The Graphic continues:

"Mexico must now be conquered or left alone. The idea that intervention can be limited to the occupation of Tampico and Vera Cruz, is a fresh delusion which will be speedily shattered."

The Standard:

"The big stick which Roosevelt would have used long ago has at last been grasped. The door of peace is still open, but it rests with Huerta to avail himself of the chance."

The Daily Mail:

"If President Huerta has the sense with which he is generally credited in Europe, he will lose no time in making his amende honorable to the United States. That he should deliberately provoke war with so formidable a power on the question of a salute seems unthinkable."

The Mail believes that in the event of war and the ejection of Huerta a temporary protectorate of Mexico is inevitable and adds:

*"President Wilson is too wise and humane a ruler to consign a vast country to the sheer anarchy which is bound to follow the collapse of such a government as now exists in Mexico."

The Chronicle:

"That any sovereign state might, without loss of dignity have condoned the Tampico affront on receipt of the apology which Huerta has already tendered."

*This argument may also be applied to Villa and Carranza should they succeed.

CHAPTER XIV.

All this time the situation was unaltered in Mexico in relation to the condition of foreigners, and without relief from the nation whose duty is is to alleviate their sufferings.

The policy of the United States was one of wavering inaction. It did no more to forcibly command peace in Mexico than did any other nation, although its citizens were the greatest sufferers from the depredations of the Mexicans. No reprisal was made on the grounds of the murder and rape of its citizens, or the destruction of their possessions. Instead arms were permitted, by administrative edict, to cross the frontier for the Insurrectionists who are responsible for many murders, including the murder of the British subject Benton. Peace at any price was the attitude of the State Department.

This condition existed until an incident occurred which is best described in the words of the President of the United States, delivered to Congress on April 20th, 1914, as follows:

"Gentlemen of the Congress: It is my duty to call your attention to a situation which has arisen in our dealings with General Victoriano Huerta at Mexico City, which calls for action, and to ask your advice and co-operation in acting upon it.

"On the ninth of April a paymaster of the United States ship Dolphin landed at Iturbide bridge landing at Tampico with a whaleboat and boat's crew to take off certain supplies needed by the ship, and while engaged in load

ing the boat was arrested by an officer and squad of men of General Huerta's.

"Neither the paymaster nor anyone of the boat's crew were armed. Two of the men were in the boat when the arrest took place, and were obliged to leave it and submit to being taken into custody, notwithstanding the fact that the boat carried, both at her bow and at her stern, the flag of the United States.*

"The officer who made the arrest was proceeding upon one of the streets of the town with his prisoners when met by an officer of higher authority, who ordered him to return to the landing and await orders; and within an hour and a half from the time of the arrest, orders were received from the commander of the Huertista forces at Tampico for the release of the paymaster and his men.

"The release was followed by apologies from the commander and later by an expression of regret by General Huerta himself. General Huerta urged that martial law obtained at the time at Tampico; that orders had been issued that none should be allowed to land at Iturbide bridge; and that our sailors had no right to land there.

"Our naval commander at the port had not been notified of any such prohibition, and even if they had been, the only justifiable course open to the local authorities would have been to request the paymaster and his crew to withdraw, and to lodge a protest with the commanding officer of the fleet.

"Admiral Mayo regarded the arrest as so serious an affront that he was not satisfied with the apologies offered, but demanded that the flag of the United States

*General Huerta denies this. There is a very low railway trestle under which boats have to pass to the landing at Tampico from the River Panuco. The possibility of striking the flag pole in order to clear the trestle should be considered.

be saluted with special ceremony by the military commander of the port.

"The incident cannot be regarded as a trivial one, especially as two of the men arrested were taken from the boat itself that is to say, from territory of the United States; but had it stood by itself it might have been attributed to the ignorance or arrogance of a single officer. Unfortunately it was not an isolated case. A series of incidents have recently occurred which cannot but create the impression that representatives of General Huerta were willing to go out of their way to show disregard for the dignity and rights of this government, and felt perfectly safe in doing what they pleased, making free to show in many ways their irritation and contempt.

"A few days after the incident at Tampico an orderly from the United States ship Minnesota was arrested in Vera Cruz while ashore in uniform to obtain the ship's mail and was for a time thrown in jail.

"An official dispatch from this government to its embassy in Mexico City was withheld by the authorities of the telegraphic service until peremptorily demanded by our Charge d'Affaires in person.

"So far as I can learn such wrongs and annoyances have been suffered to occur only against representatives of the United States. I have heard of no complaints from any other government of similar treatment.

"Subsequent explanation and formal apologies did not and could not alter the popular impression which it is possible it had been the object of the Huertista authorities to create, that the government of the United States was being singled out and might be singled out with impunity, for slights and affronts in retaliation for its refusal to recognize the pretensions of General Huerta to be re

garded as Constitutional President of the Republic of Mexico.

"The manifest danger of such a situation was that such offenses might grow from bad to worse until something happened of so gross and intolerable a sort, as to lead directly and inevitably to armed conflict.

"It was necessary that the apologies of General Huerta and his representatives should go much further, that they should be such as to attract the attention of the whole population to their significance, and such as to impress upon General Huerta himself the necessity of seeing to it that no further occasion for explanations and professed regrets should arise.

"I therefore felt it my duty to sustain Admiral Mayo in the whole of his demand, and insist that the flag of the United States should be saluted in such a way as to indicate a new spirit and attitude on the part of the Huertistas.

"Such a salute General Huerta has refused and I have come to ask your approval and support in the course I now propose to pursue.

"This government can, I earnestly hope, in no circumstances be forced into war with the people of Mexico. Mexico is torn by civil strife. If we are to accept the tests of its own constitution it has no government. General Huerta has set his power up in Mexico City, such as it is, without right and by methods for which there can be no justification. Only a part of the country is under his control. If an armed conflict should unhappily come as a result of his attitude of personal resentment toward this government we should be fighting only General Huerta and those who adhere to him and give him their support, and our object would be only to restore to the