to the Federal troops--quite a pleasant surprise for Mr. Madero's
"stocking." He is eliminated; but all seem ready to fight over the
bones of peace that Diaz left--though not one of them is worthy to
tie his shoe-strings from the point of civic government and keeping of
order, which last I now see is the first requisite for any state.
There is a cartoon in the _Chicago Inter-Ocean_ of Madero trying to
hold his hat on, with Diaz watching from Europe. That Parthian shot of
his, that in the end the Government would have to use his methods, is
going home.
_December 29th._
The "angel boy" has lost a front tooth--one of those that _you_ watched
come. It fell out at Madame ----'s _piñata_, in her big, too-handsome
house, where the entertainment was most elaborate, and the toys
that were scrambled for when the _olla_ was broken were of the most
expensive kind. Afterward all imaginable rich things were served in the
big dining-room. The hottest, pepperiest tamales were passed around
to about forty little Mexican darlings, who ate them, not only with
relish, but composure; my taste brought tears to my eyes and a call for
water.
Elim left his seat to bring his tooth triumphantly to me and tell me
I must have it set in gold. He is so little that he will be around
for years with a hole in his mouth. I felt much the way I would have
felt had I discovered him growing a mustache. Madame ----'s house, in
good taste outside, architecturally, is like her pictures inside, the
frames too rich for what they inclose. There are agate-topped tables
and malachite bric-à-brac in heavy gilt vitrines, and "hand-painted"
screens. It is beautifully situated in the Glorieta Colon, the
_rond-point_ where the statue of Christopher Columbus, by a French
artist, was raised in 1877. It shows him surrounded by the two monks
who helped him in the great adventure, and Fray Pedro de la Gante and
Fray Bartolomé de las Casas, lovers and protectors of the Indians.
The monks are Padre Juan Perez de Marchena, prior of the convent of
Santa Maria Rabada, who had the wit to understand and the power to
further Columbus's project. The other, Fray Diego Dehasa, was the
confessor and adviser of King Ferdinand. It's too bad Humboldt could
not have seen it, for he says: "_On peut traverser l'Amérique Espagnole
depuis Buenos Aires jusqu'à Monterrey, depuis la Trinité et Porto Rico
jusqu'à Panama et Veragua, et nulle part on ne rencontrera un monument
national que la reconnaissance publique ait élevé à la gloire de
Christophe Colomb et de Hernan Cortés._"
_December 29th._
Two sportsmen of note, Count Sala and Mr. Williams, came for
lunch to-day, also Riedl. They are here en route to Tampico for
tarpon-fishing, the only really fine sport Mexico offers to foreigners.
They were at the delightful dinner at the French Legation the other
night for Monsignore.
_December 30, 1911._
One of Aunt Louise's exquisite letters came this morning--I will
forward it another time. She begins by saying, "Where are you,
wandering star?" and wishes me, wherever the end of the earthly year
finds me, "joys that reside in little things, as well as fortune's
greater gifts."
Outside night and snow were falling. Within lamps were lighted and
fire glowing. Genevieve was playing "Robin Adair," and her "heart was
suddenly sad to plumbless depths," because of separations. She closes
with a verse (I don't remember from whom):
When windflowers blossom on the sea,
And fishes skim along the plain,
Then we who part this weary day,
Then you and I will meet again.
XVI
Off for Tehuantepec--A journey through the jungles--The
blazing tropics--Through Chivela Pass in the lemon-colored
dawn--Ravages of the revolution--A race of queens
_January 1, 1912._
My first thought flies to you this morning. I have sorrowed, smiled, in
other years, perhaps learned to pray, so mayhap my heart is ready for
1912.
N. has gone to the Palace, where the President receives the gentlemen
of the Diplomatic Corps; this afternoon Madame Madero receives both
_messieurs et dames_. Last night a pleasant dinner at the Embassy, at
which I presided. Americans only, the ambassador's special friends,
and home in reasonable time. I was "hung solitary in the universe" when
twelve o'clock struck and kindly healths were drunk. I thought of the
light already beginning to break over the wintry Zürich hills, and of
you, and Elliott and his Calvary, and that other dear one of our blood,
lost to men but not to God. Was he sleeping quietly?
_January 2d._
N. came in a while ago with arrangements complete for the trip to
Tehuantepec. A telegram from Aunt Laura last night says: "All quiet
here again; so glad you are at last coming."
It seems like a fairy-tale that I am off to San Gerónimo, that exotic
memory of my childhood. I remember we called it San Ger_onímo_ instead
of pronouncing it San Her_ó_nimo. How the letters used to come dropping
in--and the presents! The red-leather-covered sandalwood box, with
its brass nails; the strange, square, old Spanish silver coins, just
chopped off, as one would a bit of dough, and stamped hot; the painted
gourds, the idols and the bright bits of embroidery.
N. has just been delegated to go to get an American out of jail, the
third one this week. They are taken up for nothing; we are not popular
here just now.
Madame Madero's New-Year's reception for the _Corps Diplomatique_
was poorly attended and there was no enlivening touch in the way of
refreshments and nothing in which to drink healths. The wife of the
---- minister asked the President for a _verre d'eau_ toward the end.
He was very apologetic, pleasant, and modest, and said: "Oh, we don't
know how to do these things." He seemed full of good intentions and
hope for 1912--but alack! alack! never has it been seen that nobility
alone is able to maintain its possessor!
Elim is begging me to bring him a monkey when I come back. I hate to
disappoint him--but do you see me traveling with anything belonging to
that species? The trip is said to be magnificent--two nights and one
day. I wish it were two days and one night.
Aunt L. is thinking of me and preparing for me; I know what it means
for some one of her own to penetrate to her fastness, or rather her
jungle. Mr. Cummings has put the telegraph at N.'s and my disposal
while I am away. I have not been outside the Federal district since I
arrived, so content with the treasures of this matchless valley; but of
course one easily gets the _Reisefieber_.
I will write _en route_ to the "blazing tropics." Now, farewell.
_January 4th_, Córdoba, _10 a.m._
We have just descended into a dew-drenched world. It is supposed to
be the "dry season," _estación de secas_. A warm, wet, glistening air
comes in at the window, and my furs are in the rack.
I have been watching endless coffee-plantations with red berries
shining among the foliage, and great tobacco-fields of broad, shiny
leaves. Banana-trees grow close to the tracks, and everywhere are the
most perishable of homes, built of what looks like nothing more solid
than corn-stalks and dried leaves.
Cordoba was founded early in the seventeenth century by a viceroy, who
modestly called it after himself.
Later.
A series of the most gorgeous mountain vistas, tunnel after tunnel,
and in between each darkness a world of beauty. Lovely palms abound,
delicate yet definite in their flowery symmetry. The Pico de Orizaba
has made various farewell appearances, one more enchanting and
regretful than the other. Now a great plain is rolling away, of
seemingly incredible fertility, with shadows of clouds on its shining
stretches.
The faithful banana, which was first brought to this continent
by a Dominican monk, _via_ Haiti, about the time of the Conquest
certainly came into its own in this hot, moist land. One of the early
ecclesiastical writers in Mexico was so impressed that he hazards
the statement that it was the forbidden fruit that tempted Eve. It
certainly continues to tempt both sexes and all ages to idleness.
_Later._
Presidio, in the cañon of the Rio Blanco.
I have been absorbed in watching the tropical jungles, where form is
eliminated. Every tree is choked or cloaked by some sort of enveloping
_convolvuli_; every wall has its formless abundant covering. No
silhouettes anywhere, no "cut" to anything--which is why all this
richness could, I imagine, get monotonous.
Tierra Blanca, _3.30_.
In the "blazing tropics"! A heavy, hot atmosphere comes in at the
window. All along there has been much sitting of a dark race under
banana-trees, where not even a change of position seems necessary in
order to be fed.
We have had a long wait here at Tierra Blanca, which is the junction
of a branch line to Vera Cruz, and I have been watching station life.
It's very highly colored. Here and there appears an unmistakably
American face--the "exploiters" some would call them; but it seems to
me they gather up all this vague splendor, this endless abundance, into
something definite, with benefits to the greater number, though some
get "left," of course.
There is a decided note of _carpe diem_ transposed into orange,
scarlet, and black, which all the coming and going of men, women, and
children with baskets of coffee-beans doesn't do away with. In the
tropics the white man is king, be he Yankee, Spaniard, or Northman,
and it is part of the lure. The abundances of Mother Earth are for his
harvesting; a strange, native race seems there to do him honor, render
him service, asking only in return enough of the abundance to keep soul
in body for the allotted span.
We have just passed the broad Rio Mariposa (Butterfly River), and are
at a place called "Obispo." Indian women are holding up baskets of
the most gorgeous fruits, babes on their backs, cigarettes in their
mouths. We are near the celebrated Valle Nacional. I remember some
terrible articles in one of the magazines about the human miseries in
the working of the tobacco-factories, herds of men, women, and children
locked together into great sheds at night during tropical storms,
enslavements, separations. It's easy to hope it is not so, but I dare
say it is.
We are zigzagging through dense jungle with the gaudiest splashes of
color. Flashy birds are flying about. Sometimes one wonders if it is
bird or flower. All the green is studded with bright spots. There are
great, flat, meadow-like spaces, the soil looking rich enough to bear
food for all the hungry millions of the earth, and numberless cattle
are grazing over it. But oh! the inexpressible slipshodness of the
human abodes! Anything perishable, nearest at hand, sugar-cane stalks,
palm leaves, continue to compose the dwellings; and oh! the crowds of
children, of human beings, just as slipshod, just as perishable!
The sun is setting. Great pink brushes of cirrus are covering the sky,
against a blue that hates to give way, but in a moment I know it will
be dark.
_Later._
A wonderful day, but somehow I am glad I was born in the temperate
zone. I suppose it's the New England blood protesting against all this,
as something wasteful and unrelated. Since we passed the heavy-flowing
Rio Mariposa I have been having more than a touch of "world-pain." The
light is so poor in my state-room that I can't read, but I arrive at
San Gerónimo at 5.30, which means a 4.30 rising, so good night.
_January 5th, 5.30 a.m._
Chivela Pass in the lemon-colored dawn! I don't know what I went
through in the night, but now I am descending to the Pacific. Sharp
outlines of treeless, pinkish hills are everywhere showing themselves,
with here and there patches of the classic and beautiful organos
cactus. It is almost chilly. My heart and I are ready for the meeting.
The porter tells me there are only two more stations.
_San Gerónimo, January 6th, evening._
As the train got in to San G. I saw a very pale, very blue-eyed, slim,
white-clad figure. New England, though a thousand cycles had been
passed in the tropics. We met in silence, two full hearts, and in
silence we went over to the house....
_January 8th, evening._
We have been walking up and down the garden under the big fig-tree,
where a huge and very beautiful _huacamaia_, a sort of parrot, with a
yellow-and-red head and a long blue tail makes his home. We have been
thinking and talking in a way so foreign to the thick tropical darkness
enveloping us.
The sun went down on a world of ashes of roses and then this soft,
very black night fell. At sunset we took a turn about the sandy,
desolate-looking town.
Women, scriptural women, were washing and bathing in the broad,
high-banked stream. It reminded me of Tissot's pictures of the Holy
Land--the barren banks of the pebbly river, the fig-trees, the little
groups. The women wear most lovely garments as to outline. A wide skirt
with a deep flounce is tucked up in front, for more ease in moving, and
the falling flounce gives quite a Tanagra line.
Little girls are always dressed, from their tenderest age, in skirts
too long; but little boys go naked till they are eleven or twelve, and
the clad and the unclad play about together.
When Don Porfirio took things in hand the boys were made to dress to
go to school, and as a last touch of fashion made to tuck their shirts
inside their trousers. It appears, however, they only tuck them in as
they enter the school door, pulling them out when they are released.
... But Aunt L. says she is tired of it all--the naked children, the
barren stretches, the _carpe diem_, the ultimate unrelatedness of her
life to its frame, though I kept thinking of Henley's line, "and in her
heart some late lark singing." ...
... Each life, it seems to me, short or long, is wonderful when it
becomes a perfected story, if we could only get it in perspective,
against its own destined background; not blurred and mixed with other
unrelated lives, but by itself, in relief, as the great artists show
their masterpieces. I can't feel the ordinariness of any human life.
Some are dreadful, some beautiful, some undeveloped; but each in its
way could be an infinitely perfect story were the artist there to
record it.
_January 10th, evening._
To-day we drove over to Juchitan, the "county-seat"--Aunt L. to get
some papers witnessed and signed at the _jefatura_, and to show me the
ravages of the revolution of November.
The country, as we drove along, was scorching, dry, light-colored,
with only an occasional tree and the irrepressible mesquite growing
everywhere out of the sandy soil. We passed dreadful, screaming, wooden
carts, with their solid wooden wheels, drawn by thin oxen, trying to
nibble the withered grass; and there were herds of skeleton-like cattle
dotted over the thorny cactus-covered fields.
There is a great hill, Istlaltepec, which separates San Gerónimo
(fortunately, I should say) from lively Juchitan; and on the side of it
away from San Gerónimo are prehistoric tracings and remains, studied,
at various times, by various savants. It's a country with sandy, flat
stretches and blue hills bounding them, and the river of Juchitan
flowing to the near Pacific. The village of Istlaltepec was a blaze
of color, white-washed or pink- or blue-washed dwellings, fig- and
palm-trees, and over all the brilliant, blinding light.
At Juchitan we stopped a moment at a hotel, but it was so dilapidated
and shot with bullet marks, and so desolate and mournful-looking
inside, that we went to a small, native place of refreshment, kept
by a one-time servant of Aunt L.'s. She was old, but welcoming. Her
daughter, a fine, tall woman of thirty or thereabouts, was coming down
the street, with one of the great, painted gourds on her head filled
with a variety of highly colored things, and with the walk of a queen,
a majestic, gentle, swaying movement.
They spread a spotless cloth, in a dim, sandy, red-tiled room with
a glimpse of a palm in the old _patio_ behind, that would have been
a back yard, and a hideous one, if it had been "at home." The old
woman told her ailments, and the daughter, aided by the granddaughter,
served us a _sopa de frijoles_ (bean soup), a perfect omelet, with a
hard-crusted, pleasant-tasting bread, but no butter, and black coffee.
Goat's milk was offered; the goat was in the _patio_--but "goat _me_ no
goats."
The inhabitants of the street gathered around as we got into the
carriage, among them an Indian woman with a coal-black baby--a _salto
atras_, a "jump back," as they are cheerfully called, when the baby
is blacker than the mother. We proceeded to hunt the _jefe_ again,
but when we got to the _jefatura_ we were informed that he was still
taking his siesta, so in spite of the sun we decided to look about the
apparently deserted town.
We stopped at another inn, where there were more signs of recent
"regeneration"--blood-stained walls, mirrors broken, a billiard-table
partly chopped up, and a piano of the "cottage" variety with its
strings pulled out. The _propietario_ showed us around sadly, but with
a note of pride. His house was, for the moment, the "show-place" of the
town. He pointed out a large, carefully preserved blood-spot on the
floor, and kept repeating _muy triste_--but all the same there was a
light in his eye.
The barracks, with a large detachment of Federal troops, and the
near-by church have great pieces chipped off by guns, and are
embroidered by pepperings of rifle-fire.
Don Porfirio nearly lost his life on his way to Don Alejandro de
Gyvès' (Aunt L.'s French friend, when she first came down here; he was
consul, you remember, and they were the _civilisés_ of the place). The
Juchitecos tried to kill Diaz and his priest-friend, Fray Mauricio,
near his house, and it was the village leader of that epoch who put
his brother Felix to death. They seem to be consistent and persistent
fighters, these Juchitecos, given over to libations, always fighting
with somebody, but best enjoying it in their own bailiwick.
The damages caused by the ambitions of the late Che Gómez were amply
testified to. A French merchant, Señor Rome, whom Aunt L. saw about
some business, had had his home in the environs sacked, and his bride
had escaped with difficulty into the hills, her beloved trousseau and
household linen, brought from Paris, of course, being destroyed or
stolen.
_January 12th, 9 a.m._
We were up with the dawn, expecting to start for Tehuantepec and Salina
Cruz at six o'clock, taking the train that I had arrived on at 5.30.
But this is one of the mornings when it won't get here till after nine
o'clock.
A hot, fierce, sandy gale is blowing, and every door and window in the
house is rattling. We are just going to have a second breakfast, before
starting out. The Chinese cook does very well, but when he was talking
with his assistant this morning under my window, it sounded like the
chopping of hash, literally, a conversation of short sounds and shorter
stops.
Some fresh cocoanuts were brought in, and we have each had a glassful
of the milky beverage. I can imagine how delicious it would be, come
upon suddenly in the desert; but sitting at a table with a servant to
pour it out, I was a little disappointed. I innocently came down in a
hat for the journey, but it was impossible to keep it on, even sitting
on the veranda. These winds, it appears, blow whenever they feel like
it, from October till May.
Now we are waiting, Aunt L. in white, with a long blue chiffon
veil, and I in blue, with a white veil. I fancy we would present a
picturesque sight to the proper eyes.
_January 13th, 7.30 a.m._
At last, yesterday, the train came, and, clutching at our veils, we
were blown into it, and after another unexplained delay started off in
an American-built car like our ordinary ones. Its name was "Quincy"!
In the old days, Aunt L. went everywhere on horseback. We passed
various little wind-swept villages. Jordan was the name of one of
them, seeming, in the sandy, New-Testament-looking spot, just the right
name. Two beautiful Tehuantepec women got into the train there, kindly
sitting near us. I was fascinated by their clothes, and much more
interested in them than they were in us.
The unfamiliar cadence of the Zapoteca gave them a complete touch
of foreignness. One of them wore a beautiful, strange, complicated
head-dress of stiff pleated and ruffled lace, which, I later
discovered, does not at all interfere with the carrying on their heads
of the large, shallow, brightly painted gourds. Her skirts were long
and deeply flounced, but looped up at the waist, just a tucking in of
the lower hem of the flounce, with the rest of the stuff flowing away
in a most lovely line. The other woman had on a beautiful necklace
of irregular-shaped gold coins, and with her flashing teeth and dark
eyes, and a brilliant, low-cut, full jacket, with a yellow handkerchief
twisted turbanwise around her head, made a picture I could not take
my eyes from. I felt as colorless as a shadow, and I told Aunt L. she
looked like a blue-and-gray Copenhagen vase strayed into a Moorish
room.
Just before getting into Tehuantepec we came upon a beautiful grove of
cocoanut-palms, high and graceful, above the rest of the vegetation,
and the little nestling huts and houses. All about are jungles
containing strange creeping things, and strange fevers and kindred
creeping ills.
As the train passed slowly down the principal street, it seemed to me
I looked out on a race of queens, tall, stately, with their lovely
costumes. The men seemed undersized and sort of "incidental" in the
landscape, but those beautiful women walking up and down their sandy
streets were a revelation. Aunt L. says they possess not only the
beauty, but the brains of the race. Former generations of Tehuantepec
men, fitter mates for these queens than the specimens I saw, were
mostly killed off in the various wars of "independence," and I
understand the population is kept up by fortuitous but willing males
from other places.
Everything was color; gorgeous splashes of yellow and black, and red
and orange and blue against the shifting, sandy streets. A picturesque,
creamy _Palacio Municipal_ faces the plaza, and there were many
churches--mostly showing earthquake vicissitudes. An old fortress, once
the headquarters of Diaz, gives a last suggestive note to the whole.
Glorious memories of Don Porfirio hang all over this part of the
world, where he is adored and mourned. I must say Madero's face looked
positively childish in the _jefatura_ at Juchitan, as it confronted
the stern, clever visage of the great Indian. Even the cheap, highly
colored lithograph could not do away with his look of distinction and
power. He was, in his young days, military governor of Tehuantepec,
and at one time _jefe político_. A French savant and traveler, l'Abbé
Brasseur de Bourbourg, remembering him then, said he was the most
perfect type he had ever seen, and what he imagined the kingly hero
Cuauhtemoc to have been.
When we got out of the train at Salina Cruz, a whirl-wind caught us and
blew us down the platform. I saw very little of the town on the way to
the British Consulate, where we were to lunch, as I was bent double by
the wind and blinded by the sand.
Mr. Buchanan and his wife were waiting to receive us. Mr. B.'s kind
but shrewd blue eyes, altruistic brow, and welcoming hand-clasp show
him at first sight to be what Aunt L. says he is, "pure gold." She has
found him through years the best of friends and wisest of advisers.
The consulate is on one of the sandy ridges that the town seems largely
composed of, and Mrs. Buchanan has arranged it with taste and comfort
after our ideas, with books and flowers and easy-chairs. But one look
from the high bow window and you know at once where you are, with
irrepressible cacti and palm-trees peeking in at you.
I tried sitting on the sheltered side of the veranda for a few minutes
while waiting for lunch, that my eyes might "receive" the Pacific, but
I was glad to go in-doors again. Mr. B. says the wind blows that way
six or seven months in the year. Yesterday was one of its "best."