Civilization and Barbarism/Chapter 12
CHAPTER XII.
SOCIAL WAR.
"Les habitants de Tucuman finissent leurs journées par reunions champêtres, ou, à l'ombre de beaux arbres, ils improvisent, au son d'une guitare rustique, des chants alternatifs dans le genre de ceux que Théocrite et Virgile ont embellis. Tout, jusqu' aux prénoms grecs, rappelle au voyageur étonne l'antique Arcadie."—Malté-Brun.
CIUDADELA.
The expedition departed, and the people of San Juan breathed once more as if awakening from a horrible nightmare. Facundo displayed in this campaign a spirit of order and a rapidity of march which showed how much he had learned from past disasters. In twenty-four days he passed over with his army about three hundred leagues; so that he came near surprising some squadrons of the enemy which only became aware of his approach when he took up his quarters at Ciudadela, an old encampment of the patriot armies under Belgrano. It would be inconceivable how such an army as that commanded by Madrid, at Tucuman, with brave officers and experienced soldiers, could be conquered, if moral causes and prejudices against strategy did not solve the enigma.
General Madrid, commander-in-chief, had under him Colonel Lopez, a provincial leader from Tucuman, who was personally opposed to him; and, besides that, a retreat demoralizes troops. General Madrid was not the man to govern inferior officers. The army went into battle half-federal and half-montonero in spirit, while that of Facundo had the unity produced by terror and obedience to a leader who is not a cause but a person! and who on this account overcomes free-will and destroys individuality. Rosas triumphed over his enemies by that power, which made all his satellites passive instruments and blind executors of his supreme will.
The evening before the battle, Colonel Balmaceda asked of the general-in-chief permission to make the first charge. If it had been allowable for a battle to begin with a cavalry charge, or for an inferior officer to take the liberty of suggesting it, the battle would have been gained; for nothing in Brazil or the Argentine Republic had ever been able to withstand the charges of the second regiment of cuirassiers. The General acceded to the demand of the commander of the second; but Colonel Lopez declared that this would take away some of his best men; for to him the select troops had been given in charge, which, according to rule, form the reserve; therefore the general-in-chief, not having sufficient authority to stop these disputes, sent back to the reserve the invincible battalion, and the brave officer commanding it.
Facundo deployed his men at such a distance as to shelter them from the infantry commanded by Barcala, and to weaken the effect of eight pieces of artillery directed by the intelligent Arengreen. Could Quiroga have foreseen what his enemies were first doing? In a previous battle he had shot his own victorious officer for not pursuing with an inferior force the defeated enemy.
From one end to the other of Quiroga's line the soldiers trembled with terror, not of the enemy, but of their chief, who walked up and down behind the line, brandishing his lance. They could only hope to escape from this oppressive terror by throwing themselves upon the enemy. They rushed forward, broke the line of bayonets merely to put something between them and the image of Facundo, which pursued them like a phantom. Thus on one side reigned terror, and on the other anarchy. At the first attempt to charge, the cavalry of Madrid gave way, the reserve followed, and there only remained five officers, with the artillery, whose discharges became fainter and fainter, and the infantry, which rushed to a hand-in-hand fight with the enemy. But why say more? The victor should give the details of a battle.
Consternation reigned in Tucuman; immense numbers emigrated, for this was Facundo's third visit. The following day a contribution was levied. Quiroga, knowing that there were valuables hidden in a church, questioned the sacristan, who, being a silly fellow, answered with a laugh, for which he was shot on the spot. The chests of the general were soon filled with gold; therefore it is not strange that the guardian of San Francisco and the priest Colombres, were the next victims of the lash. Facundo then visited the prisoners, counted out the officers, and retired to rest after his fatigue, leaving orders for them to be shot.
Tucuman is a tropical country, where Nature has displayed its greatest pomp; it is the Eden of America, and without a rival on the surface of the earth. Imagine the Andes covered with a most luxuriant vegetation, from which escape twelve rivers at equal distances, flowing parallel to each other, until they converge and form a navigable stream, which reaches to the heart of South America. The country watered by these branches comprises more than fifty leagues. Primeval forests cover the surface, and unite the gorgeousness of India with the beauties of Greece.
The walnut interlaces its long branches with the mahogany and ebony; the cedar and the classic laurel grow side by side, and beneath these the myrtle consecrated to Venus; still leaving space for the fragrant spikenard and the white lily.
A belt of odoriferous cedar allows a passage through the forest, which is everywhere else impassable because of the thick and thorny rose-bushes. The old trunks are covered with various species of flowering mosses, and the bindweed and other vines festoon and entwine all these different trees.
Over all this vegetation, which defies the brush of fancy in combination and richness of coloring, fly myriads of golden butterflies, brilliant humming-birds, green parrots, blue magpies, and orange-colored toucans. The sound of these noisy birds greets one all day long like the roar of a cataract.
Major Andrews, an English traveller, who has devoted many pages to the description of these beauties, relates that he used to go out every morning to enjoy the sight of this magnificent vegetation, and that he often penetrated far into the thick, aromatic forests, so enraptured that only after his return home did he know that his clothes were torn, and his face scratched and bleeding. The city is surrounded for many leagues by a forest of orange-trees, rounded to about the same height, so as to form a vast canopy supported by millions of smooth columns. The rays of the torrid sun have never shone upon the scenes which are enacted under this immense roof. The young girls of Tucuman pass the Sundays there, each group choosing a convenient place. According to the season, they gather fruit or scatter blossoms under the feet of the dancers, who are intoxicated with the rich perfume and the melodious sounds of the guitar. Perhaps one might believe this description to be taken from the "Thousand and One Nights," or other Eastern fairy tale; but I cannot half describe the voluptuous beauty of these damsels, daughters of the tropics, as they recline for their siesta beneath the shade of the myrtles and laurels, enjoying such odors as would bring asphyxia upon one unaccustomed to the atmosphere.
Facundo went into one of these recesses formed by shady branches, perhaps to consider what he should do to the poor city fallen into his hands, like a squirrel into the paw of a lion. Presently a deputation of young girls, radiant with youth and beauty, approached the place where Facundo was lying upon his poncho. The bravest and most eager led the way, hesitating from time to time. Those who followed urged her forward; then all paused, seized with fear. They glanced at one another for encouragement; then, advancing timidly, stood before him. Facundo received them kindly, made them sit down around him, and asked the object of their visit. They came to beg for the lives of the officers who were to be shot. Sobs, smiles, all the little fascinations of women were put in requisition to obtain their charitable end. Facundo seemed deeply interested, and smiled benignantly; he wished to hear from each one, of their families, their homes, a thousand details which seemed to please him; and thus passed an hour of expectation and hope. At last he said to them, with the greatest complacency, "Do you hear those guns? It is too late: they are shot." A cry of horror arose, like that which escapes from a flock of doves pursued by a falcon. They had indeed been shot—and how? Thirty-three officers, from the rank of colonel upwards, received the fatal balls entirely naked. Two brothers, sons of one of the first families of Buenos Ayers, embraced each other at the last moment, so that the body of one prevented the ball from reaching the other. The latter cried, "I am saved." A mistake, unfortunate one! How much he would have given to live. While confessing, he had taken a ring from his mouth, where it was concealed, and had charged the priest to give it to his betrothed; who, on receiving it, lost her reason, and never again recovered it.
The cavalry took charge of the corpses, and dragged them to the cemetery; so that bits of brain, arms, and legs remained on the square of Tucuman, and served as food for the dogs. How many victories are thus tarnished!
Don Juan Manuel Rosas had killed in the same manner and almost at the same time, at St. Nicholas de los Arroyos, twenty-eight officers, not to speak of more than a hundred assassinations. If anything can add to these horrors, it is the fate of Colonel Arraya, the father of eight children, and a prisoner, witk three lance wounds in his shoulder. He was forced to enter Tucuman on foot, naked, bleeding, and loaded with eight guns. Exhausted with fatigue, a bed was allowed him in a private house. At the hour appointed for his execution, which was to take place on the public square, some musketeers forced their way into the house and pierced him with balls in his bed; leaving him to die in the flames of the burning sheets.
Colonel Barcala, the celebrated negro, was the only chief saved from this butchery. He was the ruling spirit of Cordova and Mendoza, and the civic guard idolized him. He was an instrument that they might preserve for the future.
On the following day a process was commenced throughout the city, called sequestration. It consisted in placing sentinels at the doors of all the shops, warehouses, leather and tobacco stores, tanneries, indeed everywhere, for there were no Federals. Federalism is a plant which grew there only after the soil was "three times watered with blood by Quiroga, and once; more by Oribe. Now it is said there are some Federals, as is proved by their ribbon, upon which is written, "Death to the savage Unitarios."
All movable property, and the flocks and herds, were claimed by Facundo. Two hundred and fifty carts each loaded with sixteen beeves, were sent to Buenos Ayres. The European goods were gathered to be sold at auction by the commanders. Everything was offered for a low price. Facundo himself sold shirts, women's skirts, and children's clothes, unfolding and showing them to the crowd; any bid was received; the sale was soon finished; the affair was a success,—the crowd was dense.After a few days, however, purchasers were scarce, and embroidered handkerchiefs were offered in vain for four reales—there was nobody to buy. What had happened? Did the people repent? Not at all; but there was no longer any money in circulation. The contributions on one hand, sequestration on the other, the auction finally, had taken the last medio in the province. If indeed a few still remained in the hands of the officials, the gaming-table emptied their purses. Leather bags filled with money were piled in front of the general's house, and remained there all night unguarded; for the passers-by did not even dare to look at them.
And yet the city had not been abandoned to pillage, nor had the soldiers had that immense booty. Quiroga used to say to his friends in Buenos Ayres that he never permitted his men to pillage, because of the immorality of the thing. A farmer once complained to him that some soldiers had stolen his fruit, and ordering the regiment before him, he discovered the guilty ones, who each received six hundred lashes; the terrified old man begged that the victims might be spared, and was threatened with a share of the punishment. This is the gaucho nature: he kills because his leader commands him to kill, and does not steal because he is not commanded to steal. It might seem strange that these men should not rebel and throw off the dominion of one who gave them nothing in exchange for their valor or their lives, did we not know from Don Juan Manuel Rosas how much terror can do, not only with the poor gaucho, but with the illustrious general and the proud, wealthy citizen. As I have already said, terror produces greater results than patriotism.A colonel of the army of Chili, Don Manuel Gregorio Quiroga, Federal ex-governor of San Juan, and, at that time, a major-general in Quiroga's army, perceived that this booty of half a million was destined for the general alone, who would not hesitate to box the ears of an officer for keeping a few reales from the sale of a handkerchief. He therefore conceived the idea of obtaining his pay by abstracting several valuable rings from the general stock. But Facundo found out the theft, and had him tied to a post to be publicly humiliated; and when the army returned to San Juan, the major-general went on foot over almost impassable ground yoked with a bull. The companion of the bull expired at Catamarca without attracting any notice. At another time Facundo, having found out that a young man by the name of Rodriguez, of high standing in Tucuman, had received letters from the exiles, had him arrested, conducted him to the square himself, tied him up, and ordered him to receive six hundred lashes. But the soldiers did not administer the punishment skillfully enough, and Quiroga took the leather straps used for the purpose, and swinging them through the air with his mighty arm, gave fifty lashes by way of example. At the end of the performance he himself poured salt water over the back, and picked off the bits of skin from the wounds. This done, he went home and read the intercepted letters, in which were messages from husbands to wives, charges not to be uneasy about them, together with receipted bills for merchants, etc., but not a word of politics. Quiroga then asked for Rodriguez, but hearing that he was dying, sat down to cards, and won immense sums. Don Francisco Reto, and Don N. Lugones, were heard murmuring at the horrors they witnessed, and each received three hundred lashes, with an order to walk home through the streets naked, their hands over their heads, and their backs dripping blood; armed soldiers following at a little distance to see the sentence duly executed. To what a degree of indifference men may be brought by an infamous tyrant against whom there is no appeal, was shown by Don Lugones, who, turning to his companion in punishment, said, "Hand over a cigar, and let's have a smoke."
Dysentery prevailed at that time in Tucuman, and the physicians said there was no remedy for it, that it came from mental causes, from terror, a disease for which no remedy has yet been found in Buenos Ayres. One day Facundo presented himself before the house of a young widow who had taken his fancy, and asked some children who were playing at the door, where the lady was; one of the boys answered that she was not in. "Go tell her I am here," said Quiroga. "What is your name?" asked the boy, who, when the other replied, "I am Facundo Quiroga," fell down senseless, and has only recently recovered his reason.
A young girl having excited his admiration, he proposed to take her to San Juan. It can be imagined how the poor girl received this proposition from a tiger. Stammeringly she said that she could not; that her father. Facundo went to the father, and the miserable man, trying to conceal his horror, took courage to say that perhaps he should abandon his daughter, and she would be unprotected. Facundo declared that he should have no cause for that objection; and the unhappy father, still hoping to put him off or to gain time, proposed that a paper should be drawn up and signed; but Facundo immediately wrote and signed the required document, and passed it to the other for his signature. At the last moment the father asserted himself in the man, and he cried, "Kill me! but I will not sign." "Ah, old rascal!" cried Facundo, leaving the house in a rage.
Quiroga, the champion of the provinces, as he called himself, was barbarous, avaricious, lustful, and gave himself up to his passions without restraint; his successor did not rob cities, nor outrage women; he had only one passion,—the thirst for human blood and despotism. Instead, he knew how to use words and forms which satisfy the indifferent, such as: the savages, the bloodthirsty creatures; perfidious, wretched Unitarios; the perfidious minister of Brazil; the dirty money of France; the iniquitous claims of England;—words thus sufficing to cover the longest and most frightful series of crimes that the nineteenth century has witnessed. Rosas! Rosas! I bow before thy mighty wisdom. Thou art as great as the Plata, as the Andes! Thou alone hast discovered how contemptible are the liberties, the knowledge, and the pride of mankind: Trample upon them all; let all the governments of the civilized world honor thee, the more insolent thou art. Abuse them! thou wilt always find dogs to snatch up the spoils thrown to them!
In Tucuman, Salta, and Jujui, a great, progressive, industrial movement was interrupted by the invasion of Quiroga. Dr. Colombres, whom Facundo loaded with manacles, had introduced and encouraged the cultivation of sugar-cane, for which the climate is so well adapted. He had bought plants from Havana, sent agents to the mills of Brazil to study the processes and apparatus; succeeded in distilling the molasses; and did not rest until ten mills were established and in successful operation. But this was scarcely accomplished when Facundo turned his horses into the fields of cane, and destroyed the mills.
An agricultural society was already publishing its proceedings, and preparing to attempt the cultivation of indigo and cochineal. At Salta, looms and workmen had been brought from Europe for weaving woolen goods, cloth, carpets, etc., all of which had turned out profitably. But what particularly occupied the attention of those cities was the navigation of the Bermejo, the great stream which flows between the two provinces, unites with the Paraná, and thus provides an outlet for the valuable productions of that tropical country. The future prosperity of those beautiful provinces depended upon turning their streams to the uses of commerce; from poor inland cities, with small populations, their capitals might in ten years be converted into great centres of civilization and wealth, if, under the protection of an able government, their inhabitants could devote themselves to removing the slight obstacles in the way of their progress. Nor are these chimerical dreams of a possible but distant future.
In North America, not only hundreds of large, populous cities, but even whole States have sprung up throughout the region watered by the Mississippi and its branches, in less than ten years. And the Mississippi is not more available for commerce, than the Paraná; nor do the Ohio, Illinois, or Arkansas water a larger or richer territory than the Pilcomayo, Bermejo, Paraguay, and so many other great rivers which designate the path to be taken by the people who shall hereafter inhabit the Argentine Republic. Rivadavia considered the navigation of the inland rivers of the greatest importance; an association was formed at Salta and Buenos Ayres with a capital of half a million dollars for this purpose, and Sala had made his voyage and published a map of the river. How much time has since been lost from 1825 to 1845! And how long will it still be before God shall destroy the monster of the pampas?
For Rosas, in so obstinately opposing the free navigation of rivers, in pretending to fear European intrusion, in keeping up the hostility of the inland cities and leaving them to their own resources, does not simply obey the instinctive prejudice against foreigners, nor even the impulse of the ignorant native of the port who, possessing the seaport and the general custom-house of the Republic, does not care for the development of civilization and wealth of the whole nation, or see that this would fill the harbor with ships bearing the products of the interior, and the custom-house with merchandise. He follows, rather, the natural instinct of the gaucho of the pampas, who has a horror of water, a contempt for ships, and knows no greater delight than riding a good horse. What does he care for mulberry-trees, sugar, indigo, the navigation of rivers, European immigration, or anything beyond the narrow circle of ideas in which he has lived? What does he care for the progress of the interior when he himself is in the midst of wealth, possessing a custom-house which brings in two millions a year without any trouble on his part?
Salta, Jujui, Tucuman, Santa Fé, Corrientes, and Entre Rios, would now rival Buenos Ayres if the industrial movement so eagerly begun, could have continued. As it is, some of its results remain: Tucuman now has large sugar-presses, and distilleries, which would bring great wealth if the products could be carried with less expense to the coast and exchanged in Buenos Ayres for merchandise. But no evils are eternal, and a day must come when the eyes of this people will be opened, who are now denied all liberty of progress, and are deprived of all capable and intelligent men, who could carry on the great work, and bring about in a few years the prosperity for which Nature has destined this now stationary, impoverished, devastated country. Why are such men persecuted? Brave, enterprising men, who employed their lives in various social improvements, encouraging public education, introducing the cultivation of the mulberry and the sugar-cane, exploring the water-courses, with only the national interest at heart, and desiring no other reward than the satisfaction of serving their fellow-citizens! Why do we not see again arising the spirit of European civilization which, however feeble, did once exist in the Argentine Republic? Why has the present government—more truly Unitarios in spirit than ever Rivadavia intended—never given a thought to the investigation of the inexhaustible and yet untouched resources of a favored soil? Why has not even a twentieth part of the millions employed in a fratricidal war been used to educate the people or to facilitate trade? What has been given to this people in exchange for its sacrifices and sufferings? A red rag! This is the extent of the government's care of them for fifteen years; this is the only measure of the national administration; the only relation between master and slave, the mark upon the cattle!