April 16th
This morning things seemed very bad. A curious telegram came from Mr. Bryan, to be given to the press for its private information, not yet for publication, saying that the Tampico incident was quite in the background, but reciting two recent and heinous crimes of Mexico. First, a cable for the Embassy was held over by a too-zealous partisan of the censura at the cable-office. N. arranged that matter in two minutes, over the telephone, when it was brought to the attention of the cable authorities. Hohler happened, for Mexico’s good, to be with N. at the time. The incident was less than nothing, until mentioned in the open cable from Washington. The other incident, also well enough known, happened a short time ago in Vera Cruz, where another too-zealous official arrested an orderly in uniform, carrying the mails between the ships and the Vera Cruz post-office. That matter was dismissed after an apology, a nominal punishment of the offending official, and the immediate release of the carrier. Admiral Fletcher attached no importance to the affair.
I have not cited the incidents in order. The telegram for the press, in referring to the cable incident, begins, “far more serious is the withholding by the censor of a cable addressed to the chargé d’affaires of the United States.” It also points out that no like incidents have happened to the representatives of other nations in Mexico, and that we must protect our national dignity—to which I respond with all my heart. But when we do intervene here—which I know we must—let it be for some vital case of blood and destruction. The day Huerta has a stroke of apoplexy, gets a knife in his back, or is killed by a firing-squad, we must come in, for anarchy will reign. He may not be the best man in the world, and clever and even profound thoughts of one day are counterbalanced by ineptitudes of the next; but he does seem to be the only man in Mexico who can and will keep order in the provinces under his control, especially now that the best and most conservative elements are associated with the task—Rincon Gaillardo, Iturbide, Garcia Pimentel, and many others.
Not a word of all the happenings of the past few days has appeared in any newspaper in Mexico. The great potentialities are hidden, like a smoldering, unsuspected fire. There is a throbbing, an unrest—but the great public doesn’t yet know whence it comes. I think if N. has any luck in his pacific endeavors he ought to have the Nobel prize—though I understand his chef direct has an eye on that.