Mexico (75 page)

"Where did you get those bulls?" Clay asked and Don Alipio said proudly: "Way back our family was closely associated with the marquis of Guadalquivir in Seville. His daughter Leticia came over to Mexico to marry into the Spanish branch of our family. He raised fighting bulls in Spain. To help us get started, the marquis that's living now sent over as a gift a dozen animals seventeen years ago."

"Is that his brand on the animals?" Clay asked, pointing to the big G underlined by an undulating mark representing the
Guadalquivir River.

"On the older animals, yes. It's an honorable brand, that one, but look at the younger animals," and when Jubal had a chance to inspect a calf he saw the new brand, a large P with a heavy bar across the foot of the letter. Don Alipio said: "We hope that will become a mark of honor in the plazas of Mexico," and Clay asked: "You expect many to be built?" With great confidence the breeder said: "Many."

"You must have vast acreage here, to allow the bulls to roam wild," Clay said. Palafox replied proudly as they took cool drinks from an Indian who had followed with a bucket: "The original bishop and his thieving brother converted a quarter of a million of what you call acres to our family's use. In twenty-five years it grew to a third of a million, and in 1740 we had more than a million and a quarter acres. Then came the Revolution of 1810, much land was taken from us, and now we have only some five hundred thousand acres." My grandfather was astounded: 'That's still enormous. In the States you'd own much of the rich part of Virginia," but Don Alipio cautioned: "Anytime the troops march through the plaza, whssst, there goes another quarter million."

Dinner that night at the city home of the Palafoxes was a rare opportunity for an American intruder to witness the social life of an important Mexican citizen. Within a spacious courtyard surrounded by a high adobe wall topped by jagged fragments of broken glass stood a large house on a rise high enough to permit looking over the top of the wall to the pyramid. Three other Palafox couples would be dining with Don Alipio and his wife, and when Jubal arrived, the others were in the garden enclosed by a high wall and made tranquil by the sound of water as it trickled down over, rocks. They were what Clay had supposed a group of Palafoxes would be: the men trim and well preserved from constant life in the saddle, the women well groomed and reserved in manner. He could guess the age of no one but judged that they were all well under sixty. He could see that they were slightly embarrassed, more likely confused, as to why they should have been invited to meet an American army officer with the war less than a month in the past, and they supposed that Clay would speak no Spanish. They were, of course, like most cultivated Mexicans of that day proficient in French, but none spoke English, since it was held to be the vulgar language of business and Americans. But when Don Alipio told them: "The captain is comfortable in Spanish," their reserve softened, and they gradually opened up to a discussion on what terms the peace treaty might contain.

One Palafox man, somewhat older than Don Alipio, warned: "Mexico has adjusted itself to the loss of Texas, but we will never surrender California. We need those ports on the Pacific." Another agreed: 'True, we do have Acapulco, but it's not a major port, and it's cut off from most of Mexico by jungles and mountains."

Here Clay made his first observation: "It seemed to me as we tried to march up those endless hills that Veracruz was also cut off from the high plateaus we're on now," and the men wanted to know how the Americans had been able to push through the Mexican defenses. But when Jubal started to explain, he could see that they were not really interested, for as one man said: "In Mexico we have these wars constantly. One can hardly keep up with them," and another said: "Remember how, a few years ago, your father and mine marched out so bravely to crown Iturbide emperor of Mexico? He lasted two years and Santa Anna shot him."

The first speaker corrected him: "No, Santa Anna didn't do the actual shooting. He wasn't even there. But he did turn his men against the emperor and they did the shooting."

At this point, as my grandfather noted in the brief memoir he left his family, they went in to dinner, for it was approaching the time when Mexicans took their evening meal, eleven o'clock at night, and when they seated themselves in the massive sheepskin-covered armchairs at the huge oak table, Senora Palafox said from her place at the foot of the table: "We have a special entertainment for our guest," and signaled to a maid who brought into the dining room a girl of about eight dressed in a national costume of extraordinary charm: flowing skirt reaching to the floor, many lacy petticoats, colorful bodice, lovely shawl, high comb in her hair, and a bright ring on the middle finger of each hand.

"This is our Alicia," Don Alipio said proudly as he placed his arm around her, "our little China Poblana, and now she will explain to our guest from the north the legend of her beautiful dress." In a musical voice the child recited: "Many years ago on the Manila galleon that arrived in Acapulco came this beautiful Chinese lady, dressed as you see me tonight. She came as a slave, but she was so charming that everyone loved her and she married the king, and all the ladies at court had to dress the way she did. And today this is our national costume." Bowing to each of the couples, she curtsied to her mother and left the room.

"A few minor corrections," Don Alipio said. "We never had a king in Mexico since the time of Montezuma, and the ladies were not forced to dress like the Chinese slave. They wanted to, but Alicia was correct, that is our national costume for pretty women," and each of the Palafox wives confessed that even till this day they kept as treasures the China Poblanas they had worn as young girls.

I have spent more time than I probably should have in writing about this evening, and especially the party dress of an eight-year-old girl, but that particular dress became one of the cherished treasures of my family, and Jubal, not an emotional man, wrote shortly before he died: "I was twenty-four that night I dined with the Palafoxes, and I confess I was struck by the peaceful character of their handsome home. They scarcely knew there had been a war."

That night as he tried to sleep in his room at the House of Tile, he lay awake trying to decipher why the Palafoxes were being so attentive. He did not have to wait long for an explanation because the next day the three men who'd been at dinner came to the hotel and suggested that he ride with them out to the Mineral, and when they arrived at the site he had wanted to revisit, they began to explain how this precious property, which they owned, could be converted into one of the world's top mines with the injection of substantial amounts of American money and especially engineering skills.

A man whom he judged to be Don Alipio's brother kept hold of Clay's arm as he explained: "It's not just money we need, but machines, too. They make fine ones in Sweden, I'm told. But above all, we need bright young men like you. Am I correct that you studied mining?"

"I learned trying it on my land in Virginia, after reading books sent from England and Germany."

"Is that why your general sent you out here? Is he a bright man, can he understand a business opportunity when it stares at him?"

Clay replied: "General Scott holds businessmen in contempt," and the Mexicans laughed: "Like our generals, and what fools they are."

In less than an hour the Palafoxes had shown Grandfather the entire surface structure of the Mineral, indicating which buildings and processes would be replaced if funds were available, and then they asked: "Suppose you were in charge? What would you do?" and Clay said: "Around the entrance to the mine I'd build a stone wall, maybe three feet high, with a gate through which you'd get to the shaft."

"Why would you do that?"

"I like to see things neat. No, what I mean is, there are always certain things that ought to be done, just for their own sake."

The Palafoxes asked: "Would you be willing to go down again?" and Clay said: "I would indeed. That's why I wanted to come. This place is magical," and on the descent he watched carefully to see if he could detect which of the hundreds of stone steps ought to be recut.

In the bottom cavern he saw, as if they were old friends, the donkeys, the Indian men working at the face, the women hefting baskets of ore, the high ceiling and the beginning of the shaft that would take the miners down to where the next cavern would be excavated. As he explored the present one and saw the rude beds used by the men who preferred not to climb back to the top each night, he began to contemplate seriously the improvements a real mining engineer would probably undertake, and he asked one of the Palafoxes: "How difficult would it be to square the sides of the shaft?"

"You mean, all the way down?"

"Yes. It's one of those things that ought to be done."

"You'd better ask him." The man indicated the Spanish engineer, but Don Alipio said firmly: "That one knows nothing," so there was no answer to Clay's question.

"Well," Clay continued, "if the shaft was squared off and we found an engine of some kind, and I'm sure they make them in England, you could have a long rope and a cage at the end, and you could haul the ore up to the smelter."

"What would be the advantage?"

"Well, these women, they wouldn't have to climb up an
d d
own those--"

"They've done it all their lives, Captain. That's how they live--I mean, earn their living. If you did it with a machine from England, how would they live?"

On the climb up, Jubal had an opportunity to inspect at eye level each step as he approached it. At the top he told the
Palafoxes: "I saw four steps that ought to be recut," and one explained: "We keep careful watch, and if something bad happens, we're there that afternoon."

Grandfather stayed in Toledo three weeks, making excursions out into the country, and on one he came upon Valley-of
-
the-Dead, from which the Altomecs had launched their conquest of the Drunken Builders, and he appreciated what an enticing sight the buildings of Toledo must have been in 1151, when the strangers swept in to take control. He also visited the Palafox bull ranch again, and twice more he climbed to the top of the pyramid, trying to visualize the fearful things that had occurred there. But most of all he frequented the central plaza, with its fine buildings, and the splendor of this colonial city was impressed in his mind.

When it came time to say good-bye to the Palafoxes, they said they hoped he would report favorably to the general, and he promised he would. He bade farewell to each of the Palafox women, and then saw little Alicia, to whom he bowed deeply: "Farewell, Senorita China Poblana," and he was off.

On the ride back to Mexico City his troops ran into trouble, not from the Mexican army, which had been instructed to honor his safe conduct, but from the bandits who infested all highways and who had learned that an attack on an American unit, while risky, produced rich rewards. About ten miles past Queretaro, where wealthy travelers were often spotted on their way to the capital, the bandits struck, and for nearly half an hour there was heavy firing, but Jubal and the petty officer in charge of the cavalry so ably kept their men under control that the sorties were repulsed with two bandits dead and no Americans killed. It had been a spirited fight; for which Clay would earn another commendation and a medal.

Upon his return to the office he occupied with the other aides he found General Scott in pitiful condition. Still convinced that everyone was plotting against him--and many in fact were--he had ordered the arrest of three of his subordinate generals, including President Polk's personal spy, the infamous General Pillow; but they in turn had brought charges against him. The liberal Democrats in Washington, seeing a chance to spike Scott's conservative Whig ambitions for the presidency, ordered the charges against the three generals dropped, while those against Scott were to be prosecuted with a general court
-
martial. Clay helped Scott write his protest to headquarters: "Never has a general accomplished so much with so little and in reward has been so savagely abused and humiliated by his superiors."

In later years when Clay told this story he would conclude: "And I wanted to add my postscriptum: 'You ought to be ashamed of yourselves to treat a general this way,' but when I tried to say this to the general himself, he brushed me aside: 'It's what happens when politicians try to direct wars.' "

My grandfather told one more story about his duty with Scott: "At breakfast on the morning I was to leave, Scott was under a kind of military arrest. Charges that he had stolen funds or something like that, and when it came time to say good-bye he said: 'You know, Clay, I never intended being a soldier. Back in 1807 I was admitted to the bar and considered my course in life well set. But I had barely started when the British frigate Leopard committed an outrage against our ship Chesapeake. I heard about it late in the evening, and that night, with no sleep, I bought a fine charger, rode twenty-five miles in the dark, and borrowed the uniform of a tall trooper. At sunrise I offered myself as a volunteer to a cavalry unit.

" 'I never looked back, Clay, and when this mess is cleared up, which I'm sure it will be, I propose to be the chief officer of the United States military forces.'

" 'How could that be?' I asked in amazement, and he said: 'Because if they have any sense they'll see that I'm the best man available--by far. And they'd have to choose me.' And it happened just as he said. When our Civil War broke out, he was placed in charge of all Union forces, and he did a brilliant job of establishing the great design that defeated us. Three hundred and fifty pounds, subject to fainting fits, suspicious of everyone and hated as few military men have ever been, he was the architect of Union victory, and as a Confederate fighting against his strategy, I cursed every time his name was mentioned."