Mexico -- History -- 1910-1946; Mexico -- History -- Revolution, 1910-1920
Over to the right, along the base of the line of trees, heavy dust
billowed up, men shouted, whips snapped, and there was a rumble and a
jangling of chains. We plunged into a little path that wound among the
chaparral and emerged upon a tiny village, lost in the brush near the
ditch. It was strikingly like a Chinese or Central American village:
five or six adobe huts thatched with mud and twigs. It was called San
Ramon, and there a little struggling knot of men swayed about every
door, clamoring for coffee and _tortillas_, and waving fiat money. The
_pacificos_ squatted in their tiny corrals, selling _macuche_ at
exorbitant prices; their women sweated over the fire, hammering
_tortillas_ and pouring villainous black coffee. All around, in the
open spaces, lay sleepers like the dead, and men with bloody arms and
heads, tossing and groaning. Presently an officer galloped up, streaked
with sweat, and screamed, "Get up, you fools! _Pendecos_! Wake up and
get back to your companies! We’re going to attack!" A few stirred and
stumbled, cursing, to their weary feet—the others still slept. "_Hijos
de la——_!" snapped the officer, and spurred his horse upon them,
trampling, kicking.... The ground boiled men scrambling out of the way
and yelling. They yawned, stretched, still half asleep, and sifted off
slowly toward the front in an aimless way.... The wounded only dragged
themselves listlessly to the shade of the brush.
Along the side of the ditch went a sort of wagon track, and up this the
Constitutionalist artillery were arriving. One could see the gray heads
of the straining mules, and the big hats of their drivers, and the
circling whips—the rest was masked in dust. Slower than the army, they
had been marching all night. Past us rumbled the carriages and
caissons, the long, heavy guns yellow with dust. The drivers and
gunners were in fine good humor. One, an American, whose features were
absolutely indistinguishable in the all-mantling mud of sweat and earth,
shouted to know if they were in time, or if the town had fallen.
I answered in Spanish that there were lots of _colorados_ yet to kill,
and a cheer ran along the line.
"Now we’ll show them something," cried a big Indian on a mule. "If we
could get into their cursed town without guns, what can we do with
them?"
The alamos ended just beyond San Ramon, and under the last trees Villa,
General Angeles, and the staff sat on horseback at the bank of the
ditch. Beyond that the ditch ran naked across the naked plain into the
town, where it took water from the river. Villa was dressed in an old
brown suit, without a collar, and an ancient felt hat. He was covered
with dirt, and had been riding up and down the lines all night; but he
bore no trace of fatigue.
When he saw us he called out, "Hello, _muchachos_! Well, how do you like
it?"
"Fine, _mi General_!"
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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