Chapter V: Part 5

Everywhere they may be seen, the repulsive feature of our streets. In speaking they reveal a dwarfed intelligence, as sadly ruined by their life as is their body. Their ideas are rudimentary notions derived from the common talk of the streets, comments on public events--the escape of one criminal, the sentence of another, the deportation of their companions, the capture of some “crook.” They are godless, with feeble superstition regarding the saints depicted on their scapulars or the medal of the rosary, which they wear beneath their filthy shirt. Their number is enormous; they constitute the dregs of the laboring classes, and their presence betrays the vortices of vice, where the outcasts of civilization are dragged down.

ALEJANDRO VILLASEÑOR Y VILLASEÑOR.

This well-known journalist was born in Mexico, July 15, 1864. His education was gained in the _Colegio de la Sociedad Católica_ (School of the Catholic Society), the _Escuela Nacional Preparatoria_ (the National Preparatory School), and the _Escuela Nacional de Jurisprudencia_ (National School of Jurisprudence). He received the title of Advocate, July 7, 1887. While still a student, in 1885 and 1886, he assisted upon the staff of the _Boletin de la Juventud Católica_ (Catholic Youths Bulletin). In March, 1889, he became associated with the editorial management of _El Tiempo_ (The Time), with which he still continues. He has also written many articles for other leading periodicals. In October, 1895, he founded _La Tribuna_ (The Tribune), which was not a financial success. An article in this was the cause of his imprisonment in the famous city prison of Belem.

Señor Villaseñor y Villaseñor is a member of various learned and literary societies and has participated, as a delegate, in several important congresses. Among the latter is the First Catholic Congress held in the city of Puebla, in February, 1903.

Señor Villaseñor y Villaseñor is an industrious writer. His contributions to _El Tiempo_ alone number more than seven thousand. Of books, he has written _Asunto Poirier_ (The Poirier Incident), _La cuestion de Belice_ (The Belize Question), _Guillermo; memorias de un estudiante_ (William: recollections of a student), _Estudios historicos_ (Historical Studies), _Gobernantes de México_ (Governors of Mexico), _Los Condes de Santiago_ (The Counts of Santiago), _Reclamaciones á México por los fondos de California_ (The California Funds Claims Against Mexico). This last is of high importance, being an exhaustive discussion of this international question--the first to be submitted to The Hague tribunal for settlement. It is particularly in questions of public policy, in history, and in biography, that our author is at his happiest. Our selections are taken from _Estudios historicos_.

ANTÓN LIZARDO.

We have intentionally been brief in expressing our opinion regarding the attack at Antón Lizardo and have been full in the presentation of documentary evidence; in this manner remembering that these documents proceed from unimpeachable sources, a clear and full realization will result, that what took place at Antón Lizardo was not so simple a matter as the liberal party desires to make it appear.

In instigating foreign warships to seize vessels in Mexican waters, the government of Juarez permitted the national independence, sovereignty, and dignity to be outraged by the soldiers, officers, and warships of the United States; it betrayed its country, permitting an assault against its sovereignty and humiliated the nation by invoking foreign mercenaries to assist it and to treat Mexicans with profound contempt, and to shed Mexican blood, since those wounded on board the Miramon were compatriots; and those same strangers still preserve among their trophies taken from Mexico, the flags of that vessel.

We believe that, after the publication of this study, no one will venture to deny, as recently was done, that the Juarists took part in the Antón Lizardo incident; that Turner’s intervention completely thwarted the plans of Miramon, as a work written by a well-known liberal confesses, and gave great courage to the Juarists; no one will again venture to say that Marin was a pirate and that the commander of the Saratoga did right; this assault was not merely a partisan measure, as those who are ignorant of historical facts or filled with bad faith pretend to believe, seeing in it an insignificant event without serious consequences.

It was not at Silao or Calpulálpam that the conservative party was defeated, but at Antón Lizardo; nor was it the soldiers of Gonzales Ortega and Zaragoza who routed them, but the marines under orders of Turner.

The Juarist party, beaten at all points by Miramon, Castillo, Márquez, Negrete, Robles, Chacon, etc., at the beginning of the year 1860 held no population of importance, and its directory was confined to the plaza of Vera Cruz with the immediately adjacent region, and it was recognized by the United States alone. On account of the MacLane-Ocampo Treaty, which was then awaiting ratification by the United States Senate and with which we shall occupy ourselves in the following pages, public opinion had declared itself, in the most uniform manner throughout the whole country, against the liberal doctrines, which only produced as their bitter fruit the loss of our territory and almost that of our independence.

In order to end at once these parricidal tendencies and to bring to a conclusion the bloody civil war, which was destroying the nation, there was only necessary the effort, which the conservative government was making, to conduct the siege of Vera Cruz by land and sea. Under circumstances so serious for the constitutionalist party, the assault by Turner and the protection given by President Buchanan, gave new life to this party, and a series of disasters like that at Silao or of defections like that of the cavalry at Calpulálpam, opened to it the gates of the capital; but did not give it the final triumph, since the strife still continued.

And, looking a little deeper, it is seen that the events of Antón Lizardo had graver consequences than might be imagined; they brought on the European intervention. They emphasized the ideas expressed by Buchanan in his message to Congress of December 4, 1859, and the unconcealed tendencies of the democrats in the direction of a North American intervention were no longer mere theories, but began to translate themselves into facts. Antón Lizardo and the MacLane Treaty made Europe and the conservative lovers of their country see that Mexican independence was threatened and it was then that it was thought that a radical remedy would save the imperilled nation, and certain combinations, already forgotten, were recalled.

The triumph of the party of demagoguery and the errors which it committed precipitated events and brought on the European intervention, which, when studied with care as to its causes, is clearly demonstrated to be due to the liberal party.

The name of Antón Lizardo will remain, indelible on the pages of our history, a stain of dishonor for that party, which nothing and no one can ever remove.

THE POLICY OF THE UNITED STATES.

The United States have adopted a special policy with reference to Mexican affairs, a policy which may, in time, produce results unhappy for us.

During the time of the Three Years War, the democratic party, which brought so many misfortunes upon that country and America, was in power in the North American Union. After restless and ambitious presidents, like Jackson, Monroe, and Van Buren, who, if they had found their nation more powerful, would have embroiled it in long and bloody wars of conquest, came Polk, who brought the war with Mexico to an end and snatched from us more than one-half our territory; in vain honorable men, like Henry Clay, Daniel Webster, and others, opposed that iniquitous war which has been justly condemned by notable men in our sister nation.

Already owners of the “Far West” and of a great part of the coast of the great ocean, rich by the discovery of gold deposits in California, inflated with pride on account of the great extension already gained by their country, believing themselves the absolute arbiters of the destinies of the Americas, and viewing with disdain the old nations of Europe, to which they owe everything, from their population to their freedom, they seriously thought of putting into practice the theory of “manifest destiny” and of making the starry banner float from the Niagara and the Saint Lawrence to Panama.

The Mexican enterprise, which had resulted so favorably for them, was the school in which were educated many of the adventurers, who afterward gave themselves to filibustering, and the example which many others, who through more than a decade disturbed Latin-American countries, set before themselves for imitation. The government in Washington, which observed this tendency with singular pleasure, while publicly reprobating, in secret nourished and aided it.

During Polk’s administration, the government itself had given an exhibition of the ends which it pursued, proposing to Spain to purchase the Island of Cuba at the price of one hundred million dollars, a proposition which that nation did not choose to entertain. This was but the prelude to the aggressive policy which the people of the United States adopted in their relations with other nations, even attempting to mix themselves in European affairs.

The revolution of Hungary and the efforts of Louis Kossuth met an echo in the United States, and matters were carried even to the point of proposing to aid the Hungarian agitator and his partisans to liberate that country from Austrian domination; it was necessary for Francis Joseph’s government to assume a vigorous attitude and for the nations of Europe to show dissatisfaction before these plans were abandoned, and Kossuth, instead of aid, received only a refuge in the United States.

The island of Cuba was, and yet is, too valuable a prize to escape the eyes of the rapacious Yankees; underhandedly they aided Narciso López to organize his expedition, and it was only when everything was practically arranged, that, for the sake of appearances, President Taylor issued a proclamation, on the 11th of August, 1850, forbidding the fitting out of expeditions to agitate that island and certain Mexican provinces.

Notwithstanding this proclamation, López kept on and completed his preparations and openly sailed from New Orleans, by daylight; defeated, after the attack of Cárdenas, he found a secure refuge for himself, his partisans, and his rich booty, on American soil, and it was only after his second attempt that he fell into the hands of the Spanish authorities.

Gen. Quitman, one of the generals of the Mexican War, was accused of having taken part in an expedition; although the fact was notorious and the accused was arrested on February 3, 1851, the jury discharged him.

Fillmore’s administration demanded the Island of Lobos from Peru; the annexation of the Hawaiian Archipelago was vigorously agitated; with Mexico the voided Garay Concession was disputed and no concealment was made of the intention to secure possession of a right of way across the Isthmus of Tehuantepec, and as little concealment was made relative to the desire of right of way in Nicaragua and Honduras at points where inter-oceanic communication was believed to be easy; it was left to the Governor of Texas, Lane, to gain possession of the Mesilla Valley and to qualify as aggressive the conduct of General Santa Anna and of the Governor of Chihuahua, because they protested against such an invasion and made military preparations; Edward Everett, Secretary of State, refused to take part in the convention to which France and Great Britain invited the United States, to guarantee to Spain the control of the Island of Cuba and to prevent the island from passing to the power of any other nation; the notes of these nations relative to the convention were insolently answered; their conquests in the present century were enumerated, and the advantages which the acquisition of Cuba had to the United States, it being asserted without concealment “that it was essential for her own security.” When, at Ostende, the plenipotentiaries of the United States, accredited to the governments of Spain, France, and England, were treating of the purchase of the Antillean island, for the sum of twenty million dollars, the leaders of these plenipotentiaries, Mr. Soule, was profoundly irritated because negotiations in the matter were not actively undertaken.

So much in regard to the direct participation taken by the American government in these movements, tending solely to augment the territory and the power of the Yankees on sea and land; as regards the expeditions and agitations undertaken by private parties with the indirect support of that government, the list is as long as it is instructive.

Apart from the attempts of Narciso López and other filibusters against Cuba, Rousset Boulbon, although working on his own account, drew all his supplies for the invasion of Sonora from the United States; Crab came into that same district with the hope of conquering it and annexing it, if he had not been opportunely routed by Gabilondo in Caborca; Zerman had an identical purpose in reaching California; Walker proclaimed the Republic of Lower California, placing upon the flag of that newest nation a single star, which, if his adventure had proved successful, would have come to be one more star in the North American flag; routed by General Blanco, he went to Central America, where his presence gave rise to a bloody war and innumerable disturbances.

We should never end if we were to enumerate, one by one, all the schemes which the brains beyond the Rio Grande engender for enlarging their territory and dismembering that of the American republics.

Mexico was compelled to spend great sums in combatting the filibusters who appeared and in shooting or severely punishing them; Spain was obliged to send numerous troops to Cuba and to constantly invoke the moral support of European cabinets; an energetic response had to be given to the proposition to buy Savannah harbor and a round denial to the claims for the island of St. Thomas and others belonging to Denmark and Holland; England was forced to establish long-drawn negotiations, resulting in the Clayton-Bulwer Treaty, which in part assured the independence of Central America; necessarily this unchecked appetite for lands and islands exhibited by the United States caused alarm and apprehension throughout Europe. Finally, it was necessary that the great Secessionist War should came, through which this nation expiated a part of its great crimes, a war which brought it to the verge of ruin, but which taught it, in time, to check itself upon the perilous descent, upon which Polk, Taylor, Fillmore, Pierce, and others had started it--men who, without having the qualities of great statesmen, contributed, by their policy and their counsels, to bring about this great crisis to which their unbounded ambition and the cancer infecting their institutions bore them.

It would seem that those men proceeded with the most refined malice, if they were not blind, when we consider that they said with the greatest calmness, as James Buchanan, in mounting to the Capitol on March 4, 1857, that the great territorial increase which the United States had achieved since its independence was due to pacific and legal measures; now by purchase, now voluntary--as with Texas in 1836--adding: “Our past history prohibits the acquiring of territory in the future, unless the acquisition is sanctioned by the laws of justice and of honor.”

This is equivalent to justifying the conduct of Jackson in Florida, that of Fremont in California, of Austin in Texas, of Gaines in the Sabine district, the continued spoliations of the Indian tribes in the valleys of the Ohio and Mississippi and to the west of the Alleghanies, the scandalous invasion of California in 1842, the no less scandalous war against Mexico, and so many, many deeds which, to the shame of the United States, are recorded in her history.

Thus, as in the preceding chapter, we briefly made known the situation of Mexico in 1859, in this one we have sketched in bold outlines, the neighboring nation, in its tendencies and aspirations, in order that our readers may the better appreciate the bearings of the events which we are about to narrate in the following chapters.

RAFAEL ÁNGEL DE LA PEÑA.

Rafael Ángel de la Peña was born in the City of Mexico, December 23, 1837. His early education was conducted by an older brother and his father. In 1852 he entered the _Seminario conciliar_, where he pursued the regular studies, including laws, making a brilliant record. From 1858 on, he devoted great attention to the exact sciences, particularly to the mathematics. For three years he taught Latin in the _Colegio de San Juan de Letran_; in 1862, he was Professor of Logic in the _Escuela Nacional Preparatoria_ (National Preparatory School), and was later Professor of Spanish Grammar, and, for many years past, Professor of Mathematics in the same institution. He is an excellent teacher, leaving a permanent impression upon students.

The writings of Rafael Angel de la Peña are didactic, thoughtful, and chiefly in the fields of language and philosophy. “His diction is chaste and correct; his style careful, pure, and polished; his form elegant, terse, and limpid.” Some of his addresses have attracted notable attention and are in print. Many of his most important studies were submitted to the Mexican Academy and are contained in its _Memorias_ (memoirs). Rafael Ángel de la Peña was elected to membership in the Academy in 1875 and, since 1883, has been its Permanent Secretary. He is a correspondent of the Royal Spanish Academy and contributed upward of four hundred articles to the twelfth edition of its famous Dictionary. He is a member of the _Sociedad Humboldt_, the _Liceo Hidalgo_, the _Sociedad de Historia Natural_, and other Mexican societies, and an honorary member of the _Sociedad Mexicana de Geografía y Estadistica_. Outside of his important contributions to the Academy and to the Dictionary, his most valuable work is _Gramática teórica y práctica de la Lengua castellana_ (Theoretical and Practical Grammar of the Spanish Language), published in 1898, which has called forth high praise from the most competent judges in Spain and in South America.

THE MEXICAN ACADEMY.

The Mexican Academy has thought well to begin the third volume of its memoirs with a brief summary of its literary labors and of the most notable events which have befallen it since the year 1880.

Perhaps someone may think such a sketch needless, since--the Academy living almost completely isolated, without holding public meetings or participating in those promoted by other literary or scientific societies, printing its productions very slowly, and avoiding publicity so far as it may,--it may be assumed that no one remembers it, or, if knowing that it exists, has an interest in how it discharges the aims for which it was established.

But, if such considerations inclined it to preserve silence regarding its internal life, it has nevertheless felt that it should make a report to the Royal Spanish Academy, as to how it has endeavored to respond to the high honor which that body extended to it, in inviting it to participate in the formation of the last Dictionary. It believed, as well, that it was under obligation to supply notice of its doings to its few devoted friends, who, far from relegating it to oblivion, do not lose sight of it, but stimulate and nourish it by the favor with which they receive its publications.

Already, in an earlier sketch, it has been stated that the Academy has, by preference, from the days of its establishment, dedicated itself to the discussion of the additions and emendations which should be made to the Dictionary of the language. It persevered in this laborious task until the month of August, 1884, when it remitted to the Royal Academy the nineteenth and final list of items for the Dictionary. The definitions proposed by this Academy were twelve hundred and eighty-five in number; of these, six hundred and fifty-two were accepted by the Spanish Academy, some with slight modification, and six hundred and thirty-three were not admitted, the greater part of these being our provincialisms.

It is necessary to admit that the harvest gathered is not large; but, though so scanty, it gave occasion to mature studies, and long discussions, of all of which there remains no other vestige than the brief notice recorded in the proceedings of the meetings.

It can be readily understood that, as the Dictionary invades the domains of the sciences and of philosophy, of the arts and industries, we were forced often to discuss topics so heterogeneous that the only points they had in common were the initial letters of their names. Thus, from the word _Prostesis_, we passed to study the word _Positivismo_, considered as the name of a school of philosophy. The mere exposition of this system and its definition occupied long and serious sessions. Equally long and exhaustive were the discussions of the definitions of one and another science, as that of Biology and that of Astronomy, or those fixing the acceptations of technical scientific and philosophic terms. Such discussions were often interrupted by dissertations and discourses upon points of Literature, Philology, and the History of our Literature. Some of these productions have been printed in two preceding volumes of the Memoirs.

The Academy has also undertaken to discover and bring together materials for forming the history of the national literature and an example of this activity is the article entitled _Francisco Terrazas and other poets of the Sixteenth Century_. Señor Don Francisco Pimentel, member _de numero_ of this corporation has taken the lead in this and has, unaided, written that history and has begun to print it.

With the publication of the last Dictionary of the language, by the Royal Spanish Academy, the Mexican Academy considered the lexicographic work, which had been entrusted to it, as completed; not so with that which it had undertaken for forming a _Diccionario de Provincialismos_ (Dictionary of Provincialisms), which should contain, in addition to those current throughout the Republic, those which have been limited to a certain State or to a district of whatever extent and importance. In order not to delay the publication of this Lexicon, it was decided, as soon as items were secured under each letter of the alphabet, to give the list at once to the press; then to make as many more, with new alphabets, as might be necessary.

The Venezuelan Academy, Correspondent of the Royal Spanish Academy, notified us promptly of its inauguration on the 26th and 27th of July, 1883, the Director being His Excellency, Señor General Don Antonio Guzmán Blanco, then President of that Republic. The Mexican Academy was delighted with such agreeable news and gave a cordial welcome to the Venezuelan. Later that learned body proposed the establishment between the two Academies of an exchange of national printed works and manuscripts of value for literary merit. The Mexican Academy consented with pleasure and later sent such parts of its _Memorias_ as were not exhausted to that of Venezuela, and also to those of Ecuador and Colombia.

The Spanish Academy has given ours constant tokens of esteem and kindness, now, by accepting our additions and emendations to the Dictionary; now, in sending its diplomas of foreign correspondents to those individuals, whom the Mexican Academy recommended; and, again, by naming members for newly-established seats or by filling the chairs left vacant by the death of some Academicians.

Unhappily, there has hardly been a year which has not been mournfully marked by the loss of one or more members of this body....

Being desirous of knowing those provincialisms of each State which combine the conditions necessary for inclusion in the _Diccionario_, which it is forming, the Academy has considered it necessary to name as Academic Correspondents persons resident outside of the Capital, who are notable for their love of the Castilian tongue and for the knowledge of it which they possess. In this capacity, the following gentlemen belong to it: Señor Melesio Vázquez, Archdeacon of the Church of Tulancingo, Señor José María Oliver y Casares, residing in Campeche, and Señor Audormaro Molina, who resides in Merida.

In truth, the Mexican Academy has been able to do but little in behalf of our language and literature, but it can present in excuse the complete lack of all those means without which it is impossible to achieve the ends for which it was established.

The indispensable funds are lacking to the body and the time necessary for long and serious studies is lacking to the members. Those who compose it do not live entirely by literary pursuits; some give their chief attention to their professional occupations, others to the direction of affairs--personal or other--others, finally, to the discharge of high offices in State or Church.

Academies are, usually, liberally subsidized by their governments; they count upon their own sources of support, and those who compose them are suitably remunerated. The Mexican Academy lacks everything; there only remains to it the will to do what its scanty resources permit. Neither the poverty in which it lives, nor the little time at its disposition of its members and correspondents for carrying out the labors already begun, discourages it. Constant in its purposes, it will continue its labors, slow, it is true, but never interrupted; it will continue, by preference, to collect materials for the _Diccionario de Provincialismos_, and in a day, perhaps not very distant, will thus make known how the Castilian language is spoken in Mexico.

IGNACIO MONTES DE OCA Y OBREGÓN.

Ignacio Montes de Oca y Obregón was born at Guanajuato, June 26, 1840, his father being Demetrio Montes de Oca, a well-known lawyer, and his mother being Mara de la Luz Obregón. When at the age of twelve years he was sent to England to study, returning to Mexico and entering the _Seminario conciliar_ in 1856. He later went to Rome, where he received the degree of Doctor in Theology, in 1862. In 1863, he was Presbitero at the Basilica of San Juan de Letran in Mexico, and in 1865 became Doctor in Laws. For a time, he served as parish priest at Ipswich, England, but was soon appointed to a similar position in his native city. He was Chaplain of Honor to Maximilian and Pius IX appointed him his Secret Chancellor. Having raised Tamaulipas from a _vicariato apostólico_ into a diocese, Pius IX appointed Señor Montes de Oca y Obregón its first Bishop, in 1871. Without availing himself of the permitted delay of one hundred days, the new-appointed prelate at once took charge of his exceptionally hard field. He was indefatigable in the discharge of his duties, making two pastoral journeys over his whole diocese, establishing a _Seminario_ and founding a cathedral at the episcopal city, and restoring and enlarging churches throughout his domain. After this remarkable career in Tamaulipas, he was made Bishop of San Luis Potosí, where he has continued to display exceptional energy and wisdom.

Bishop Montes de Oca y Obregón writes both poetry and prose. In poetry he has published _Poetas bucolicos Griegos_ (Greek Bucolic Poets), _Ocios poeticos_ (Poetic Loiterings) and _Odas de Pindaro_ (Pindar’s Odes). Of all three, editions have been printed both in Madrid and Mexico. His translations from the Greek poets are close and beautiful. In prose, he has published six volumes of _Obras pastorales y oraciones_ (Pastoral Works and Orations) and a volume of _Oraciones funebres_ (Funeral Orations). Señor Montes de Oca y Obregón especially shines in oratory. Of him Portilla says: “As a sacred orator, he possesses those endowments of spirit essential to oratory--most brilliant talent, vast and agreeable erudition, exquisite literary taste,--and to these spiritual endowments he joins in happy combination the physical qualities which serve for their realization--a fine presence, a noble bearing, a musical quality of voice--all that, in fine, which constitutes the irresistible enchantment of eloquence. All these qualities shine, in never-witnessed brilliancy, in his famous funeral oration on the Literary Dead, magnificent novelty which will make an epoch in the annals of sacred oratory in Mexico.”

Bishop Montes de Oca y Obregón is a member of the famous Arcadian Academy of Rome, bearing in it the name Ipandro Acaico. He was a member of Maximilian’s _Academia de Ciencias y Literatura_ (Academy of Sciences and Literature). He is a Corresponding Member of the Mexican Academy. In 1899, he was Secretary of the Latin-American Council at Rome. In travels in Italy, France, and the United States, during the past three years, he has made several notable addresses.

JOAQUÍN GARCÍA ICAZBALCETA.

Great is my satisfaction at presiding over this meeting. It is more than two years that you have not gathered in general assembly; and on seeing three-months after three-months pass, without your coming to invite me to your regular meeting, I had come to ask myself the question: “Do the Conferences of San Vicente de Paul still exist in my diocese?” The President General of your pious brotherhood has, on various occasions in Mexico, directed to me the same question and with that zeal which distinguished him has asked me, with tears in his eyes: “Is it possible that charity is dead among the distinguished gentlemen of San Luis Potosí? Is it possible that there is no one who can arouse the members and revive the almost extinguished meetings?”

The sign of life, which you now give, coincides with the death of that illustrious President, and it is fitting that, in addressing you, I shall pay a tribute to the eminent _savant_, the fervent Christian, the exemplary member of your conferences, Don Joaquín García Icazbalceta.

Others have already pronounced his eulogy as a man of letters, as a historian, as the type of a man of wealth and of the flower of Mexican aristocracy. It falls to me to present him to you as a model member of the conferences and to briefly praise before you his charity and his obedience and attachment to the Church.

His was a long life and he employed it all in distributing benefits. Rich from his cradle, he preserved and increased his capital, without ever extorting from the poor, without unduly taking advantage of their labors, without ever practicing usury, that plague of our society which seems to most tempt those who have most wealth, and which the Gospel so clearly anathematizes. In all his vast territorial possessions, that dissimulated slavery, so common in some parts of the country, which chains the peasant for his whole life to one master and to one piece of ground without hope of bettering his condition, was never known. Most exact in his payments, he had further a box of savings, as he called it, for each of his employees, from the humblest to the highest, which really consisted of systematic gifts which he made them on the more important occasions of their lives or of the lives of their wives and children. Were they marrying? He supplied the necessary expenses without making any charge against them. Were children born; did disease come to afflict them; did death arrive? He generously opened his chest and alleviated their pains and necessities.

The works of mercy which he did among his own, he also practiced with strangers. Through long years, the conferences of Mexico found him visiting the houses of the poor and liberally succoring them; when he was their President, he exerted his influence inside and outside of the Capital, maintaining the fervor of the old members, and attracting new ones by his fine demeanor, his opportune appeals and his prudent persistency. How important is such tact in those who occupy the high posts in the conferences! The most ardent zeal, unless accompanied by prudence and judgment, far from attracting, repels, and instead of aiding, hinders good service of the poor and the prosperity of the association.

Great as were his material works of mercy, they are eclipsed when compared with the spiritual. It is, indeed, a meritorious work to teach the ignorant, to correct the erring, to pardon injuries, and all this Joaquín García Icazbalceta did in a high degree. Not only did the Lord give him great wealth, but also the inestimable gift of wisdom. The leisures, which his condition of comfort afforded him, were all employed in gathering an immense store of solid doctrine and in placing this at the service not only of the wise, but also of the humble and the ignorant. The devotional books compiled and _printed_ by him have gained an enormous circulation among the faithful and have greatly fomented piety among Mexicans. _Printed_ by him, I have said, and this is true in the full meaning of the word. Convinced that manual labor dishonors no one, he, personally, worked at his printing, and, to his talent and assiduity, the typographic art owes much.

All these labors, all these studies, were placed at the service of the Church and of the public by Señor García Icazbalceta. How, except for him, would we know how much the early missionaries did for the civilization and the prosperity of the New World? Thanks to his researches, books, and manuscripts, long forgotten, were reborn, and, in circulating, decked in the typographic beauty of Señor García Icazbalceta’s private press, and adorned with his commentaries and notes, they dissipated many prejudices and made those holy men, the apostles of New Spain, who were despised by the few who recalled them, known to the world.

Among them he presents Friar Juan de Zumárraga, how beautiful, how grand! Not without reason did the history of that life, so beautifully written, fly through the world, and, attracting the attention of the highest dignitaries of the Seraphic Order, to which the first Bishop of Mexico belonged, it was translated by one of them into the Tuscan and, in that idiom, circulated about the Vatican and throughout the whole Italian peninsula.

Such pious undertakings could not fail to arouse the envy of the world--and of hell. The demon, disguised as an angel of light, clothed in a religious garb, attacked him, as envy ever attacks, with bitterness, with acrimony, with implacable cruelty. What he had published was malinterpreted and _what he had not written_ was thrown into his face; his intentions were calumniated and productions foreign to his genius were attributed to him.

The fruitful writer replied never a word, nor even attempted to defend himself. At the suggestion of a prelate he cut out one chapter, an entire chapter, from his most cherished work; a chapter which cost him long years of study and diligent labors. Nor did his sacrifices end here. On seeing that those who were most embittered against him were ministers of that Church of which he was an obedient and submissive son and which he desired to defend, he broke, forever, his learned pen. Ah, beloved members of the conferences of San Vicente, how many injuries a misguided zeal inflicts! To the unjust and uncharitable attacks of which he was the victim, we owe it that most important works upon the Mexican Church remained unfinished, that documents of the highest interest lie mouldering in dust, that your learned President General dedicated the last years of his life only to the compilation of dictionaries and to grammatical studies, which could scare no one.

The Lord has already rewarded his ardent charity, his obedience to the prelates of the Church, his readiness to forgive even those injuries which most deeply wound one who is conscious of being a fervent Catholic and a conscientious historian. Without the sufferings of illness, without the bitterness of the final agony, sudden death, though not unforeseen, which is accustomed to be the punishment of sinners and the recompense of the righteous, lately snatched him away. Although a layman, he exercised, upon the earth, an apostleship more fruitful than that of many who are called by God to the highest destinies; and on receiving him to his bosom, the Lord without doubt has given him that reward, which he offered to those, who, without occupying a high place in the Church, duly fulfil their mission, and, being the _last_ in the hierarchic scale, come to be _first_ in heaven.

That which he could not gain in this world by his persistent efforts and courteous appeals to men, he will gain, we trust, in the better land by his prayer to the Almighty--the regeneration of the conferences of San Luis Potosí. May heaven rekindle your fervor, reanimate your charity, and infuse that zeal, as ardent as prudent, and that respect to the ministers of the Church, which animated Don Joaquín García Icazbalceta through his mortal life. Pray for him, and try to imitate him.

MEXICO’S PROTOMARTYR.

Today, it is fifteen months since I terminated the longest pilgrimage of my life, arriving at the shores of that enchanted Japan, in which our Mexican protomartyr was crucified. Terrible are, in all times, the seas of the Far East. The cyclones, which, in the century of Vasco de Gama and Francis Xavier, engulfed so many ships, have not lost their force; and the most that modern science can do is to predict them by a few hours, to indicate their probable course, and to teach mariners, if their vessels are capable of such speed, to fly before these messengers of death.

Just so, steaming at full speed before one of these tremendous hurricanes, our vessel was sailing the night before we reached the desired haven of Nagasaki. Although we were considerably in advance of it, our velocity was not so great but that the effects of what is called the anticyclone overtook us. The waves tossed, the wind whistled, and while, on the one hand, I promised Felipe de Jesús, if he saved me from peril, to honor him in an especial manner on the next centenary of his martyrdom, on the other hand, my thoughts transported me to that galleon of imperishable memory, which, through these same seas, bore the saint, three hundred years ago, to the very coasts whither we were bound. Before entering fully upon the brilliant epic, which through good fortune, it falls to me to narrate to you this happy day, I desire to carry you also on board of it.

Do not expect to see in it a rival of the colossal steamers which today plow the ocean. Although a marvel for that time, it is comparatively small and shows not a few defects in construction, which render it unsafe in tempests. It is scarcely ninety feet in length and its highest mast is of equal measure. In spite of criticisms already beginning to be made among naval architects, the enormous castles of the poop and prow rise high above the rest of the ship; and, that slope, which has begun to be given to the hull of merchant vessels destined for the Indies, in order that the waves in striking may lose some of their force, is impossible here on account of the many heavy pieces of artillery which garrison it. Its hulk is broad and the means of controlling the rudder are crude.

It sailed from the port of Cavite, in the Philippine Islands, July 12, 1596, bound for Acapulco; and, though now it is September 8, far from being near the Mexican coast, it is at 33 degrees of latitude, and the hurricane is constantly driving it toward the northwest. Almost from the start storms have troubled it and contrary winds have driven it from its course; on this night the tempest has culminated, and the Commander, Matéas Landecho, though an expert mariner, despairs of its salvation. The sails have been torn to tatters, the yards float in the sea, it has been necessary to destroy the masts, and the pumps have been worked unceasingly, in vain. To cap all these misfortunes, a wave of irresistible force shattered the rudder, and one of those moments has arrived, when even the most impious of sailors, the last hope gone, looks to God alone.

Officers, soldiers, crew, and passengers, all threw themselves upon the deck and cried with one voice, like Peter on the Lake of Tiberias, _Lord, save us, we perish_. Among these last were two Augustinian monks, one Dominican, and two Franciscan. Of these, the youngest remained on his knees, holding fast to one of the broken masts, his eyes fixed on heaven, and absorbed in profound prayer. By the gleam of the frequent lightnings, his manly face could be seen, upon which were visible traces, not only of recent privations, but also of long penances, and were observed that fineness of features, that ardent glance, that Roman nose, that sun-darkened skin, peculiar to the Spanish race as modified in the New World. His companion, older than himself, and named Friar Juan de Zamora, has often spoken of the austerity of that youth, during the five years which he had spent in Manila, in the Franciscan community. There he took the habit, May 20, 1591; there he made his vows, and not content with the penances prescribed by the rules, he had given himself up to greater austerities and was accustomed to make daily confession of his sins, before the Seraphic Family. Named _enfermero_, he had practiced such acts of charity and abnegation with the suffering and dying as are scarcely recorded of the most famous saints, and this not occasionally, but through entire years.

On the other hand, during the first days of the voyage, when the sea, yet tranquil, left opportunity for jests and idle talk, the careless soldiers pointed at him with their fingers and told the story of the young Franciscan, to one another, in terms but little flattering. He is the son of Alonso de las Casas (they say), a rich Spaniard of the City of Mexico, and he has a very pious mother, who came from Ilescas to New Spain, where this young fellow was born. This is not the first time he wears the seraphic habit. Formerly he was a novice in Puebla de los Angeles; but, after a few months, he threw aside his gown and gave himself again to the libertinage, which had distinguished him. His parents sent him to China, for punishment, where not a few of us have seen him living the gay life of a merchant. They say that he goes, now to Mexico, to take sacred orders and console his pious mother. We shall see whether he now gives proof of greater constancy.

Thus passengers and sailors of the galleon _San Felipe_, painted the youth, Friar Felipe de las Casas, at whom, apparently absorbed in meditation, we look from the bridge. The sea has calmed somewhat and the thick cloud masses, separating a little, permit us to see the constellations of the two bears, and, particularly, the polestar, shining brighter than ever. The Franciscan has his eyes fixed in that direction and after a half hour of silent prayer, he rises majestically and pointing southwest of the Great Bear exclaims with prophetic voice, “Look, look, our ship shall not perish! We shall soon arrive in safety on the coast of Japan.”

“A miracle! a miracle!” exclaim the sailors in chorus, seeing for the first time the prodigy, which Friar Felipe had been watching for a half hour, and the meaning of which the Lord had made known to him by inspiration, as in another time, to the Magi, that of the mysterious star in the East. It is a cross, an immense cross, much larger than that constellation which we call the Southern Cross; a cross, whose pale and peaceful glow at first resembled that of Venus; but which afterward appeared red, the color of blood, (such as we saw the planet Mars in last December), surrounded by a refulgent aureole and afterward enwrapped in a black cloud. It is a cross, but not such as that of Jesus Christ, which we are accustomed to see. Besides the customary arms, it has another transverse piece near the feet and a little protuberance near the centre, all perfectly drawn against the blue of the clear sky.

Passengers and sailors rejoice at the celestial vision. A board is soon rigged out as rudder; those sails, which the wind has not completely destroyed are quickly repaired; the countless holes are covered up and the prow is turned, not toward New Spain indeed, but, in the direction indicated by Providence. Yet there lack thirty-two days of stormy sailing, but they journey gaily in the midst of dangers, and on arriving at the port of Tosa, on October 20, they intone hymns of thanks to the Savior.

They journey gaily; yes, but beyond all Felipe de Jesús de las Casas, to whom God has revealed his high destinies. He knows that martyrdom upon a cross, such as he has seen in the sky, awaits him; martyrdom, the supreme recompense to which we, who run the race of life, aspire, but which the Lord grants to few; the martyrdom which Francis Xavier and his companions in religion and apostolic labors, sought with longing, but which God in His lofty purposes refused to them, to give it to Felipe de Jesús and to some companions, who arrived but yesterday, who did not seek it. _Omnes quidem currunt sed unus accipit bravium._

To relate to you the details of that glorious martyrdom, is what I propose in this discourse, longer than usual. Do not refuse me your kind attention. The story is so interesting and so brilliant notwithstanding its dark passages, that the sublimity of the event will compensate for my deficiencies. Furthermore, as the Holy Virgin has never yet refused me her aid, she will surely assist me in this memorable centenary. Invoke her with me, saluting her with the sweet words of the angel--_Ave Maria_.

IGNACIO M. ALTAMIRANO.

Once and again in Mexico there arises, from the mass of the Indian population, a man who leads, not only his race, but his nation. Such a man was the great President Juarez, who established Mexico’s present greatness; such in art were the artist Cabrera and the sculptor Instolinque; such in letters was Ignacio M. Altamirano.

No one who knows not the Mexican Indian village can appreciate the heroism of the man who, born of Indian parents, in such surroundings, attains to eminence in the nation. It is true that the Aztec mind is keen, quick, receptive; true that the poorest Indian of that tribe delights in things of beauty; true that the proverb and pithy saying in their language show a philosophic perception. But after all this is admitted the horizon of the Indian village is narrow: there are few motives to inspiration; life is hard and monotonous. It must indeed be a divine spark that drives an Aztec village boy to rise above his surroundings, to gain wide outlook, to achieve notable things.

And when once started on his career, what an enormous gulf yawns _behind_ him! How absolutely severed henceforth from his own. And what a gulf opens _before_ him! He is absolutely alone. Poor, friendless, with race prejudice against him, obstacles undreamed of by the ordinary man of talent confront him. Only immense ambition, tenacious purpose, inflexible persistence, unconquerable will, can succeed.

Ignacio M. Altamirano, pure Aztec Indian, was born at Tixtla, State of Guerrero, December 12, 1834. The first fourteen years of his life were the same as those of every Indian boy in Mexico; he learned the Christian Doctrine and helped his parents in the field. Entering the village school he excelled and was sent, at public expense, in 1849, to Toluca to study at the _Instituto Literario_. From that time on his life was mainly literary--devoted to learning, to instructing, and to writing. From Toluca he went to the City of Mexico, where he entered the _Colegio de San Juan Letran_. In 1854 he participated in the Revolution. From that date his political writings were important. Ever a Liberal of the Liberals, he figured in the stirring events of the War of the Reform, and in 1861 was in Congress. When aroused he was a speaker of power; his address against the Law of Amnesty was terrific. Partner with Juarez in the difficulties under Maximilian, he was also partner in the glory of the re-established Republic. From then as journalist, teacher, encourager of public education and man of letters his life passed usefully until 1889, when he was sent as Consul-General of the Republic to Spain. His health failing there, he was transferred to the corresponding appointment at Paris. He died February 13, 1893, at San Remo. His illness was chiefly _nostalgia_, longing for that Mexico he loved so much and served so well.

Altamirano was honored and loved by men of letters of both political parties. Although a pronounced Liberal, he numbered friends and admirers among the Conservatives. His honesty, independence, strength, and marvelous gentleness bound his friends firmly to him. He loved the young and ever encouraged those rising authors who form today the literary body of Mexico.

We may not even enumerate his writings. He produced graceful poems, strong novels, realistic descriptions, delicate but trenchant criticism, strong discourses, truthful biographies. He ever urged the development of a national, a characteristic literature, and pleaded for the utilization of national material. Unfortunately, his writings are scattered through periodicals difficult of access. A collection of them is now being made. Our selections are taken from his _Revista Literaria_ (Literary Review) of 1861, from a discussion of Poetry dated 1870, and from his well-known _Paisajes y Leyendas_ (Landscapes and Legends) of 1884.

GENIUS AND OBSTACLES.

Rigorously speaking, it can not be said that popular neglect can be a chain which holds _genius_ in the dust of impotence.

No: the genius, powerful and lofty eagle, knows how to break with his talons the vulgar bonds with which the pettiness of the world may attempt to shackle thought.

Thus Homer, aged beggar, to whose eyes the sun denied its light, but whose divine soul inspiration illuminated, was able to endow ungrateful Greece, in return for his miserable bread, with the majesty of Olympus, with the glory of the heroes and with the immortality of those eternal songs which survive the decay of the agonies and the ruin of empires.

Thus, Dante, proscribed by his countrymen, has been able to cause to spring from the depths of his hatred and his grief the omnipotent ray which was to illuminate the conscience of his time and to be the admiration of future ages.

Thus, that other blind man, who, as Byron says, made the name _Miltonic_ synonym of _sublime_ and who died as he had lived the sworn enemy of tyrants, in the cell to which ingratitude consigned him, improvised for himself a throne, and from its dominated creation saw prostrate themselves at his feet not only his country, but the world.

Thus Cervantes, the poor cripple, disdained by persons of distinction and persecuted by fortune created, in the midst of the agony of misery, the sole treasure which can not be wrested from old Spain, more precious truly than the ephemeral grandeur of kings and the imbecile pride of nobles.

Thus lastly, Camoens, soldier also like Cervantes, and like him unfortunate, left in his deathbed in a foreign hospital, as a great legacy to his country, his _Lusiadas_, the most beautiful monument of Portuguese glory.

Thus many others, dead through the hemlock of contemporary disdain, and compensated with tardy apotheosis, have not found obstacles in poverty, in envy and in defeat; and abandoning with thought the narrow spheres of the world, have gone to grave their names upon the heaven of poetry.

But such is the privilege of genius and of genius only. The talents which cannot aspire to such height, nor feel themselves endowed with force divine, are eclipsed in the test, the same test which causes him, who is predestined for sublimity, to shine forth more resplendent and more grand.

And in Mexico the genius enwraps himself yet in the shades of the invisible, or does not belong to the new generation.

Those of us who penetrate, with timidity and difficulty, into the sacred enclosure of poetry and literature, belong to the crowd of mortals; and scarcely may we aspire to the character of second rate workers in the family of those who think.

Thus for us are heavy those chains which for geniuses would be but spider webs; discouragement crushes us at times--discouragement, that poisoned draught, whose vase of vile clay is shattered before the glance of genius, accustomed to sip the nectar of the immortals in the myrrhine cup of faith.

As for us, we need, not the applauses of the world, but the sympathy of our countrymen, the word of encouragement, the hand which saves us from the waves which threaten to submerge us in their bosom.

It is not the necessities of material life which hamper us. We may rise superior to those or may supply them with the product of honorable labor, though outside of literature. As little do we seek, the patronage of the mighty. The _gilded mean_ of Horace were unbearable for us if we have to supply in exchange for it a _Hymn to Maecenas_; the palatial advantages of Virgil would cause us loathing if we had to purchase them by placing the sacred lyre of the aged singer of the Gods at the feet of Augustus.

PLEA FOR A MEXICAN SCHOOL OF WRITING.