Part 21
I had an Easter-egg hunt in the garden, for Elim, at which nine little darlings assisted. Then we had tea, with many flashes of Spanish wit. All the foreign children here prefer to speak Spanish. The mothers and other ladies left at six, after which the French military _attaché_, de Bertier, and Letellier, came in, and we talked _Mexicana_ till eight. De Bertier said this was the second most interesting situation he had ever watched. The first was the beginning of the French power in Morocco--that clear flame of French civilization, at first trembling and uncertain, in the deserts and mountains of North Africa, but ever increasing, carried to the Arabs, a “race pure,” by a handful of brave and dashing soldiers, also of a “race pure.” He finds the problem much more complicated in Mexico, where a _salade_ of races is involved.
_April 14th. 2_ P.M.
This morning, like so many mornings here, had its own special color. Nelson had not seen Huerta since the interview on Friday night, about the saluting of the flag. We drove out to Chapultepec, where, before the restaurant steps, the usual _petit lever_ was being held--generals, Cabinet Ministers, and other officials. Nelson went over to the President, while the motor, with Clarence Hay and myself in it, retreated out of the blazing sun under the shade of some convenient and beautiful ahuehuetes. From afar we saw the President get out of his motor and Nelson go up to him; then both walked up the broad stairs of the restaurant. In a few minutes Ramon Corona, now chief of staff, walked quickly over to our motor.
“I come from the President to ask you to go to the _fiesta militar_ in the Pereda _cuartel_,” he said. The President took Nelson in his motor, I following in ours, with Corona. Hay vanished from the somewhat complicated situation. I got to the barracks to find that we were the only foreigners, and I the only lady on the raised dais (where generals and Cabinet Ministers were even thicker than at Chapultepec), to watch the various exercises the well-trained _gendarme_ corps gave for the President. They are for the moment without horses, the lack of which is a great problem here. We watched the various steps, drills, and exercises for a couple of hours with great interest, I sitting between Corona and charming young Eduardo Iturbide, the present governor of the Federal district. It is wonderful what those Indians did, having been gathered in only during the last month. I told one or two little stories of things I had seen in Berlin and Rome. You remember how the raw recruits used to pass Alsenstrasse on the way to those big barracks, just over the Spree--great, hulking, awkward, ignorant peasants who after six weeks could stand straight, look an officer in the eye, and answer “Yes” or “No” to a question. The Italian story was one once told me by a lieutenant who had been drilling some recruits back of the Pamfili-Doria Villa. After several weeks’ instruction, he asked a man, “Who lives over there?” pointing to the Vatican. “I don’t know,” was the answer. He called another man, who responded, promptly, “The Pope.” The officer, much encouraged, asked further, “What is his name?” “Victor Emmanuele,” was the unhappy response. This last story especially appealed to the officers. They told me their greatest difficulty is to get any kind of mental concentration from the Indians.
The exercises finally came to an end, with the Police Band--one of the finest I have ever heard--playing the waltz time of “Bachimba,” composed in honor of Huerta’s great victory when fighting for Madero against Orozco. Huerta gave me his arm and we went in to an elaborate collation--champagne, cold _patés_, and sweets--I sitting on the President’s right. Huerta then made a speech that seemed as if it might have come from the lips of Emperor William, on the necessity of discipline, and the great results therefrom to the country. He said that when the country was pacified the almost countless thousands of the army would, he hoped, return to the fields, the mines, the factories, stronger and better able to fight the battle of life for having been trained to obedience, concentration, and understanding. When the speech was over, and all the healths had been drunk (mine coming first!), the President gave the sign and I turned to leave. We were standing in the middle of the flower-laden horseshoe table, and I moved to go out by the side I had come in. He stopped me.
“No, señora,” he said, “never take the road back--always onward. _Adelante._”
Repeating, “_Adelante_,” I took the indicated way. As we went down the steps and into the _patio_ we found _four_ cameras ready, about three yards in front of us! I felt that Huerta was rather surprised, and I myself stiffened up a bit, but--what could “a perfect lady” do? It was not the moment for me to flinch, so we stood there and let them do their worst. I could not show him the discourtesy of refusing to be photographed--but here, on the edge of war, it was a curious situation for us both. Well, the _censura_ can sometimes be a friend; the photograph won’t be in every newspaper in the States to-morrow. If, in a few days, diplomatic relations are broken off, that will be an historic photograph.
The Old Man is always delightful in his courtesy and tact. As for his international attitude, it has been flawless. On all occasions where there has been any mistake made it has been made by others, not by him. His national political attitude has perhaps left “much to be desired,” though I scarcely feel like criticizing him in any way. He has held up, desperately and determinedly, the tattered fabric of this state and stands before the world without a single international obligation. Who has done anything for him? Betrayed at home and neglected or handicapped abroad, he bears this whole republic on his shoulders.
_5.30_ P.M.
I am trembling with excitement. On getting out of the motor, I met Hyde, of the _Herald_. He has just had a telegram (the real sense made clear by reading every other word--thus outwitting the censor) that the whole North Atlantic fleet was being rushed to the Gulf, and that a thousand marines were being shipped from Pensacola. Hyde says that Huerta said to-day, “Is it a calamity? No, it is the best thing that could happen to us!”
I hear Hohler’s voice in the anteroom....
_April 14th. 6.30_ P.M.
Burnside and Courts came in just after Hohler, and the inevitable powwow on the situation followed. Burnside says we all have the Mexico City point of view, and perhaps we have. Hohler was very much annoyed at a hasty pencil scrawl just received from the north, informing him that Villa had confiscated many car-loads of British cotton and that many cruelties to Spaniards had been committed in connection with it. Certainly there is not much “mine and thine,” in the Constitutionalist territory, and not much protection. Here property and life are respected.
There is a report that Huerta wants to send the “Tampico incident” to The Hague for settlement. He insists that he was in the right about the matter, and that any impartial tribunal would give him justice. Be that as it may, we know he must give the salutes. It only remains for him to find the way. _Cherchez la formule_, if not _la femme_.
_April 15th._
Another day, full to exhaustion, and winding up with the reception at Chapultepec. There, while the President and N. were conferring, we, the sixty or seventy guests--Mexicans, plenipotentiaries, officials, civil and military--waited from six o’clock until long after seven to go in to tea, or “lunch,” as they call it here. Beyond occasional glances at the closed doors, no impatience was manifested. All know these are the gravest and most delicate negotiations. We whiled away the time on the palm-banked terrace, listening to the music of a band of _rurales_, who made a picturesque mass in their orange-colored clothes embroidered in silver, with neckties so scarlet that they were almost vermilion, and great, peaked, white felt hats, with a heavy cord around the crown of the same color as the flaming cravats. They sat in one corner of the great terrace, playing their national music most beautifully--dances full of swing, or melancholy and sensuous airs of the people, on zithers, mandolins, guitars, harps, and some strange, small, gourd-like instruments played as one would play on a mandolin.
At last the President and N. came in, looking inscrutable. No time to ask results now. The President gave his arm to me, and he then wanted N. to take in Madame Huerta; but the _chef du protocol_ headed off this rather too-close co-operation, saying that was the place of the Russian minister. I talked to Huerta to the limit of my Spanish, with pacific intent, but he kept glancing about in a restless way. I even quoted him that line of Santa Teresa, “_La paciencia todo lo alcanza_.” He asked me, abruptly, what I thought of his international attitude, and before I could reply to this somewhat difficult question he fortunately answered it himself. “Up to now,” he said, “I have committed no faults, I think, in my foreign policy; and as for patience, I am made of it.” He added, “I keep my mouth shut.” I changed the subject, too near home for comfort, by telling him that his speech of yesterday, to the troops, might have been made by the Emperor of Germany. I thought that would send his mind somewhat afield; you know he loves Napoleon, and would be willing to include the Kaiser. He brightened up and thanked me for the compliment, in the way any man of the world might have done.... It is a curious situation. I have all the time a sickening sensation that we are destroying these people and that there is no way out. We seem to have taken advantage of their every distress.
We hurried away at eight o’clock, so that N. might see Courts at the station, and give him the summary of his conversation, to be repeated to Admiral Fletcher. It was that Huerta would be willing to give the salutes if he could _trust_ us to keep our word about returning them. As he certainly has no special reason for any faith in our benevolence, he finally stipulated that the twenty-one salutes be fired simultaneously. N. said he was very earnest and positive during the first part of the conversation, but that toward the end he seemed more amenable. Heaven alone knows how it will all end. One thing is certain--it is on the lap of the gods and of Huerta, and the issue is unknown to the rest of us.
I got home from the station to find Mrs. Burnside in the drawing-room, ready to spend the evening. The captain was down-stairs, with what he afterward characterized as “blankety blanks” (willing, but unmechanical civilians), who were helping him to set up the rapid-firing guns, otherwise known as the “doves of peace.” Mrs. Burnside tried to persuade me to go to Vera Cruz to-morrow, when she departs, but I couldn’t, in conscience, cause a probably unnecessary stampede of people from their comfortable homes. If I had taken advantage of the various opportunities held out to flee, I would have had, in common with many others, an uncomfortable winter _à cheval_ between Mexico City and the “Villa Rica de la Vera Cruz.”
I don’t know what answer has been made to the Hague proposition, if any, by Washington; but it must have staggered Mr. Bryan and caused him to blink. The Hague is one of the dearest children of his heart, and universal peace has ever been a beloved and fruitful source of eloquence. When it confronts him at this special moment, can he do otherwise than take it to his bosom?
_April 16th._
This morning things seemed very bad. A curious telegram came from Mr. Bryan, to be given to the press for its private information, not yet for publication, saying that the Tampico incident was quite in the background, but reciting two recent and heinous crimes of Mexico. First, a cable for the Embassy was held over by a too-zealous partisan of the _censura_ at the cable-office. N. arranged that matter in two minutes, over the telephone, when it was brought to the attention of the cable authorities. Hohler happened, for Mexico’s good, to be with N. at the time. The incident was less than nothing, until mentioned in the open cable from Washington. The other incident, also well enough known, happened a short time ago in Vera Cruz, where another too-zealous official arrested an orderly in uniform, carrying the mails between the ships and the Vera Cruz post-office. That matter was dismissed after an apology, a nominal punishment of the offending official, and the immediate release of the carrier. Admiral Fletcher attached no importance to the affair.
I have not cited the incidents in order. The telegram for the press, in referring to the cable incident, begins, “far more serious is the withholding by the censor of a cable addressed to the _chargé d’affaires_ of the United States.” It also points out that no like incidents have happened to the representatives of other nations in Mexico, and that we must protect our national dignity--to which I respond with all my heart. But when we do intervene here--which I know we must--let it be for some vital case of blood and destruction. The day Huerta has a stroke of apoplexy, gets a knife in his back, or is killed by a firing-squad, we must come in, for anarchy will reign. He may not be the best man in the world, and clever and even profound thoughts of one day are counterbalanced by ineptitudes of the next; but he does seem to be the only man in Mexico who can and will keep order in the provinces under his control, especially now that the best and most conservative elements are associated with the task--Rincon Gaillardo, Iturbide, Garcia Pimentel, and many others.
Not a word of all the happenings of the past few days has appeared in any newspaper in Mexico. The great potentialities are hidden, like a smoldering, unsuspected fire. There _is_ a throbbing, an unrest--but the great public doesn’t yet know whence it comes. I think if N. has any luck in his pacific endeavors he ought to have the Nobel prize--though I understand his _chef direct_ has an eye on that.
_April 17th._
Last night N. was with the Minister for Foreign Affairs for several hours. They finally tracked Huerta to his house. The orderly said he had gone to bed, but the Minister sent in his card. After a wait of half an hour he sent in another. Huerta had forgotten that he was waiting. He received him in bed, and in the midst of the conversation asked him, as he afterward told N., what he thought about his pajamas, adding, with a grin, that they were _Japanese_. Nelson did not go in. He had spent several hours with the President at various times during the day, and did not want to see him about painful and irritating matters at such a late hour, when he and the President were worn out.
In thinking over Huerta’s remark, a few days ago, about the demonstrations of our fleet not being a calamity, I believe he means that this is, after all, the best way of consolidating the Federal troops. We may stiffen them to service of their country against a common enemy--but, oh, the graft! Oh, the dishonesty and self-seeking that animate many of the hearts beating under those uniforms! They sell anything and everything to the highest bidder, from automobile tires and munitions of war, to their own persons. As for punishing the various officers that are guilty, it seems very difficult; court-martials would mean the decamping to the rebels of many officers, high and low. So when _we_ demand punishment of this or that official, the “Old Man” is placed between the devil and the deep sea. It is a position he should now be accustomed to, however. On spies or on those conspiring against the government he is relentless. That all political colors recognize, and they do not hold it against him. Apropos of going over to the rebels, the Mazatlan incident of last Christmas (or January first) is a case in point. The officers on the gunboat _Tampico_ in the harbor had a scandalous debauch, with stabbings, etc. They were to be court-martialed, but they got out of that difficulty by going over, boat and all, to the Constitutionalists at Topolobampo!
XXI
Mr. Bryan declines the kindly offices of The Hague--More Americans leave Mexico City--Lieutenant Rowan arrives--Guarding the Embassy--Elim keeps within call.
_April 17th._
Washington will not take The Hague into consideration, and will not fire simultaneous salutes, which, of course, it would be childish for us to do, so the question is narrowed down to one point:--the Mexicans must salute our flag, and we engage ourselves to answer it. Many precedents for this are being cited by foreigners here. For instance, the celebrated case of the French consul in San Francisco, who was jailed for a few hours through a mistake. We made all reparation and engaged ourselves to fire twenty-one salutes to the first French ship that came into the harbor. Kanya tells me of an incident that transpired when he was _chargé d’affaires_ at Cettinje, that was regulated by an exchange of salutes between the contending parties, in Antivari harbor.
I have had calls all afternoon--German, Belgian, Austrian, and Italian colleagues, Marie Simon, de Soto (looking more like a handsome contemporary of Velasquez than ever)--all, of course, talking about _la situación_. Now I am waiting dinner for Nelson, who has been out since four o’clock, trying to communicate the very courteous, but firm, answer of Washington cited above.
_Later._
N. came in for dinner as the Burnsides, d’Antin, and McKenna were sitting with me at table. One of the numerous telephone calls proved to be from the Minister for Foreign Affairs, saying that he was leaving the Ministerio, and would be immediately at the Embassy. I had cognac and cigarettes placed in the drawing-room, and then everybody got out of the way. They are both in there now--9.45--and the fate of Mexico hangs in the balance, in that pleasant, high-ceilinged _salon_ of mine, with the big vases of long-stemmed pink geraniums, and books, and photographs, and bibelots, and its deep, comfortable green leather chairs and sofa. I am writing this in one of the smaller rooms, with newspaper men running in and out, and the telephone ringing. To the journalistic demands Nelson has told the clerks to say “there is no change,” which, in spite of my excitement, or perhaps because of it, reminds me of the story recounted of a Russian Ambassador to London. His wife had the bad taste to die at the time of the great visit of the Czar to Queen Victoria. The Ambassador, who was above everything a diplomat, had the body put on ice in the cellar of the Embassy, and to all inquiries as to his wife’s health he replied, suavely: “Thank you; madame is in the same condition.”
_11.30._
Back in the drawing-room, with the historic cognac, the equally historic cigarette ash, and the drawn-up chairs as mute witnesses that something has taken place. What will come of it all? Rocking the ship of state is an exciting business. I don’t understand Huerta’s attitude, unless he is whipped by the rebels, and _knows_ it, and prefers defeat at the hands of a nobler foe.
Portillo y Rojas said the President felt that he had done all that he was called on to do as chief of the nation to expiate the Tampico incidents; that the sailors were put at liberty immediately, with an apology given by the _jefe de la plaza_--General Moreles Zaragoza--to Admiral Mayo; that since then the President himself had manifested regret and had ordered an investigation to punish the guilty party; that any nation in the world would have been satisfied by these proceedings, and that furthermore he agreed that the Mexican cannon might salute simultaneously with those of the Americans, which would fully show the good-will on both sides, and also let the neighboring peoples witness the happy termination of a difficulty that had never been serious. There is a Spanish proverb about having more fins than a fish, which certainly applies to this sauve and clever old Indian. He further sent expressions of great friendship for Nelson by the Minister, but said he _couldn’t_ do this thing even for him, much as he desired to.
A moment ago a little blond-headed, blue-robed, sleepy angel appeared on the scene to ask when I was coming up-stairs. Perhaps, like the rest of us, Elim feels the disturbing electric currents in the air. He is now lying on the sofa, wrestling with sleep. He had been put to bed some hours before, rather unhappily. He kept pressing close to my dressing-table as I was getting ready for dinner, fingered every article on it, and asked me countless questions. These ranged from, “What does God eat?” to, “Why don’t women wear suspenders?” until I was frantic and had him removed in tears.
There are fears that the Zapatistas will arrive in the city; but they are nothing compared to other fears that stalk the town to-night. During the French intervention many people remained in Mexico City, reached a ripe old age, and died in their beds; which every one seems anxious to do, though I have never felt that dying in one’s bed is all it is cracked up to be. “Bury me where I fall. Everywhere will be heard the judgment call.” I don’t much care when or where or how it comes.
_April 18th. 4:30_ P.M.
No news as yet from Washington. I have just returned after lunching at the Russian minister’s. Everything was very _soigné_, as it always is, with _blinis_ and delicious caviar and all sorts of good things. I feel as if I had eaten the Legation instead of at it. One has so little appetite at eight thousand feet above sea-level. There were von Hintze, Kanya, Marie Simon, in one of her smart Drecoll dresses, and myself. They all think the situation in the south is very bad, but I am no more to be scared by the cry of Zapatistas, having heard it ever since I first put foot in Mexico.
The _Mexican Herald_ remarks this morning (dealing with the situation in glittering generalities) that “When each party to an agreement gets the idea that the other side is going to back down, it is certainly trying to the patience of an _Irish_ peacemaker.”
One of the great dust-storms of the end of the dry season is on us to-day; all the color is gone out of the air, which has become opaque, gritty, non-refracting.
_6.30._
Callers all the afternoon. Now McKenna comes in to say that the final word, _en clair_, from Washington has been received. It was given out at the White House at noon. “General Huerta is still insisting upon doing something less than has been demanded, and something less than could constitute an acknowledgment that his representatives were entirely in the wrong in the indignities they have put upon the United States. The President has determined that if General Huerta has not yielded by six o’clock on Sunday afternoon, he will take the matter to Congress on Monday.”
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