very poor, considering
the beauty and variety of the Mexican birds and the Aztec traditions in
this regard. The park has no railing around it--one can stroll in from
the broad Avenida Juarez. The drawback to the stone benches, placed at
intervals, is that the most prominent have graven upon them the words,
“_Eusebio Gayosso_”--the name of the _popular undertaker_. In the midst
of life you are in death there. However, the eternal Indians, sunning
themselves and their offspring on the benches, can’t read; they have
this advantage over any _ilustrado_ who might want to rest a bit.
N. has just returned with the anxiously awaited answer, which is quite
beside the point. Huerta is probably sparring for time. He proffers
vague, pleasant words in answer to the very definite message of the
President, to the effect that he has always been animated by the most
patriotic desires, that he will always limit his acts to the law, and
that after the elections he will scrupulously respect the public wish
and will recognize any person elected as President for the term to the
30th of November, 1916. N. recommends the withdrawal of the Embassy if,
after the 23d of this month, when a new congress is to be convened,
Huerta has not resigned. This might influence Huerta; and again, he may
consider it only another cry of wolf.
The fact is, nobody believes we really will intervene. The chances that
we shall depart on a war-ship instead of by the Ward Line are very
good, the “d” in this instance making all the difference. I shall hate
to leave this palpitating, prismatic sort of life; but it isn’t the
moment to have personal feelings of any sort.
Driving back this evening toward a beautiful, clear, red sunset, up the
Plateros between the rows of autos and carriages full of handsomely
dressed people, the men standing along the edge of the pavement as they
do in Rome on the Corso, it seemed impossible that I was looking at a
people over whom a great national humiliation was hanging. The crowds
become more and more Mexican every day, with fewer American faces.
We lunched to-day with the Iturbides. Everything was done in the best
of style--with beautiful old silver and porcelain. He is a descendant
of the Emperor Augustin Iturbide of tragic history, and a charming
and very clever young man who would adorn any society. Señor Bernal,
with his Christus head, its extreme regularity chiseled in pale, ivory
tones, sat on my other side. They all seemed to fear that in view of
the, to them, inexplicable attitude of the United States, the end in
Mexico would be the long-dreaded intervention in some form. Not a man
who was at the table, however, really occupies himself with politics.
They all have handsome houses in town, but they live for the most part
on their haciendas, which they work on the paternal plan, the only
plan as yet productive of results here and which we in the United
States don’t at all understand, not being able to put ourselves into
another nation’s shoes. The actual political business here is left to
the educated middle class, whose members, instead of being pillars of
society, form the stratum from which the professional politician and
embryo revolutionist always spring--the _licenciados_, sometimes called
the curse of Mexico, and other men of the civil professions, generally
venal to a degree. The peon is faithful when he has no power and the
aristocrat is noble; but no country is secure whose best elements are
the extremes.