VI
One must not assume that a Mexican revolution is a comic opera affair. The least conspicuous uprising sows something of death, destruction, and a loss of feminine virtue in its wake. But Mexico is large and sparsely populated, and can stage a dozen revolutions at once without disturbance of its general calm.
The De la Huerta revolt raged principally in central Mexico. For a few months the republic was aflame from Vera Cruz to Manzanillo. But Obregon had the best generals. The United States, taking the quickest means to bring about order, allowed him to buy arms denied the revolutionists. The Huertistas, beaten and dispersed, fled southward into the jungles of Tehuantepec, fighting sporadically along the railway I had just traversed, until completely disbanded. American newspaper readers settled back in their easy chairs with the self-congratulatory comment, “There’s another revolution over! Those Mexicans must be a cut-throat lot!”