Mexico -- History -- 1910-1946; Mexico City (Mexico) -- Social life and customs
Have been thinking of you to-day, as you will know. The once famous
Church of San Agustin is now the National Library, so I went to San
Hipólito near by, equally interesting, and one of the oldest in Mexico,
dating from 1525. It was built on the spot where hundreds of Spaniards
lost their lives during the retreat of the "Melancholy Night." But I
was thinking of the Nauheim days, and all the preparations for your
feast, and so much that has slipped "into the vast river flowing." I
hope you got the pearl pin.
Spent yesterday at the Bonillas'. They have a tumble-down, picturesque
old country house, unoccupied for a generation, that they are beginning
to put in order, with a jewel of an unkempt old garden, where all the
growing things have just done as they beautifully pleased. It is a
favorite spot for picnics for our little circle--not too far out of
town, just beyond Tacubaya. After luncheon, partaken of under an arbor
of _mosquete_ and honeysuckle at the end of a lovely white-pillared
walk, we wandered over the maguey-planted hills stretching back of the
garden.
Von H. does not care about it all. As we sat on the hillside, talking
of Iswolsky, Demidoff, and Petersburg, where he was for seven and a
half years naval aide, _ad latere_, to the Czar from the Kaiser, I
thought how little, after all, he was fitted for a background of _agave
Americana_.
Such a sweet letter from Miton S., from Copenhagen, with a photograph
of their charming Legation drawing-room--with Miton's portrait and
that of Janos by Tini Rupprecht hanging on the wall. She tells me
she returns to Horpács, where Laszlo is to do her portrait and her
sister's. They are occupied with the familiar Copenhagen round,
golfing every day at beautiful Klampenborg, and are going to the
Fryjs' magnificent place for a visit, and later to Norway _chez les_
Löwenskiold.
_August 31st._
Mr. Garfield came to lunch to-day with the McLarens. He is most
agreeable, and is trying to pursue the political game along altruistic
lines. I certainly wish him success. He, too, hopes all things from
Madero. So few Americans have come this way that to have any of the
really nice ones here is a great treat. It made me think of all those
far-away tales of my childhood, when you knew his father as President.
The luncheon was the vehicle for one of those informal, intimate
exchanges from like standpoints, always so particularly agreeable
against an exotic background.
Yesterday, the 30th, Madero was nominated for President by the Mexican
Progressive party in convention in the city. As it was a case of "birds
of a feather," all went off smoothly as far as that special assemblage
was concerned, though any kind of peace is apt to be rather noisy, I
have discovered, this side of the Rio Grande. The elections, primary
and secondary, are set for October 1st and 15th.
[11] St. Augustine of the Caves.
IX
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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