It was this large planting, which went on from 1900 to 1914, which caused the first glimmering of the idea of “direct action” on the part of the hacendados, the growers of the sisal. It takes seven years for henequen plants to come into bearing, and the prospect of immensely increased production and probably lowered prices inspired the first idea of a pool which would maintain the old price levels. In 1912 a scheme for regulating the price of henequen was first presented to his fellows by a Yucatan hacendado. His idea was not so much to create an artificial shortage by storing the hemp, as to form some sort of organization which would have first chance to buy the henequen crop and thus make the hacendados participants in the profits made by the jobbers or middlemen. The organization which resulted, in 1914, was called the “_Comisión Reguladora del Mercado de Henequén_” (Commission for Regulating the Henequen Market), or, for short, the “Reguladora.” It was not, however, a great success, for the Reguladora was only an organization buying in competition with the old established agents, and the growers still pursued their own immediate interests in seeking their markets. Coöperation has never been one of the outstanding virtues of the Mexicans, and in the selling of their crops the Yucatecan hacendados have never shown any sign of a break away from the national individualism. The hacendados have always done their business in Merida, the capital and business center of Yucatan. They pass from one sunlit office to another, wailing dismally over the terrible prices the comfortably ensconced buyers offered them and their unfortunate fellows, but seeking and ready at a momentary hint to drive a bargain which would cut their neighbors’ throats on the possible chance of a temporary personal profit. The gentlemanly agreement of the Reguladora was not, under these circumstances, a controlling factor in the henequen market. This was the situation when, in March, 1915, General Salvador Alvarado, a doughty retainer of President Carranza, “captured” the state of Yucatan with an army of 8,000 men which he had brought from Vera Cruz. Although Mexico has been in revolution since 1911, Yucatan had, till this time, taken little part, accepting new governors with mild surprise but no opposition as one administration succeeded another in Mexico City. Yucatan is a great peninsula far to the east of the Mexican mainland, unconnected by railways, and thirty-six hours’ journey by fast steamer across the Gulf of Mexico from Vera Cruz. The Yucatecans have always considered themselves as a people somewhat apart from other Mexicans, and during many of the revolutions previous to Diaz, the peninsula remained aloof and politically independent, re-entering the Mexican confederation only toward the close of the pre-Diaz era.