HANDSOME ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
One evening, a few weeks after the close of the brief campaign, the
town-hall of San Juan presented a picturesque and even brilliant
spectacle. All the important people, and a good many of the
unimportant, of the capital and of San Rosario were assembled in
response to the President's invitation, to celebrate the foundation of
the Republic. Two long tables ran the length of the hall; at the top a
cross table was ranged beneath a shield bearing the Mollendo arms. The
President occupied the centre seat. On his right hand sat General
O'Hagan, on his left a young captain of the same name. Next in order to
these were the principal actors in this little drama: Colonel Zegarra,
his friend the lawyer, Dr. Pereira, Nicolas Romana, Pedro Galdos, the
Durands, father and son--for Senor Durand, having contributed to the
Mollendist war-fund, had apparently determined to get something for his
money.
Two personages whom one would hardly have expected to see there were
Senor Fagasta and Captain Pierola. Senor Mollendo had been informed by
Tim of the warning given by the gobernador, which had resulted in the
discomfiture of Pardo's night attack on the house. The President argued
from this that Senor Fagasta had his good points; and being anxious to
conciliate the officials under the old regime he reinstated the burly
gentleman in his former office. For the same reason he offered to
Captain Pierola, now recovered of his wound, the command of the
republican forces, which Mr. O'Hagan, deaf to all entreaties, had
relinquished.
In a balcony at the opposite end of the hall sat a bevy of ladies, to
watch the feasting in which they, angelically, were not to partake, and
to hear the speeches that would follow. Mrs. O'Hagan sat in the centre
beside Senora Mollendo. The younger ladies, dressed with all the grace
and charm of which the Peruvian belle is mistress, were impatient for
the end of the tiresome preliminaries: the banquet in which they could
not share, the speeches which some of them had already heard rehearsed,
had less attractions for them than the dance which was to round off the
proceedings.
The table decorations were unusual. The vases were filled with leaves,
blossoms, and berries of the nasturtium, of which homely plant every
guest had a flower in his button-hole.
The courses were handed round; the glasses of wine and pisco were filled
and emptied and filled again; and then the President rose. A smile
beamed upon his benevolent features as he surveyed the cheering company.
A broad band of orange satin formed a graceful loop over his white
waistcoat, and a large diamond in his shirt-front flashed as it caught
the rays of the innumerable candles. He was a dignified and impressive
figure.
When the cheers had subsided, he began to speak. After a few
introductory sentences, he launched into a summary of the events which
had led up to this culminating scene. He described the birth of the
Republic, enunciated with great eloquence the principles which would
govern his administration, and then, turning to personal matters,
announced the honours and dignities which he had conferred on certain of
the gentlemen whom he saw on either side. He made graceful references
to the legal attainments of Senor Fagasta, to the military abilities of
Captain Pierola, to the loyal services of Senores Pedro Galdos and
Nicolas Romana, whom he had appointed respectively treasurer and
secretary of the Republic. Then, after an expressive pause, he
proceeded:
"Gentlemen, on this great and auspicious occasion I have a duty to
perform---a duty of which I acquit myself with all the ardour of an
overflowing heart. There are epochs in the life of nations when the
firmament is obscured by dark aggregations of cloud, which exclude the
radiance of heaven's bright luminaries, and among which the thunder
rumbles with awful and portentous reverberation. At such a period of
distress and gloom, when Rome, the heart and centre of the ancient
world, saw herself threatened by pestilent hosts of waspish barbarians,
the eyes of men turned in their trouble towards a simple farmer, who
pursued the avocations of bucolic life in his rural retreat, amid sounds
no more horrific than the lowing of his cattle and the guttural
ejaculations of his swine. To him repaired a deputation of his
despairing countrymen, who found him cleaving the stubborn soil with his
labouring plough, and besought him to quit those haunts of industry and
peace, and, exchanging the gleaming ploughshare for the well-tempered
sword, the smock of Ceres for the shining corslet of Mars, to return
with them and save the State.
"You know, gentlemen, the sequel of that momentous domiciliary visit.
You know how Cincinnatus marshalled his hosts, led them against the
enveloping invaders, and having smitten Volscians and AEquians with
irresistible might, laid aside the implements of war, and withdrew to
replace the yoke upon his toiling oxen, and ruminate in rustic
simplicity upon the vicissitudes of mortal things.
"Gentlemen, we too have our Cincinnatus. We have in our midst a
gentleman who, driven from his peaceful fields by the shameless greed of
tyranny, threw in his lot with the despairing victims of a rapacious
despot: who, having laid down the sword which he had wielded with
conspicuous dexterity in his youth against the enemies of his adopted
country, girded it on in his maturer years at the call of an oppressed
and suffering community. Gentlemen, it is to him we owe the inception
of the reign of peace and prosperity in this elevated region. I bid you
raise your glasses and drain them to the health of our illustrious
friend and liberator, our Cincinnatus, Senor General O'Hagan."
The President's speech was hailed with a chorus of vivas as the company
sprang to their feet to honour the toast. Handkerchiefs fluttered in
the ladies' gallery. Tim, catching Durand's eye, winked, and his friend
responded with a look which meant "Look out! The old buffer hasn't done
yet." Tim wondered what his father would say in answer to this
effusion. He found that the President, instead of resuming his seat
when the cheers had died away, remained standing, took a sip from his
glass, and went on:
"History does not record whether Cincinnatus was a married man, but,
indulging our imaginations, we may suppose that he had a wife and
family. We may see with our mind's eye the homely Roman matron, leaving
the meal-tub when her husband broke to her the fateful news, and wiping
the flour from her industrious hands that she might gird him with the
sword, and furbish his shield, and arrange the folds of his toga in
comely dignity. We may picture his sons and daughters gazing with
admiration not unmixed with awe at their heroic father, watching him as
he bestrode his fields with the proud senators who had brought the
people's summons, gazing with longing eyes day after day into the misty
distance, wondering with anxious fears how their beloved progenitor was
faring in the stress and heat of strife. We can imagine their pride and
gladness when he returned, crowned with the laurel wreath of victory,
and, so far as history relates, without a wound. We can see them
gathered about his knee, on the winter nights when the pine-logs
crackle, and the wolf's long howl undulates across the marshes, and hang
upon his lips as he relates the story of great doings on the stricken
field.
"These, I say, are the pictures which imagination paints for us; but we
need no aid from imagination to behold the domestic life of our own
Cincinnatus. _Integer vitae, sceleris purus_, as the great Roman sang,
he has lived among us, in a home graced by the presence of a beauteous
spouse, and brightened by the lively merits of a gallant youth. Such
praise and gratitude as we owe to the father we owe also in no small
measure to the son, who sits beside me in all the glow of healthy
juvenility, blushing with ingenuous pride in the achievements of his
noble sire. What need to recount, gentlemen, the exploits of this
youthful warrior! Modestly as he himself has veiled them, the admiration
of his devoted men could not be silenced, and they proclaim his prowess
with unbated enthusiasm. Picture the scene, gentlemen, when, pursued
for long miles by the mounted warriors of the tyrant, our dauntless
friend sped on unfaltering on his matchless steed, and was not abashed
when he beheld the yawning gulf unbridged before him. For him Fate had
not ordained the sacrificial leap of Marcus Curtius; the safety of the
State did not demand his death. Flashing like a meteor to the very brink
of the abyss, he defied the laws of Nature, and soared through the
startled air with the swift legerity of a mountain bird. Thus
wonderfully preserved from peril behind and before, he played a manful
part in the final scenes of this glorious revolution, and, in the words
of the august orator of Rome, _de republica bene est meritus_. I bid
you raise your glasses, and drain them to the health of Senor Capitan
O'Hagan."
The toast was hailed with thunderous applause. Tim sat with downcast
eyes, wishing that the floor would open and swallow him. "I hope to
goodness the old josser is done now!" he thought. But the President
waited with a benignant smile until silence was restored, then went on:
"It is known to you, gentlemen, that the Senor Capitan is the first
recipient of the Order of the Nasturtium, which I have founded in
celebration of the new era upon which we have entered. Since it becomes
us to invoke the gracious countenance of feminine loveliness upon the
order, I have inscribed at the head of the roll the name of the Senora
O'Hagan."
Here he bowed very gallantly towards the balcony, and Tim, glancing up,
saw his mother incline her head, and raise her handkerchief to her
mouth, as if to hide a smile.
"It is known to you also, gentlemen," the President continued, "that in
deference to the unanimous wish of the citizens, I have consented that a
statue of myself shall be erected in the plaza of this town, not in any
spirit of vainglory, but as a permanent witness of the triumph of the
principles which I profess. But I deemed it unfitting that the sister
town of San Rosario should be without a similar memorial, and I have
therefore taken upon myself to order, from Paris, the home of art, two
other statues, to stand in the plaza of our neighbour. The one will
represent the Senor General as Cincinnatus, garbed in the toga of
ancient Rome, with a sword crossed upon a ploughshare at his feet. The
other will exhibit the effigy of the Senor Capitan. It was a matter of
much deliberation how to mould this second statue that it might form a
harmonious companion of the first. As you are aware, the Romans did not
anticipate the triumphs of the inventive modern mind. They did not
possess the motor-bicycle. But by dint of much thought I have reconciled
the old with the new. The Senor Capitan will appear as Mercury, the
messenger of the gods, with his caduceus in his hand, and his winged
feet planted on a globe. These statues will face each other in the
public square, and proclaim to future generations the features and the
characteristics of the two gentlemen whose achievements and merits we
honour so heartily to-night."
The President at last sat down. Mr. O'Hagan, looking supremely
uncomfortable, thanked him and the company, for himself and Tim, for the
flattering honours that had been paid to them; and after speeches from
Senor Fagasta, Colonel Zegarra, and half a dozen other notables, the
proceedings came to an end, and the hall was cleared for dancing.
"I say, old chap," said Durand, when he had an opportunity of speaking
to Tim, "won't you feel rather cold as Mercury?"
"Shut up!" growled Tim. "Old Moll's off his chump. But he doesn't mean
it."
"But he does!"
"Well then, I'll waylay the silly old thing on the road, and smash it to
bits. I never heard of such silly rot."
But these violent measures were not necessary. Every now and then
during the next few months Durand put Tim in a rage by announcing that
the statues had left Paris, that they had reached Lima, that they were
on the road. But the truth is that the financial straits to which the
new republic was soon reduced have hindered the realisation of President
Mollendo's generous dream, and up to the present the plaza of San
Rosario is destitute of classic statuary. Cincinnatus lives very
contentedly on his farm, and Mercury is now leading a grimy existence in
some famous engineering shops on the Tyne.