My only experience in politics was gained with Lerroux.
One Sunday, seven or eight years ago, on coming out of my house and
crossing the Plaza de San Marcial, I observed that a great crowd had
gathered.
"What is the matter?" I asked.
"Lerroux is coming," they told me.
I delayed a moment and happened on Villar, the composer, among the
crowd. We fell to talking of Lerroux and what he might accomplish. A
procession was soon formed, which we followed, and we found ourselves in
front of the editorial offices of _El Pais_.
"Shall we go in?" asked Villar. "Do you know Lerroux?"
I had met Lerroux in the days when _El Progreso_ was still
published, having called once with Maeztu at his office; afterwards I
saw him in Barcelona in a large shed, which, if I recall rightly, went
by the name of "La Fraternidad Republicana," and then I was accompanied
by Azorín and Junoy.
Villar and I went upstairs and greeted Lerroux in the offices of _El
Pais_.
"Estévanez has spoken of you to me," he said. "Is he well?"
"Yes, very well."
A few days later, Lerroux invited me to dinner at the Café Inglés.
Lerroux, Fuente and I dined together, and then fell to talking. Lerroux
asked me to join his party, whereupon I pointed out the qualifications
which were lacking in me, which were necessary to a politician. Shortly
after, I was nominated as a candidate for the City Council, and I
addressed a number of meetings, although always coldly, and never at
high tension.
While I was with Lerroux, I was never treated save with consideration.
Why did I leave his party? Chiefly because of differences as to ideas
and as to tactics. Lerroux wished to organize his party into a party of
law and order, so that it might be capable of governing, and also to
have it friendly with the Army. I was of the opinion that it ought to be
a revolutionary party, not in the sense that I was thinking of erecting
barricades, but I wished it to contest, to upset things, and to protest
against injustice.
What Lerroux wanted was a party of orators who could speak at public
meetings, a party of office-holders, councillors, provincial deputies
and the like, while I held, and still hold, that the only efficacious
revolutionary weapon is the printed page. Lerroux was anxious to
transform the radical party into something aristocratic and Castilian; I
desired to see it retain its Catalan character, and continue to wear
blouses and rope-soled shoes.
I withdrew from the party for these reasons, to which I may add
Lerroux's attitude of indifference upon the occasion of the execution of
the stoker of the "Numancia."
Not many months after, I met him on the Carrera de San Jerónimo, and he
said to me:
"I have read your diatribes."
"They were not directed against you, but against your politics. I shall
never speak ill of you, because I have no cause."
"Yes," he replied, "I know that at heart you are one of my friends."