XIV
A “neat little haul” for brigands—Tea at San Angel—A picnic and a burning village—The lesson of “Two Fools”—Austria-Hungary’s new minister—Cigarettes in the making—Zapata’s message.
February 6th
There was no disturbance of any kind yesterday. Never were the streets more peaceful, nor the heavens more calmly beautiful. Madame Simon had a luncheon for the new Austro-Hungarian minister, and afterward we all motored out the Toluca road, driving on till from a high mountain place we could see the setting sun filling the stretches of the Toluca Valley with translucent flame colors, mauves, reds, and browns. It was like some new Jerusalem or any other promised glory. Every time we saw a group on horseback we wondered if it were the redoubtable Zapatistas who make that part of the world so unquiet. It was all carefully patrolled, however, with armed men at intervals, cartridge-belts full, and guns across their saddles.
Our party would have been a neat little haul for brigands: the Austro-Hungarian minister, the Italian minister, Joaquin Garcia Pimentel, Señor and Señora Ösi, Madame Simon, and myself. Señora Ösi had on a magnificent string of pearls, likewise a huge diamond pin that blazed in the setting sun. I left my jewels at home, and Madame Simon kept hers well covered. I wonder that we did get back as we went. It was marvelous, dropping down from the heights to the glistening town, in the mysterious Mexican half-light.
I wonder what President Wilson is going to do about the revolution in Peru? I see they have deported Billinghurst from Callao, and Augusto Durand, the revolutionary chief, has assumed the Presidency. There was a price on his head a day or two before. It will take more than one administration to cure the Latin-Americans of their taste for revolutions. Have sent you a Cosmopolitan, with a story, “Two Fools,” by Frederick Palmer; it deals with a certain burning side of the Mexican situation, and has excited much comment.