Panama to Patagonia

by Charles M. Pepper

During the procession some of the women and many of the boys knelt in the streets and a few men doffed their hats, but the crowd as a whole was not devout and the ceremony was not impressive. It partook more of the nature of a perfunctory official function.

Though the snow of the Cordilleras is always in sight, Santiago does not have a snow-storm oftener than once in ten years. But it rains. During June, early Winter, I saw clear skies on not more than half a dozen days. My Chilean friends told me this was exceptional, and to prove it they brought the verified weather statistics. These showed an average of only 35 rainy days out of 365. The largest proportion was in August, when there were ten days on which rain fell. But the sky is overcast much oftener than this. There are very many days which are described by the expressive Spanish word triste, that gives to Nature the element of personality and means sombre and sorrowful. Besides, while the actual rainfall is not so great, there are seasons when the humidity is very disagreeable, and this is in Winter instead of in Summer. In January the relative humidity was 64.6, while in July (midwinter) it was 83.7. The average for the year was 73.29. The temperature is quite variable, and the difference between sun and shade is marked. In January the maximum in the shade was 68° Fahrenheit, and in the sun 85°. In July it was 46° in the shade and 57° in the sun. The mean average for the year was 69°.

The Chilean of the upper class is as indifferent as he thinks the humbler class ought to be to mere physical comfort. He resents the statement that not more than half a dozen dwellings in the capital have chimneys, and he is right in doing so, for that is a libellous exaggeration. Yet the majority of them are without chimneys, and their occupants get through the villanous Winter season with oil-stoves or perhaps even without this means of artificial warmth. I went an afternoon in midwinter to call on one of the local captains of industry. He had a handsome residence, and, happily, a parlor upholstered in warm colors. No other means of getting warm were provided. He came down to see me in his overcoat, and I had gained experience enough not to think of removing mine. “It is only a few months,” is the smiling explanation of shivering through the Winter. But the means to provide comfort during those few months are coming. The wealthy citizen now builds his residence with chimneys and open grates.

Life in Santiago—that is, social, professional, and business life—is only for the classes. The gulf between comfort and poverty—for it is simply comfort, since there are few great fortunes—is bridged by ignoring poverty. And it has to be confessed that, with wretchedness blinked out of sight, existence in the Chilean capital is agreeable. The city is both the heart and the pulse of the nation. The commercial habit—hardly industrial, for the factories are few—limits itself to an hour in the morning before breakfast and rather resents intrusion during that hour. Though he is at his office, the business man would rather have you come around after breakfast, since it spoils his mid-day meal to take up the work of the day before then. Some humorous experiences of my own, some polite postponements, satisfied me of the fixedness of this custom. In the afternoon there is real activity, concentration which in a few hours makes up for apparent slackness.

In professional and official affairs it is the same. An official appointment or a call of any nature on a public functionary should be made somewhere between half-past two and half-past four. I discovered that the official urbanity was greatest if the call could be made between three and four o’clock.

The social life is more of the clubs than of the home, yet there are many fine homes where a charming hospitality is dispensed. The breakfast, preferably on Sunday, is a favorite social function, beginning at mid-day and conducted with all the formality of an evening dinner. At a breakfast in the home of Mr. Emilio Bello Codecido, a colleague in the Pan-American Conference at Mexico, I met many of the leading people of Santiago, among them Mr. Auguste Matte, another colleague in that conference. Madame Bello is the daughter of former President Balmaceda. Again, Mr. Juan Walker Martinez, the brother of the Chilean minister in Washington, desiring to give me an opportunity to meet some of the principal men of the city, arranged a breakfast at the Union Club. When given on week days, these social breakfast functions presuppose no pressing business or professional engagements during the afternoon.

The Santiagonian is a night-hawk. His club life, and when he is not at the club his family life, does not begin till two or three hours after sundown. Every evening he is found at the Union Club, one of the best associations of gentlemen in South America. It may be that he is going to forego this practice for a few hours and accompany his wife and daughters to the opera or the ball, which celebrates some charity or a public function. Female society is satisfied with these diversions and with church-going. At the opera it is resplendent in Parisian costumes. Charity draws all its members. At a charitable performance in the Municipal Theatre one night I was assured I saw all that was lovely in the capital—and very lovely it was.

The Chilean women are less restricted by traditional Spanish formalities than their sex in other South American countries. They shop by themselves, and many are employed in the stores and similar places, but man is the master, and the women take pleasure in recognizing this. They go to the ball or the opera to be admired, and the strangers admire and continue to admire.

The chivalry of the male Chilean, while formal and precise, is rather commonplace. He gives the lady the inner side of the street, and will politely describe the arc of a great circle and cheerfully step off into the sewer that his gallantry in this matter of etiquette may not be questioned. But this is the limit of his concession, except that if he be of a literary turn he may write sonnets to her black eyes. He extends the first greeting. Without it his most intimate female acquaintance must not manifest the faintest sign of recognition. This custom is intensely exasperating to the visitor, who finds the Chilean women look so much alike that he may have calmly ignored his vis-à-vis at a social function while he has greeted with effusive politeness a lady who makes it apparent, though not disagreeably, that she never saw him before.

At the theatre the zarzuela, or one-act comedy, is as popular as in Spain. After the performance the clubs find all the men congregated there. The gambling is high. It has been said that the Chilean who forms a part in the social life of the country must be either a soldier, a priest, or a farmer. With the predominance of the army and navy, the first class would be certain. The priest is less an element than formerly, but the farmer is the constant factor. The latter class includes the professional men, lawyers and doctors, and the business men, for all are landed proprietors.