June 8th.
It is after dinner; N. has gone back to the chancery. All doors and windows are open, and a cool, thin, dry night breeze, most lovely, is blowing in.
I sent a Mexican Herald about the temblor and the entry of Madero. The streets are not yet quiet, though the vivas for Madero have somewhat died down.
Even that crowd had its physical limits. I can't understand why, when the streets are burst open, great rifts everywhere, especially in the neighborhood of the Embassy, that there not a vase or a photograph was upset, though some heavy bookcases filled with books, in the basement, were thrown to the ground.
I am reading The Relations of Bernal Diaz, companion and chronicler of the Cortés expedition. It is quite the most romantic, realistic bit of literature I ever got hold of, and has, here on the spot, a double-distilled charm. I was interrupted for a day by the arrival of that other conqueror.
June 9th.
Knowing how anxious you would be, I cabled on the 7th; now comes your cable asking for news and an announcement from the cable office here that my cable has been returned. It appears the employee just omitted Zürich; the address, Waldhaus, he explained in the note, he thought would be enough—the effect of the earthquake on his brain, I suppose.
It appears the New York newspapers said Mexico City was nearly destroyed. You must have been on the qui vive for two days. If the earthquake had been up to the newspaper account, you would doubtless not have heard.
People holding property here are not worrying about natural phenomena. The ever-increasing banditry all over the country, murders of people on isolated haciendas, and general dislocation of business and lawlessness are what worry them. A swift sliding down into the old pre-Diaz brigandage is feared. The slopes are so attractive to the dissatisfied and uncontrolled. Facilis est descensus.
Madero has publicly announced that he will encourage American investments, but that he will oppose all trusts and unjust concessions. It sounds almost too reasonable to be true. He made these statements from some place in the north when he promised to liberate all political prisoners and all prisoners of war. This revolution in Mexico has been full of contrasts, to say the least. Has any one ever seen such an anomaly as we witnessed here? The heads of a solid, recognized government turning over their offices to a relatively few armed opponents. I put it all on Anno Domini, not because so-called democratic principles have suddenly won a miraculous victory. The old dictator's hand was weakened by the stronger hand of time—and a "man with a dream at pleasure," etc.