A diplomat's wife in Mexico

by Edith O'Shaughnessy

Yesterday I had tea with Madame B. She was looking very handsome, lying among her costly blue-ribboned laces. The baby, born ten days ago, looks like a miniature “conqueror,” with its severe Spanish features and glossy black hair. Madame B.’s father, who is one of the wealthiest hacendados, spoke with Huerta for the first time several weeks ago at the Jockey Club. The President asked him, “How are matters in Morelos?” (The Zapatista country where they have immense sugar haciendas.) Don. L. answered, “You are killing us with your demands for contributions.” Huerta grew rather excited. “You do nothing for the country,” he declared, “neither you nor your sons.” Don L. answered, “I have lost one and a half millions in the past year.” “Lucky man to have it to lose,” commented Huerta, grimly. “Great sugar crops are now ready for harvesting, but I can get no men,” Don L. went on; “they are all in the army. Give me men and I will give you contributions.”

Huerta immediately sent the men needed, the sugar is being harvested, and Don L. feels convinced that Huerta is doing what he can; but his daughter, who told me all this, added, with a smile and flash of white teeth, “Pardon me; but what can we do with your Mr. Wilson on our backs?”

Evening.

We have had such a day of agitation. Telegrams from New York tell us that Nelson’s father has received the last sacraments. We have telegraphed to Vera Cruz to know if one of the smaller fast ships is in the harbor. I might go in it to New Orleans and thence by rail to New York—in all seventy-eight or eighty hours from Vera Cruz. Berthe has been packing my things. I know lives must end, but my heart is very sad.

I kept my engagement to take the Russian and Austrian ministers out to Tozzer’s Aztec diggings. Their governments have subscribed money for archæological work in Mexico (I have never quite understood why), and Tozzer was most anxious to have them see what he had done. We had tea, and regalitos of heads of idols, dug up on the spot—spontaneously offered, this time. There was a dust-storm blowing—the volcanoes were invisible—and things were generally gritty. All the time my thoughts were turning toward the life-and-death issue, and I was so anxious to get home.

The Lefaivres leave definitely on the 12th. The Legation is dismantled, and Madame Lefaivre is still lying with her knee in plaster. Their secretary and his wife naturally see them leave with mixed feelings. We all know how that is, for what greater benefit can a chief bestow than absence? Madame Lefaivre said to the secretary: “What if the ship doesn’t sail on the 12th?” He made the most polite of disclaimers, but she answered, smilingly, “Oh, I know the hearts of secretaries!”

March 1st.

I have just come from Mass, wondering how it is with the soul and body of Nelson’s father....

This morning Washington must be thinking “how sharper than a serpent’s tooth”! Carranza and Villa are defying the supreme powers. They even deny our rights to ask information regarding Benton, who, they say, is a British subject—adding that they will listen to only such representations as are made to them by Great Britain herself “through the proper diplomatic channels.” No one knew any such channels existed. They add, further, that this ruling applies to other nations desiring redress for their people. The Frankenstein monster is certainly growing. Carranza also says that he has already investigated the Benton affair, but only for use in case Great Britain desires to take up the matter with him as head of the revolution. The matter of Gustav Bauch, American citizen, he will be kind enough to discuss with Mr. Bryan, stating that he “greatly laments his death.” This turn is most unexpected, though Villa and Carranza were very uppish several months ago when William Bayard Hale was sent to treat with them. Now that the embargo is lifted, their arrogance knows no bounds.

Vergara, the supposed American citizen, supposed to have been put to death at Piedras Negras by a Federal officer, and whose death so greatly outraged Washington, has simply escaped and rejoined the rebel forces. It appears, on investigation, that he was the chief of a gang of eighteen bandits, and his occupation was the getting in of arms and ammunition across the border for the rebels, or the driving of large herds of stolen cattle over to the American side. The Federals would have had a perfect right to shoot him.