A diplomat's wife in Mexico : $b Letters from the American Embassy at Mexico City, covering the dramatic period between October 8th, 1913, and the breaking off of diplomatic relations on April 23rd, 1914, together with an account of the occupation of Vera CruzO'Shaughnessy, Edith
History
A diplomat's wife in Mexico : $b Letters from the American Embassy at Mexico City, covering the dramatic period between October 8th, 1913, and the breaking off of diplomatic relations on April 23rd, 1914, together with an account of the occupation of Vera Cruz
O'Shaughnessy, Edith
Mexico -- Foreign relations -- United States; Mexico -- History -- 1910-1946; United States -- Foreign relations -- Mexico; Veracruz (Veracruz-Llave, Mexico) -- History -- American occupation, 1914
Only a word before beginning a busy day. I must go out to Chapultepec
to see that the luncheon of twelve, for Hanihara and Cambiaggio, is all
right. The town is filling with Japanese officers from the _Idzuma_,
lying at Manzanillo. There will be a veritable demonstration for them,
indicating very completely the anti-American feeling. There is an
enormous official program for every hour until Friday night, when they
return to their ship.
_Evening._
My luncheon for Hanihara went off very pleasantly, at Chapultepec.
That restaurant is the knife with which I have cut the gordion knot
of entertaining. The new Italian minister was there, the Norwegians,
Mr. E. N. Brown, president of the National Railways, Parra, from the
Foreign Office, and others. We reached home at four o’clock, and I
drove immediately to the Garcia Pimentels, where Don Luis was waiting
to show me some of the special treasures in his library. Up-stairs,
the handsome daughters and their equally handsome friends, married and
single, were sewing for the Red Cross. We meet there every Tuesday.
Each daughter had a beautifully embroidered _rebozo_ thrown over her
smart Paris gown _à la Mexicana_--heirlooms of the family.
The house is one of the noble, old-style Mexican edifices, with a large
_patio_, and a fine stairway leading up to the corridor that winds
around its four palm- and flower-banked sides. Large, handsome rooms,
with pictures, rare engravings, priceless porcelains, and old brocades,
open from the corridor. I merely put my head in at the door of the big
drawing-room where they were working, as Don Luis was waiting for me in
his library down-stairs. I spent a couple of delightful hours with him,
among his treasures, so lovingly guarded through generations. Oh, those
fascinating title-pages in reds and blacks, that thick, rich-feeling
hand-woven paper, that changeless ink, fit to perpetuate those romantic
histories and the superhuman achievement of the men of God! I could
scarcely put down the beautifully written letter of Cortés to Charles
V., wherein he tells of the Indians as he found them. They so closely
resemble the Indians as _I_ have found them.
Many of Don Luis’s most valuable books and manuscripts were found in
Spain, and his library of _Mexicana_ embraces everything obtainable
down to our own time.[9] His wife is a charming woman, very _grande
dame_, cultivated, and handsome. She and her daughters are always busy
with countless works of charity. Just now they are busy making up
little bundles of layettes for the maternity home. It does make one’s
fingers nimble to see Indian women obliged to wrap their babies in
newspapers!
I had just time to get home and dress for dinner at the British
Legation, but we came away at half past nine, leaving the rest of the
party playing bridge. I had on again the gray-and-silver Worth dress,
but I feel sad without my black things.
_Evening, January 27th._
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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