THE MEXICAN CAPITAL
I
It was another four days’ journey to Mexico City--a journey directly
eastward and a trifle skyward.
Mexico is a mountainous country--so loftily mountainous that one has
only to travel upward to pass in turn through every variety of climate
and every type of landscape.
The road led from Manzanillo through the hot coastal plain--through
palm-land and swamp-land where sweating, semi-naked _peons_ waded
knee-deep in pools formed overnight by the first downpour of a tropic
rainy season--to Colima, a conventional little city at the base of
a snow-tipped volcano--into the highlands through tortuous defiles
where the cane gave way to maize and the jungle-growth to cactus--past
tiny villages of adobe huts clustering about a huge white church that
dwarfed the rugged gullies--into a climate of eternal spring--to
Guadalajara, the second largest and the most delightful city of the
republic, where orange trees were golden throughout the year--and
beyond, to the wide expanses of Mexico’s high plateau--to a land of
vast, gloomy spaces and lonely grandeur--the grandeur of rolling
yellow plains stretching to a distant horizon rimmed with jagged peaks,
where at twilight the purple shadows crept upward toward an azure
sky--to a country desolate and superb, and a trifle wintry.
[Illustration: THE ORANGE TREES IN GUADALAJARA’S PLAZA WERE GOLDEN
THROUGHOUT THE YEAR]
To the stay-at-home American, Mexico is only a sun-scorched desert.
In reality, it is a land of everything--of sandy wastes, of rugged
mountains, of rank tropical jungles, of temperate valleys--of lowlands
bathed in moist tropic heat, of midlands where strawberries are always
ripe, even of highlands swept eternally by chilling winds. Yet always
there is some intangible spirit about it that makes it unmistakably
Mexico, especially upon the bleak plateau.
II
The haunting melancholy of the high altitude seemed to have affected
the natives.
Below, on the coast, the poverty-stricken Indians had appeared
contented and happy. On the tableland they were very solemn. A _peon_
marching behind his little burro wore the same stolid, pack-animal
expression as the beast itself. There was no animation in the faces.
The greater part of the masculine population sat upon the station
platforms, wrapped in blankets and meditation, waiting only for another
day to pass.
The women, more energetic than the men, still besieged the car windows,
offering for sale the local products, not in the cheery manner of the
lowland women, but hopelessly and mournfully, as though they expected
that no one would buy. Unimaginative as the men-folks, they all sold
the same article--whatever article some more energetic ancestor, many
years before, had sold in their particular village. At Irapuato it was
strawberries; at Celaya a species of fudge in tiny wooden boxes; at
Queretaro opals from the neighboring mines; at San Juan del Rio lariats
and ropes.
They waited in a bedraggled group as the train pulled in. They all
advanced toward the same window. When the first customer did not buy,
they shrugged their shoulders and turned away. Gradually it would dawn
upon them that there were other passengers, and they would drift out
along the sides of the other cars, holding up their baskets in mute
appeal.
“It is _pulque_,” explained a Mexican fellow-passenger. “They are all
sodden with it here. _Que borachos!_ What drunkards!”
_Pulque_, the cheap liquor of the plateau, grows only in the highlands,
and sours too quickly to be transported elsewhere. As we ascended
toward the 7500-foot altitude of the capital, fields of _maguey_--the
source of the beverage--became more and more frequent until they lined
the railway in long even rows that covered the rolling plains to the
distant mountain-rim--each cactus resembling a huge blue artichoke,
and adding another touch of color to the landscape. In blossoming, the
plant sends up a tall stalk from which, if it be tapped, there flows
a milky fluid locally known as “_aguamiel_” or “honey-water,” which
ferments very rapidly. Within a few hours it becomes a mild intoxicant
with a taste like that of sour buttermilk; within a few hours more it
becomes a murder-inspiring poison with a taste which the most profane
of mortals could never adequately describe.
In the fields _peons_ could be seen, each with a pigskin receptacle
slung over his back, trotting from plant to plant, climbing upon the
pulpy leaves of the big cactus as though he were some little bug
crawling into a flower, bending over the central pool to suck the
liquid into a hollow gourd, and discharging it into the pigskin sack.
When the bag was filled, he would trot away to the _hacienda_ with it;
a little stale _pulque_ would start it fermenting; on the morrow a
series of early trains, the equivalent of the milk trains elsewhere,
would carry it to all the neighboring cities to befuddle the population
there.
Drunkenness is extremely common in Mexico. Although _pulque_ can not
be widely distributed, the Mexicans boil the lower leaves of their
cactus and distill therefrom their _mescal_ and _tequila_--two fiery
alcoholic stimulants condemned both by moralists and by connoisseurs
of good liquor--which are responsible for most of the acts of violence
which transpire in the republic. Yet drunkenness is most prevalent in
the highlands, for _pulque_, while comparatively mild, is the cheapest
thing in Mexico, and one can buy a quart or two for a few pennies.
On each station platform the men sat patiently, waiting while the women
offered their wares. The old girl probably would not make a sale, but
_quién sabe_? If she did, there would be more money for _pulque_.
Already sodden with it, they wrapped their tattered blankets about
them, and watched fatalistically, inhabitants of the world’s richest
country, resigned to an empty life, oblivious to the charm of the most
fascinating country on all the earth.
For despite its gloom, I know of no country more fascinating than the
Mexican plateau.
In the clear mountain air each picturesque detail of the vast landscape
stood out distinctly--the peaked hat of a little Indian plodding
solemnly behind his burro--a herd of cattle grazing leisurely upon
the coarse bunch-grass, mere brown specks against the yellow hills--a
lonely white chapel with two slender towers and a massive dome,
standing by itself without the suggestion of a possible worshiper
within miles and miles--an infrequent _hacienda_ with a host of tiny
laborers’ shacks grouped about a crumbling ranch-house that once had
been a palace. Yet the indefinable charm of the scene lay not in the
details, but in the immensity of the canvas. Against the majestic sweep
of the wasteland itself, the details appeared dwarfed and isolated.
They gave one a feeling of utter loneliness--even of sadness--a
strangely delicious sadness. A bleak, gloomy place was this plateau,
yet many years hence, whenever one heard “Mexico,” one would think not
of the desert or the jungle, but of these vast stretches of yellow
wasteland and this horizon of purple mountains, and one would sense a
haunting desire to see them again.
III
After two days upon that plateau, Mexico City was a shock.
The train roared into a crowded station. Vociferous hotel runners burst
into the car and fought up and down the aisles. _Cargadores_ clamored
outside the windows. Mexican friends met Mexican friends with loud
cries of joy. All screamed noisily to make themselves heard above the
din of claxons from riotous streets outside.
Some runner, having driven rivals away from Eustace and myself, handed
our suit-cases through the window to a waiting desperado, and we chased
him frantically through the mob. Some chauffeur, having driven rivals
away from the suit-cases, packed them inside a taxi, shoved us in after
them, and shot away at full speed the moment his assistant cranked the
car, leaving the assistant to dodge aside and jump aboard as best he
could, zigzagging madly through a fleet of other taxis, all of which
were shrieking their claxons and roaring past with wide open cut-out,
avoiding a dozen clanging trolley cars and scraping along the side of a
thirteenth, pausing momentarily while a rabid policeman waved his arms
and screamed abuse in voluble Spanish, then tearing onward as wildly as
before through a world of leaping pedestrians.
We drew up with a grinding of brakes before a modern hotel, the
chauffeur collected a modern fare, a hotel clerk grunted at us with
modern incivility, a bell-hop conducted us with modern condescension
to a modern room, and left us to spend a night of modern wakefulness
listening to the nerve-wracking din of a thoroughly modern city outside.
After the plateau, it seemed profane. One had the illusion that in the
midst of a grand cathedral service the bishop had given a college yell,
the organ had burst into jazz, and the choir had danced an Irish jig.
IV
In the morning Eustace and I wrote President Carranza a friendly little
note, requesting an interview. Then we set out to see the town.
It proved surprisingly attractive by daylight--one of the most ornate
in the Western Hemisphere outside of Argentina or Brazil. If it lacked
the impressive solidity of an American city, and failed to startle with
giant sky-scrapers, it undoubtedly surpassed New York or any other
Yankee metropolis--including Washington--in the beauty of its parks and
boulevards.
[Illustration: MEXICO CITY, ONE OF THE MOST ORNATE CAPITALS IN THE
WESTERN HEMISPHERE, SOMEWHAT RESEMBLED PARIS]
Superficially it suggested Paris. Along the streets of its business
section the buildings, all of the same height of three or four
stories, were of European architecture. Its avenues and gardens, with
their numerous statues and monuments, were distinctly French. There
was a suggestion also of other lands. There were German beer halls
and rathskellers, dignified English banks, Italian restaurants, and
Japanese curio shops. There was even the American quick-lunch counter
where a darky from Alabama asked abruptly, “What’s yours, boss?” and
shouted “One ham sandwich!” through a wall-opening to a white-capped
cook. But French window-displays of modes and perfumery predominated,
and combining with the architecture, gave the city the general aspect
of Paris.
V
It proved a cool city, however, both in climate and manners. Of the
two, the former seemed the more kindly. If the air were chilly at
morning or evening--either in summer or winter, wherein there is little
variation--it was hot enough at mid-day to bring out the perspiration.
But the manners remained constantly those of all large cities, even in
Mexico.
There was no reason that they should be otherwise. After traveling,
nevertheless, through smaller towns, where natives looked upon a
newcomer with interest and other Americans immediately introduced
themselves, we found that we were regarding the entire population of
the capital as downright discourteous. Americans upon the street were
not merely indifferent but suspicious. When we attempted to stop one to
inquire the way to the National Museum, he would duck aside and hurry
away before we could speak. We had about decided to punch the next
fellow-countryman we met, and were looking for a small one, when we
discovered the reason for American distrust.
Every fourth _gringo_ in town seemed to be broke and in need of alms.
Two clean-cut youngsters, lured here evidently by the illusion that
any one could make his fortune in Latin America, came into an American
restaurant where we lunched, and begged the proprietor for a job
washing dishes.
“For God’s sake, man, we’re hungry! And we’re willing to work! All we
ask is our meals, and five pesos a week to cover room rent--not a
penny more!”
The proprietor shook his head.
“I’m sorry for them,” he said, as the youths went out, “but there’s too
many. They use up all your sympathy.”
Another youth stopped us in the park.
“I’m not a regular bum,” he pleaded. “I came down here because a
fellow I knew invited me. He was a Mexican, and he worked beside me in
the auto factory up at Detroit. He was always telling me what a fine
country this was. After he went home, he kept writing to me about how
when I came to Mexico his house would be my house. I thought he meant
it. And he kept saying there were lots of jobs. I didn’t know it was
their habit to say nice things like that just to please you. I came
down here three weeks ago, and there _were_ no jobs--or else Mexicans
took them on a salary that wouldn’t support an American--and when I
looked up my friend, he kept saying that his house was my house, but
I’ve never seen the inside of it, and since the first day I haven’t
seen _him_. I’ve spent my last cent, and I’m up against it.”
But among the down and out were many less deserving, with stories just
as good. Some were draft-evaders that had come to Mexico during the
War, and had been unable to return. Others were professional vagabonds
who had gravitated southward to enjoy the privileges of a country that
recognized vagrancy as a legitimate profession. At first, like most
new arrivals touched by the pitiful sight of a fellow-countryman in
misfortune in a foreign land, we gave liberally. But within a few days,
we grew hardened, and like the Old-Timers, we ducked away at the very
approach of a strange American, even though he merely wished to ask his
way to the National Museum.
For companionship, we confined ourselves to Old Barlow, who occupied
the hotel room next to ours, and who drifted into our quarters now and
then to gratify an Old Resident’s love of spinning yarns.
He was somewhat of a pessimist. He liked Mexico but he always carried a
gun. A gray-haired man, walking with a slight limp, he claimed to have
been present at every earthquake, revolution, and dog-fight that had
ever transpired in Mexico or Central America, and when once started on
a recital, each murder suggested another.
“Best thing I ever did see was the duel Cash Bradley fought. Cash
didn’t know nothing about swords, so when this geezer challenged him,
he went up to ask General Agramonte for advice. Great old war-horse
was Agramonte! Says he, ‘You don’t need to know nothing about
swords--except one little trick of swordsmanship I’m going to teach
you. When you first start, the seconds will count three, and at each
count you bring down your sword and clash it politely with the other
guy’s sword by way of salute. Well, on the count of three, you just
accidentally miss the other fellow’s sword and salute him politely in
the neck.’ And believe me, boys, that little feat of swordsmanship just
saved Cash Bradley’s life.”
Then he would puff at his pipe, and muse a while.
“Great old war-horse, Agramonte! I remember when he had a run-in with
President Huerta, the bird Carranza chased out. Huerta invited him up
to the Palace for tea, and when Agramonte was about to leave, he says
to him, ‘I’ve got forty soldiers on the staircase, waiting to shoot you
on your way home.’ Agramonte didn’t blink an eyelash. He just shoved
his own gun into Huerta’s ribs, and answers, ‘Then you’ll come with me,
and if one soldier raises a gun, you’ll die first.’ They walked down
the staircase, arm in arm, and kissed each other good-by at the door,
and not a soldier fired a shot.”
Then he would muse again, rapturously, as though recalling pleasant
memories.
“Huerta was some war-horse himself. He used to be a general in Madero’s
army, until he suddenly walked into the Palace, with his army behind
him, and told Madero to quit. Huerta was always a great stickler for
constitutionality, so he wanted Madero to sign a proper resignation.
And Madero wouldn’t resign. Huerta heated the poker and started to
tickle him with it. You could see the blood running out of Madero’s
eyes, but he was stubborn as a mule, and he just kept saying, ‘I’m the
rightful president of Mexico!’ Finally Huerta had to shoot him. But he
was a great stickler for constitutionality, so he put Madero’s body in
a coach, and took it out for a ride and had his troops fire a volley on
the coach; then he told the world that Madero was shot by his own men
while fleeing the country. Some one had to take the presidency then, so
Huerta took it. Great stickler for constitutionality was Huerta!”
Another puff at his pipe.
“Carranza don’t do his own shooting, but he’s got plenty of generals
to do it for him. If I was you boys, and had written some nasty things
about the Old Gent, like you say you have, I wouldn’t wait for no
interview. I’d take the next train to Vera Cruz, and catch a boat.”
VI
We waited for the interview. The chances were that nothing we had
written would ever be published. If it were, Carranza would never know
it. And there was more of Mexico City to be seen.
If it bore a superficial resemblance to Paris, its population remained
distinctly Mexican.
In the early morning, upon the Avenida Francisco I. Madero, the
Mexican Fifth Avenue, the _boulevardiers_ were mostly Indians in
blankets, and shop girls hurrying to work with black shawls over their
heads. Gradually they gave way to people in European dress, yet here
and there in the crowd there passed an _hacendado_ just in from his
country estate and still wearing riding boots and _sombrero_ and a huge
revolver pendant from a heavy leather belt encircling his ample girth.
Then came the shoppers--stout, overpowdered matrons with a flock of
_señoritas_ in tow--all in Parisian garb, but unmistakably Mexican.
They came in handsome private cars, alighting with the assistance of
uniformed attendants, and disappearing into the fashionable _modistes_’
establishments with the grand aristocratic air of the newly rich--for
most of the city’s real aristocracy had fled the country during the
long series of revolutions, and these were largely the wives and
daughters of the successful generals.
At noon, the streets became almost deserted, for here as everywhere
the _siesta_ was a ritual, but later the crowd reappeared, and now
for a brief hour the Avenida did bear some true resemblance to Paris.
The womenfolk came out in their new finery, and rolled up and down in
their handsome cars to display themselves. The men, having finished the
day’s work, loitered along the sidewalk, chatting merrily, twiddling
their canes, puffing at their cigarettes, and keeping an attentive eye
on passing femininity. But at twilight, the womenfolk disappeared,
and the chill of evening brought an end to the atmosphere of gayety.
The men still loitered, but the attentive eye was fixed now upon the
shop girls that hurried homeward.
“Why hasten, _chiquita_?” they called after each _mantilla_-muffled
figure. “Come with me instead.”
Sometimes the male voices were serious. Usually they were casual, as
though merely performing the rite--considered a sacred duty by the men
of all Latin America--of insulting the unchaperoned woman. The girls
were accustomed to it, and paid no attention either to the words or
to the nudges and pinches that followed. Now and then there passed
a street-walker--an institution seldom seen in the smaller Mexican
cities, where vice is more carefully segregated--and she invited with
a concentrated flash of eyes, but she did not speak, as might her
counterpart in Paris. Over the crowded streets there hung an air of
gravity--of Mexican gravity--the gravity of the high plateau.
Darkness came. The men pulled up their coat collars, pulled in their
necks, and discussed the advisability of a cocktail. Lights appeared
in thick clusters of glowing bulbs, as in the French capital, but they
shed a radiance that inspired no gayety. The taxis still roared and
rattled, and shot zigzag through the streets like so many skating-bugs
on a millpond; the trolleys passed at thirty-foot intervals
incessantly clanging their gongs; the policemen at each corner turned
their “_Alto-Adelante_” or “Go-Stop” signs first one way, then another,
blowing their shrill whistles first with one toot, then two toots, and
sending the traffic scurrying first in one direction, then another;
above the Avenida there rose the grand discord of a busy metropolis;
yet Mexico City became merely noisy rather than lively. Acquaintances
embraced acquaintances demonstratively, yet with an air of
conventionality. The loitering throngs before the blazing doorways of
theaters or cinemas were subdued and solemn. The street-walkers invited
with unsmiling eyes. The boulevardiers withdrew, group by group, for
their cocktails, not to pleasant sidewalk cafés like those of Paris,
but to formal Spanish bar-rooms. By ten o’clock the sidewalks were
almost as empty as those of Hermosillo. Only the flying taxis remained,
dashing about with screeching claxons as though crying vainly, “This is
Paris.”
It looked like Paris, and from a distance it sounded like Paris, but
the Parisian insouciance was missing. This was still Mexico--the Mexico
of the high plateau.
VII
Carranza not proving very prompt in answering his correspondence, we
amused ourselves with a visit to the ancient pyramids of San Juan
Teotihuacán--remnants of what had been a mighty empire before the
Conquest--distant some twenty-eight miles from the Capital.
A leisurely train carried us there in something over an hour and a
half. We descended at the station, expecting to be pounced upon by
a dozen professional guides, but none molested us. Little barefoot
children with spurious relics were our only assailants. We looked about
for a conveyance and discovered the Toonerville Trolley. An individual
asleep inside acknowledged that he was the conductor. He proved also to
be the motorman, for having collected our fare, he aroused the mule,
and the car jogged slowly away with swaying gait through lanes of
cactus, toward the squatty figures of two pyramids, deceitfully small
with distance and dwarfed by the mountains behind them.
But at length the cactus-hedge ceased, and upon our right appeared the
ruins of a temple--the Temple of Quetzacoatl--a big square surrounded
by heavy ramparts of earth and stone, wherein a group of workmen
were restoring a wall lined with monster demon-heads and gargoyles
carved of solid rock. And a few minutes later we were at the foot of
the pyramids, no longer small and dwarfed, but looming skyward above
us--pyramids which, if less imposing in stature than those of Egypt,
excel them in the dimensions of their base, and may even antedate
them, according to the estimates of some archeologists, by possibly a
thousand or two thousand years.
[Illustration: THE MEXICAN PYRAMIDS PROBABLY ANTEDATE THOSE OF EGYPT BY
A THOUSAND YEARS OR MORE]
Speculation as to just how old they really are has kept many a
scientist out of worse mischief, but seems to have accomplished
little else. Thanks to the demolition by the fanatical Spaniards of
the heathen writings they found in the Americas, practically nothing
is known of their origin. It is believed that they antedate the
Toltecs, and that they testify to the existence of an ancient race in
Mexico, long since vanished to who-knows-where, that once surpassed in
engineering skill and presumably in civilization the early peoples of
the other Hemisphere.
So little had we read of them, and so free did they appear from
exploitation as a tourist sight, that Eustace and I experienced almost
the joy of personal discovery. But it was soon rudely shattered. For up
drove an automobile from Mexico City’s leading hotel, and out climbed
two other Americans.
They were recognizable immediately as Rotarians. They were both good
fellows. They had met at the Regis, and in talking over business had
discovered that both by profession were Realtors. They had found a
mutual bond of interest in the fact that Mexico City, although it
_was_ a better burg than they had anticipated, had a less up-to-date
garbage-disposal system than Long Branch, N.J., or Newburyport,
Mass. They were now having a whale of a time kidding the guide
good-naturedly about the shortcomings of his country, and were getting
to like each other better every minute. Next week, upon their return
home, each would tell his friends about the good scout he bumped into
down in Mexico, and would exclaim, “It beats all how you meet people!
The world’s a pretty small place after all!” And at Christmas, each
would send the other a card playfully addressed “Senor.”
“So that’s what you brought us out here to see!” said the man from Long
Branch.
The other drew out a guide-book and read:
“The pyramid of the Sun Tonatiuh Itzcuatl damn this language anyhow a
truncated artificial mound 216 feet high by about 721 and 761 feet at
the base divided into five pyramidal sections or terraces which narrow
as they ascend. Now that we’ve seen that, where do we eat?”
We left them below while we started up the long flight of stone steps
that led up the five terraces of the larger pyramid, The Sun. It had
been partially restored, and its surface of many-colored rocks, each
the size of a domesticated cobblestone, originally held together with
adobe, now gleamed white with Portland Cement. Upon its lofty top,
covered to-day by a flat rock, there had once been a gigantic statue
of the Sun, cut from a block of porphyry, and ornamented with gold.
And here the Aztec priests had probably plunged their arms into many a
victim’s breast, to draw out a beating heart, and toss the body of
the sacrifice down the steep rocky sides to the wasteland beneath.
It was very quiet now, with the restful calm that one finds only upon a
mountain-top. One could look down upon miles and miles of rolling plain
dotted with cactus of many shades of green, clustering sometimes in
prickly forests, stretching away in two parallel lines to mark a trail,
arranging themselves in military rows to indicate a _pulque_ hacienda,
gathering in a hedge about the low flat roof of an adobe homestead.
Here or there rose the unfailing spires and dome of another lonely
church. In the fields a yoke of oxen, plowing a cornfield, seemed
scarcely to move. The sky above was of vivid blue, with puffy white
clouds along the horizon. Sounds drifted up from the world below--the
mooing of a cow, the cackle of a hen, the tap of a hammer--each very
distinct, yet so softened by distance that it seemed not to interrupt
the silence--as though it merely came from a far-away land wherewith
one had severed connection.
Then the two tourists came panting up the steps.
“Damn those stairs, anyway. They ought to have a railing on each side.”
Eustace blandly suggested an elevator, but the sarcasm was lost.
“We’d have one, if this was in Newburyport. We’d have a regular train
service out here, and we’d put in a modern cafeteria. Boy, but you
could make money out of this thing, if you had it in the United States!
You could hire a bunch of Irishmen and dress them up like Aztecs, have
a couple of girls doing an Indian dance on top, charge a fifty-cent
admission--why, man, you’d clean up a fortune!”
As we started down to catch the evening train back to the
taxi-screeching City of Mexico, Babbitt and Kennicott were carving
their initials on the flat rock atop the Pyramid of the Sun.
VIII
A week drifted past, and Sunday arrived.
On that, of all days, Mexico City was most typically Mexican.
The aristocrats paraded themselves in the parks; the middle-classes
went picnicking; the _peons_ went to church.
We strolled out along the Avenida Madero, past the National Opera
House--said to be the handsomest building of its kind on the continent,
but still with an unfinished dome because one administration had
started it, and others had neglected to provide funds for its
completion. Beyond it lay the _Alameda_, the Mexican Central Park.
It was a European park, quite unlike the palm-grown _plazas_ of the
smaller cities, but there was the usual Mexican band concert, and the
people were renting camp-chairs along the shady walks to enjoy the
national pastime of seeing and being seen.
Beyond the _Alameda_, commenced a wide boulevard, the _Paseo de la
Reforma_, typically Parisian in its wealth of monuments, and lined
with handsome embassies and residences, leading out to Chapultepec,
a larger and even more charming park, with wide expanses of lawn
and woodland and lake and meadow surrounding the National Palace, a
squatty fortress-like structure pleasing in its effect of strength and
beauty, perched upon high cliffs and glimpsed through the tree-tops
as though it hung suspended in the sky. The policemen here were clad
in Mexico’s _charro_ costume--the costume of the old grandees--with
short buff jacket, skin-tight blue trousers lined with rows of silver
buttons, flowing red tie, huge velvet _sombrero_, and a big gleaming
sword. An orchestra in similar costume held forth beneath an awning
near the lake, playing sweetly upon a marvelous combination of guitars,
mandolins, marimbas, harps, cellos, oboes, and what not. Automobiles
rolled past along the winding driveway, each filled with a bevy of
_señoritas_. Horsemen rode grandly past, dressed also in _charro_
costume, and mounted upon the finest steeds in Mexico. Pedestrians
idled beside the lake, watching the procession, and listening to
the orchestra, with that rare enjoyment of really good music that
characterizes _peon_ and aristocrat alike. Here, as in the small-town
plaza, the Mexicans were finding a pleasure in their park such as
no American ever finds in the parks of the United States. Here, as
everywhere in Mexico, a public garden was not merely a place for the
perambulation of baby carriages by nursemaids, but an institution of
which even society took full advantage.
Having seen the aristocrats in action, we caught a trolley out to the
floating gardens of Xochimilco to observe the middle-class picknickers.
It was a profanely modern trolley, with a “No Spitting” sign, and
rimmed with lurid posters from which “Wrigley” and “Colgate” peeped out
from a conglomeration of Spanish, and it carried us through streets
whose buildings were defaced either by countless advertisements or
countless warnings not to post advertisements. But presently it left
the city behind, and raced out through maize-fields and _maguey_
fields, and dropped us at a quaint little town, complete even to
cathedral-fronted _plaza_.
Tiny children, their arms laden with flowers, surrounded us, sticking
bouquets into our buttonholes and pockets, and pleading for “a little
_centavito_.” They were irresistible. Dressed exactly like their elders
in long skirts and mantillas, and with the mature air characteristic of
Mexican children, they seemed like little dwarfed adults. Their voices
were caressing, and they would retreat whenever we tried to return
their bouquets without purchasing.
“Ah, no, _señor_! Buy them from me! A little _centavito_, no more!”
Looking rather like floating gardens ourselves, we drifted toward the
canals. These were the remnants of the great network of waterways that
the Spanish conquistadores saw when first they entered the Valley
of Mexico. In those days, before Modern Progress decreed that the
Valley should be drained, Mexico City was a Venice, upon whose lakes
there floated rafts of interlaced twigs, covered with rich soil, and
blossoming with flowers. Xochimilco was the last survival of the Aztec
floral paradise, and it proved distinctly disappointing.
[Illustration: IN THE GARDENS OF XOCHIMILCO, RELICS OF AN AZTEC
PARADISE, ONLY THE CABBAGES WERE IN BLOOM]
A barefoot boatman met us, holding up a piece of paper upon which was
written in English, “Do you want one bot? I have a fin bot.”
He led us to a dugout canoe, with an awning supported by vine-laced
framework, and paddled us out through a canal where native women were
washing clothes or cleaning chickens, under a bridge emblazoned with
“Drink Moctezuma Beer,” and along a waterway lined with decaying rafts
covered with a luxuriant growth of carnations, cane, eucalyptus, and
cabbages, of which only the last-named seemed to be in bloom. Parties
of picknickers drifted past us in larger boats, each with a table
in the center, at which every one was busily eating. Along the way
were restaurants and refreshment rooms, each with an orchestra of one
fiddle, one guitar, and one bass-drum, which started to play at our
approach and quit as soon as we passed, the bass-drummer invariably
outspeeding and outdrowning his collaborators. The final exhibit, at
the far end of the canal, was the city waterworks.
We came back to the churches to see the _peons_.
At the central Zocalo, or main _plaza_, a rather dusty square with
a few bedraggled palm trees, where once had stood an Aztec pyramid,
there now stands the famous Cathedral of Mexico. Mexicans will inform
one that it is the largest and handsomest cathedral in the hemisphere,
although it is much smaller than the Peruvian Cathedral, and one of
the least handsome churches in Mexico itself. There are really two
edifices, joined together like the Siamese twins; each with a façade of
elaborately carved gray sandstone against a background of cracked red
basalt, pierced by many little windows in which repose mildewed green
bells.
This, essentially, is the church of the common people. Society attends
a more exclusive church on the Avenida Madero, where the women (always
devout) go inside to mass, and the men (usually agnostic) remain at
the gate to ogle them as they make their exit. There one finds the dim
light, the subdued air, and the solemnity of churches in other lands.
There is none of it in the Cathedral.
Everything in the huge edifice was bright and gaudy and noisy. Many
windows flooded it with light. Glittering gilt ornamentation was
everywhere. The priests wore green and yellow robes. The choir sang
enthusiastically and loudly, without evidence of training, as though
each would outsing his fellows both in volume and speed. Services were
proceeding simultaneously in both halves of the institution, and each
seemed trying frantically to drown out the other.
Yet this, offensive even to one of mediocre taste, impressed the
_peons_ for whom it was intended. They knelt at the door and lighted
their candles. Then they crept forward upon their knees--ragged little
brown devils, unwashed, unshaven, and unlaundered--many of them still
a trifle _pulque_-sodden from a _fiesta_ of the night before. This
noise and display thrilled them as no solemn service could thrill
them. As they crept forward, with arms extended, expressions of rapt
ecstasy almost ennobled their villainous faces. Their sins were
forgiven! To-morrow, with that odd mixture of idealism and materialism
so characteristic of their race, they would start sinning again with a
clean conscience.
These ragged little devils were the pawns of a long series of
revolutions. To-day, while the successful generals rode grandly through
Chapultepec, the _peons_ who had won their battles and gained nothing
turned to the Cathedral for solace. One might not believe in their
religion, but one was forced to admit that they found comfort. And
certainly they needed it.
IX
To avoid religion as a delicate subject, as most writers do, is to
ignore a most important phase of Mexican life.
In Mexico, even more than in most parts of Latin America, the Church
has been obliged, to the regret of many of its own clergymen, to
sacrifice much of its dignity. It came originally to a land which
already possessed a religion consisting solely of barbaric rites. It
was adopted by a people whose conception of things ecclesiastic was
limited to the meaningless observance of pagan ceremonials. And these
people, as a whole, to-day attend mass and march about in procession
without any very definite idea of what the Church means, in much the
same fashion as in days of old they followed their Aztec priests. Even
in more intelligent circles, the Church must cater to a racial mind
which concerns itself not with substance but with form and cares little
about creed or doctrine so long as it can maintain outward appearances
by elaborate ceremony. And since the rank and file of the clergy come
from the same sort of people, the Church in Mexico has become largely
theatrical.
Religion, in short, caters here to a primitive mind. It has many
difficulties wherewith to contend. Because its earliest leaders were
gaining such authority among the _peons_, the government placed severe
restrictions upon them. To-day no foreign priest is allowed to conduct
services. No native priest may appear upon the street in clerical garb.
No collections may be taken at mass. No church may own its property,
which the government holds and permits it to use. And church bells may
ring but one minute out of every hour.
Yet the clergy still has a tremendous hold upon the people. It abides
by the letter of the law. The bells ring for one minute only, but
they ring loudly and with rapid strokes. The churches, although no
collections are taken, are filled with boxes for offerings. Mexico is
covered with chapels and shrines, religious holidays number about three
hundred and sixty-five a year, and the custom of pilgrimage is well
established. Practically the entire population professes the Catholic
faith.
Of all the many shrines, that of Guadalupe, the patron saint of Mexico,
is the most popular. According to legend, a poor Indian on his way to
mass met the Virgin Mary at this spot, and was sent to the Bishop with
the command that a church should be erected here. When the Bishop was
incredulous, the _peon_ brought him a bunch of roses plucked from a
barren hillside. Convinced that a miracle had transpired, the Bishop
erected the church, and it became at once so popular that a deluge of
miracles swept all over Mexico, and every other good friar erected a
chapel. But none has ever rivaled that of Guadalupe.
It is situated only a brief distance from the capital. A trolley took
Eustace and myself there, stopping at a small square filled with
rude stands under improvised awnings where Indians sold soft drinks,
beads, edibles, and candles. Before the square stood a church and a
merry-go-round. Above it, reached by a long flight of winding stone
steps, there stood a small white chapel.
On each step sat a crippled beggar, seemingly a poor advertisement for
a shrine that purports to heal all ailments. Yet the Mexicans saw no
inconsistency in this, and no irreverence in the merry-go-round nor in
the host of tin-type photographers who had set up their stands upon
the vestibule of the church. Many of the Indians who pilgrimaged here
had come from the farthest ends of the republic, making the journey on
foot, and supporting themselves by plying along the way whatever trade
they possessed. Most of them sold trinkets, and were now selling them
at the shrine itself.
The flight of steps was long and steep. On certain holidays, the
faithful were accustomed to ascend it slowly upon their knees. In the
high altitude, it was sufficiently arduous to walk up. But the little
chapel on the hilltop was white and clean and simple. Behind it lay
a very peaceful, fragrant cemetery, neatly kept, with many flowers.
One wall was honeycombed with tiny little alcoves, where one might
rent “_Nichos para restos perpetuedad $100.00_”--“permanent niches for
corpses at 100 pesos”--or niches to be paid for by the year or month,
with the penalty, in case of non-payment, of seeing the ancestral bones
consigned to the scrap-heap. But there were graves and tombs as well,
many of them so handsome as to suggest that even while Guadalupe,
like the Cathedral, was mainly a _peon_ institution, the aristocrats
sometimes came here after death.
Descending by another long flight of steps, we came to the Chapel of
the Well--another small chapel under a big dome of glittering tiles,
containing a well of curative waters. Ecstatic _peons_, their faces
shining with joy, were lowering a bucket and drinking, seizing the
receptacle from one another’s hands in their eagerness. At a near-by
counter, where crosses were sold, and ribbons marked with the measure
of the Virgin’s head or feet, one might also obtain empty bottles--some
of them still bearing unhallowed labels--and these the natives filled
at the well for their fellow-villagers at home.
Turning around the corner, we came back to the larger church. In its
cellar was the evidence of the cures effected. There was the usual pile
of crutches to be seen in all healing shrines. The wall was covered
with letters of thanks, letters accompanied invariably with pictures,
as though their authors, who in their inability to read or write had
been forced to dictate their messages to a professional scribe, assumed
that their Benefactor was equally illiterate. Many of them were from
supplicants who could not reach the shrine, describing their troubles
and begging assistance. The illustrations showed them being run over
by a trolley-car, shot in battle, caught between two colliding steam
engines, massacred in other startling fashions or confined to a gloomy
sick-bed. There was one of papa looking out from between prison bars,
with a note from the family asking the Virgin to soften the heart
of the Magistrate. And there was one from a very pretty young girl,
inclosing her photograph, and thanking the Virgin--with an absence of
detail that piqued one’s curiosity--for having given her what she most
desired. The writing was frequently illegible, the words misspelled,
and the paintings execrably done by the very worst of artists. Yet
groups of _peons_, surveying them, murmured their admiration of the
bright coloring, and exclaimed aloud with astonishment at the marvelous
cures.
No other church could so satisfy the Mexican _peon_.
X
We came back from Guadalupe to find a uniformed Staff-Officer awaiting
us. Old Barlow was entertaining him in our absence.
The officer was a young man, in neat-fitting blue uniform, and he had
keen, sharp features. He wore a little black mustache, like that of the
villain from a melodrama. He was suavely polite.
[Illustration: MEXICAN POLICEMEN IN WHITE SPATS]
“Mario Sanchez, aide to his excellency, Venustiano Carranza, President
of the Republic of Mexico, at your service, _señores_!”
We bowed. There was a cool reserve about him that told us he did not
expect to be kissed.
“You are the _Señores_ Foster and Eustace, I believe, the authors of
these newspaper articles that I here display?”
We stared in amazement at a sheaf of clippings which he held before us.
Our writings had been published! The news of our death, followed by a
letter describing our heroic escape from Pedro Zamorra, had brought
us fame! We were headlined on front pages! And our articles about
Mexico had all found a market! We were successful free-lance newspaper
correspondents!
“But where on earth did you get them?” demanded Eustace, incredulously.
The officer smiled.
“My government keeps a careful check upon writers who discuss our
administration in the United States. And you have honored us with
a request for an interview. It is customary, of course, that such
requests come through the American Embassy, but in this case, we are
very pleased that it has not. President Carranza will grant the
interview on one condition--that you tell not the Embassy you are
coming. To-morrow evening, I shall call for you, but you must come with
me, very quietly, to the Palace, telling no one. I can not now explain.
But it is very important that you tell no one. Until to-morrow evening,
at the eight o’clock. _Adios, señores._ I am your humble servant.”
With another deep bow, he withdrew.
We turned, mystified, to Old Barlow. He was strangely nervous.
“Pack your suit-cases and beat it!” he advised. “I know these
devils--polite as they can be, and damned likeable, but don’t you
trust them. You heard him say, ‘Tell no one!’ He’ll take you away in a
car, and not a soul on earth will ever see you again, or learn what’s
happened to you. So beat it just as fast as you can!”
We packed our suit-cases. We bade each other farewell. Eustace was
determined to go back to Manzanillo, and catch a boat to San Francisco.
I was determined to go to Vera Cruz, catch a boat for Cuba, and see
something more of Latin America before I returned home. Only one thing
was certain. The expedition had reached a temporary halt.