A Portuguese Cinema

I

November 9 [1918].
A SENSATIONAL hoax, yesterday: the Diario de Noticias came out with the announcement of the signing of the armistice, ‘ at five o’clock! ’ Like magic, flags began to appear at every window, at the top of every building; the streets were soon thronged by an uneasy holiday crowd, expectant, keyed up, anxious to miss nothing, to be in it. Hawkers were selling tiny Allied flags: ‘Buy the winning colors!’ A mob collected at the corner of the Rocio and the rua do Carmo, in front of a large Spanish banner, hung out on a line between two Portuguese flags. They watched me closely as I passed. I knew that any expression of the disgust I felt would be taken as a signal for operations, and maintained my neutrality. I heard, later, that a demonstration had taken place, with an attempt to burn the flag!
We spent the day telephoning to all the legations and being telephoned to! Little Silva Graça, the owner of the Seculo, was fairly green with anxiety. What a disgrace for his paper, if the news were confirmed! He held up his evening edition several hours, hoping for something definite. But what a crushing triumph, this morning! His intense relief after that horrible scare, that nightmare, is expressed in epithets toward the rival that might well scorch the paper. The rival is too far gone to recant and persists in its error. ‘We have it from a sure source,’ says the voice at the other end of the wire. In the evening there were a few fireworks, scattered groups singing and parading. Up to ten o’clock, no confirmation. Colonel Darcy, Aerts, and I joined the crowds and wandered around. We felt half pleased and half resentful. If we could only liberate all of France first! Drive the Boches out in a rout, smash them, humiliate them. Colonel Bernard, the French Military Attaché, was almost weeping with rage. He was a prisoner, badly wounded, in Germany three years. We tried to work up some cheer: thought the conditions must be sufficiently hard to make the Boche feel whipped, as is necessary for the future peace of the world, and just. We got reconciled to the idea, thought of the precious lives saved — and now, it’s all uncertain again! I think they’ll wait until the end of their seventy-two hours, hoping for something to happen, some weakening at the last, bluff, and surrender. The twilight of the Junkers!

November 12. It was on the strength of the fake news of the armistice that Colonel Darcy issued invitations to a luncheon, for Monday the eleventh. The lack of confirmation was only a passing cloud. ‘What if they refuse to sign, the swine: we’ll have a jolly good luncheon just the same! I say, old chap, let’s go ahead.’ So we did. I helped arrange the ménu and went foraging with the colonel, while Magdalena was kept busy bringing up bottles in her large marketbasket. ‘ We ought to have a damnable good time!’ the colonel declared; and as we were planning the seating, ‘Put me anywhere, only, I say, old chap, place that nice Miss Brown next to me. Jolly desirable girl!’
We’d forgotten place-cards! I hastily improvised some, and, as a surprise, Germanized all the names. Cormon, the lady-killer with the fatal gift of attraction, was von Herzbrecher; Rossi rejoiced in the title of Graf Spaghetti Trentinenberg; Aerts, coming from Lille, had to be von Lillienthal, etc. The colonel’s Irish open-heartedness had made him invite about twice as many as we had originally planned for, and the seating arrangement was completely upset at the last minute. Everyone squeezed in as best he could; we were packed around the table as tight as sardines; but it was a happy crowd and the best party of the year. Songs between courses. ‘He’s a jolly good fellow, and so say all of us’ — a variant I had n’t heard before. The English girls’ pronunciation of ‘Over there,’ with dipthongized o, and of ‘Yanks,’ amused me.
Everyone made a speech. After the colonel, Rossi: a roaring success, delivered in English from phonetic notes made by Aerts. Rossi’s vocabulary does n’t go much beyond ‘Ow-yess!’ He felt he must do himself justice, however, and delivered a very eloquent discourse in Italian. He had a peculiar way of repeating a phrase while in search of another, the repetition in a louder, almost challenging tone, reminding one of the promising growl of a self-starter. Aerts spoke next, then de Viguerie, and Rossi began to rout out the shy ones, enthusiastically calling for toasts and drinking them, in port, out of a sizeable beer-glass!
I said a few words in French, returning compliments, praising the French and British armies, and then caught Rossi’s eye! A nice break! ‘As for the Italians,’ I added checking the impulse to sit down in a desperate effort to save myself, ‘I feel some hesitancy about praising them, as they are like brothers, for is n’t New York the second largest Italian city in the world!’ etc.
Rossi came over to embrace me. We left the table at four-thirty, and joined the celebrating throngs on the streets. Aerts and I had barely sat down at the hotel, just before six, when Rossi rushed in, in great excitement. His minister had been looking for him all afternoon; he was giving a dinner at Estoril to the Italian Chamber of Commerce, and wanted Aerts and me to represent our countries. ‘We start at six. The automobiles are in front of the hotel. Come quickly!’ Rossi was all flustered; he had been running all over the place to collect his guests, he said, and had wrung his hands several times at my office.
We climbed into a gay car, covered with flags and bunting, and started off amid cheers, the waving of hats, and tossing of caps in the air!
Half-way to Estoril, our car broke down. One had already passed us and our only hope was in number three. It was quite cold on that lonely road, and I was making sarcastic remarks to myself about the superiority of French cars, when the owner of our wreck drew up and assured me that his Paige was an excellent machine, but what could you expect with such a chauffeur! Number three was finally heard rattling along. It was one of those monstrous old traps made in the early days of the automobile, such as you sometimes meet in Vermont and New Hampshire thundering up and down hills. It received us all and chugged along powerfully with its twelve passengers! I had chosen the seat with the chauffeur, where it was as warm as in a Ford, and held on to the Italian flag, rescued from the other car.
The dinner was the most amusing thing I have yet done. I sat opposite the Italian Minister and next to an elderly gentleman everyone called ‘Papa’ Somebody, a very clever and interesting man who has lived many years in Constantinople. Aerts was across, then the Secretary of the Legation and the President of the Chamber of Commerce. Altogether the most mixed crowd imaginable: diplomats, soldiers, prominent members of the Italian colony, many untutored, all moneyed. One, a multimillionnaire, had come out of jail that very day, after serving a term for profiteering, in wheat, I believe. He was so pleased to be asked that he pulled out his check-book, at the table, and ecco! gave a thousand dollars to the Italian War Relief!
Marconi Napolitani started the dinner. I took only a slender helping, for looks, — as the fumes of cheese were strong, — and thereby created a sensation, almost an uproar: all eyes were suddenly fixed upon me, some with suspicion. Was it modesty? I explained that I adored spaghetti, but cheese never; and immediately all were pacified, smiling. Some even told stories about people they’d known, fine people too, who simply could n’t stand cheese. The minister asked for a special cheeseless dish for me; but there was none, and I was soon happily forgotten in the general enthusiasm of spearing the elusive wigglers. It was Pantagruelian. They simply put away yards and yards and took more helpings. Absolute silence, except for the tapping of forks and the smacking of lips; no time for talk until the sacred dish had been finished and all plates scraped clean. Then sighs of satisfaction, as they leaned back and wiped their mouths on the napkins they wore tucked in at the neck.
The minister is a very broad, very rotund little man, with a wide forehead, a pug nose, pop eyes, and flabby cheeks that give him the look of a Pekinese. We chatted together, later, and I found him gracious and very intelligent. Talking of racial traits, he wanted to know if I had any Russian blood in me! There are rare moments! As, for instance, when the French professor detected in me the modifications brought about by the American climate and environment, which tend to make us look like the Indian; when I, a pure Latin, am told confidentially that ‘We Anglo-Saxons ’ must stick together and rule the world! when I am taken for a Slav, and represent America, while France is represented by an Alsatian, a Basque, and a German once removed! It’s like topsy-turvy land!
Of course, there were speeches! An eloquent one by the minister and a very good one by Aerts. Each rose as the spirit moved him, and I felt uneasily conscious that it ought to move me, and soon. Not being an orator, I tried to be a diplomat. I waited until everyone had been thoroughly tired out by a very long and tedious discourse, — we listened to every speech standing, — and as all were about to sit down, I made their hearts sink by proposing a toast, and cheered them by making it very short and pleasing, taking for subject, Italia no longer Irredenta! No one had thought of those lost provinces Italy has been so longing for!
Then the ex-jail-bird rose. Round head, close-cropped gray hair, tired red-rimmed eyes. He wore a loosefitting, gray business suit; a large diamond sparkled in his ready-made black four-in-hand, and, as he spoke, his knotty hands kept twisting a heavy gold chain, rattling with watch-charms. It was a humble speech, in Portuguese, for he had evidently lost fluency in his native tongue during the long years of exile. He was only a working man, he said, holding out his open palms, a modest trabalhador, a self-made man. What was he, to stand there with the representative of His Majesty, with all their Excellencies?
The audience was touched and gave him a small ovation: ‘Bravo, Antonio! Ben’ ditto! ’ This success was too much for him. We were preparing to enjoy a well-earned rest, the steaming coffee before us, when, scraping his chair back, our Antonio arose again. ‘I am only a trabalhador, a humble working man; I started without a cent and made every penny I now have. Who am I that I should stand here with his Excellency, the minister?’ and so on.
It was getting wearisome, and this time the applause was perfunctory. Our trabalhador seemed puzzled, somewhat nettled, perhaps, at this coolingoff of enthusiasm. He sat moodily thinking it over a while, his thumbs stuck in his waistcoat pockets, and then, resolutely placing a heavy hand on the tablecloth, was about to brace himself up for a third effort. But a chubby, florid little chap had got ahead of him and was now standing at his place, amazed at his own rashness, petrified by feeling all those eyes fixed upon him. He remained speechless for some seconds, dazed, a simple foolish face and round eyes blinking at the light. ‘I too have made a fortune,’ he finally blurted out, ‘and I — I don’t know anything, either!’ And he sat down amid the good-natured applause and began to sob at the thought of how happy his old father would have been to see this day. Friends came closer and patted him, consoled him. ‘I have no family,’ he said between sniffles, ‘no family of my own, and I want to pay for this feast, all of it. This is the happiest day of my life; I would pay for it just the same, even if I had children to whom to leave my money. Viva Italia! Viva! Viva Genova! Viva! Evviva il Rei!’
The answering ‘Evviva!’ made the windows rattle. Such abandon, such gestures, whole-hearted cheers and embraces! Democracy is here, among the Italians, as nowhere else. No stiffness, no formality with these people; they all mix happily together, a certain instinctive good-breeding, tact, respect for authority, making them keep distances. The minister was like a father to them all. To one who had impulsively seized his hand and wished to kiss it, he opened his arms, and they embraced.
The only other speech, the last, was Homeric in its naïve boastfulness. ‘Who but I, with unequaled boldness, carried the flag of Italy in the wildest pampas, bringing with it our glorious civilization? Who explored and brought commerce to unknown African shores?’ A pompous, rather surly-looking man he was, with a tawny kaiser moustache, bristling scornfully upward.
His panegyric was interrupted by a blare of brasses, shrieking trombones, cymbals, and thundering bass-drums. All Estoril in a torch-light procession, led by the Sociedade Filarmonica Estorilense, had turned out to honor the noble Allies! We rushed to the door, behind the minister, who replied to the enthusiastic vivas, and before I knew what had happened, had thrust me in front of him, in full view of the shouting populace, strange in the flicker of the torches, and was introducing me as ‘The Great President Wilson’s Special Representative.’ It sounded as if I had been hurriedly sent down from Washington to greet the Estoril Glee and Trombone Club. Still, everyone was too happy to feel critical, and my eloquent ‘Viva Portugal e viva Sidonio Paes!’ was received with thunderous applause.
On the way back, the car baulked at every hill, and the nine passengers got out in shifts of three and pushed! The little villages through which we passed were alive with light and song, and we were cheered wildly by soldiers and people, and more and more the nearer we came to the town. The crowds were still dense in Lisbon, and our progress was a continuous ovation.
The management of the Apollo had given us boxes for a special performance of the Princeza Magalona; but we got there too late, after midnight, and went straight to Maxim’s, which had been selected as the gathering-place of the Allied clans. It has a beautiful ballroom, excellent music, and is accessible, being on the Avenida, a few yards from the hotel. We found the ladies of the legations having the time of their lives! In a real gambling club for the first time, examining everything and everybody, laughing and dancing, trying their luck at roulette, mixing with the habitués, who looked at them quite as curiously; all under the protection of diplomats, generals, colonels, down to yeomen first class!
Colonel Darcy was dancing like a seventeen-year-old and kept it up until 5 A.M. The very dignified and aristocratic counselor of the French Legation was having an uproarious time, whirling around on a lofty stool of the American Bar, and pouring colored cascades from one glass into another; while little Madame de Tilleman fluttered about anxiously with a forced smile of unconcern. Our staid Britishers were all a trifle mellow, and so unbelievably effusive that it made one regret the approach of the sobering dawn. If they could only be kept permanently in that state of geniality! I suppose that there really is n’t enough champagne in the world for that! There was stiff old Stone doing pirouettes, then turning the ballet-skirt back into a napkin and waiting soberly on the table where some of the party were supping! Sir Lancelot, somewhat lost without his monocle, stood on the edge of the crowd. I noticed him staring intently at an old yellow-and-blue cigarette-bag on the floor; he gave it a careless kick, picked it up cautiously, and brought it close to his eyes. ‘By Jove,’ he exclaimed, flushing slightly, as he caught my eye, ‘I thought it was a bank-note, you know! ’ He spoke with a deliberateness that emphasized the British pronunciation: ‘Ja-ove — na-ote.’
Every now and then, the band would strike up one of the Allied hymns, amid tremendous cheers and applause. The ‘Star-Spangled Banner,’ mangled and dragged into a dirge, passed almost unrecognized. ‘What is that?’ people asked. ‘They can’t be very happy in that country,’ a woman remarked. I sent word to the conductor to double the tempo, make it lively. He had just received the music, he explained, and not having practised, was going cautiously. His second attempt was more successful, although still tinged with gloom. I left the festivities at their height — at 5 A.M. So this is the end of the Great War! The climax of four years of suffering and sacrifice! One would have wished for a day of absolute peace, a day of dedication to those who gave their lives. To think of all the heroism, the devotion and faith of those who used to dream: ‘If only I could live to see that day!’ That day! How tawdry our celebration seems! And yet what could you expect, especially in a country that has felt the war so little and only indirectly? I was amazed even at the amount of feeling shown. Paris must have been glorious! Imagine the delirious joy, the singing, the dancing, the street enthusiasm, the wild ringing of bells! I wonder how it was in New York.

II

December 15.
The President was shot last night in the Rocio station, as he was about to take the train for Oporto. He died a half-hour later. I heard of the shooting a few minutes after it had happened, at midnight, and hurried out. The neighboring streets were heavily guarded; people were being challenged and held up by policemen who suddenly darted out from under the shadows of the theatre’s arcades and approached with leveled rifles. They were decidedly jumpy. I advanced deliberately, well under the glare of the arc-lights, was recognized, saluted, and passed on. The acrid smell of powder was in the air; in the excitement, the panic of the first moments, with no one to give orders, the police had lost their heads and fired into the crowd, killing or wounding a few innocents who had come to cheer the President, some army officers of his escort, and one or two other policemen.
It makes one feel desperate about these people. Sidonio Paes was really a strong man, clear-headed; a dictator, of course; but it is that, or having the country torn to pieces by the chacals of politicians. Now, who know? There is really no one to succeed him. There may be a coup d’état, a revolution. The cannon are booming salutes every fifteen minutes.
The minister, General Brainard, and I drove to Belem, to the palace, early this afternoon. The entrance-hall was thronged: people of all classes and conditions, men and women, peasants, diplomats, sailors, officers, and privates. We put down our names on some blackbordered sheets of paper, more or less crumpled and ink-spotted, and dropped cards of condolence. An usher showed us into the inner rooms. The President’s first aide, Camara, a burly chap, stood at the door of the ante-chamber, his big face puffed up with tears. We shook hands with him and tried to comfort him. The variety of expressions was interesting: soldiers on guard staring vacantly like peaceful ruminants; gentlemen showing the same bored indifference as at an ordinary formal function; others with reddened eyes. It was perhaps the contagion of emotion, but General B—’s aide, who knew the President even less than we did, had tears trickling down his cheeks.
We exchanged a few words with the Minister of Marine, a fine old man, who has been appointed acting head of the government, and passed on to where the body lay in state. It was a very humble little room, almost uncomfortable-looking. A narrow bed of plain white wood, varnished, a clothespress with mirrored door. On a table, at the foot of the bed, was an ordinary army sword and a blue-gray military cap, with a thin gold edge on the visor. The guard of honor was made up of two lines of soldiers, with a few sailors and a policeman or two. We stayed about ten minutes. The minister, before leaving, walked to the side of the bed and pressed his hand on the clasped hands, causing the body to move slightly; it gave me an unpleasant little sensation. I stood at attention, saluted, and followed the general out.
We found little Albuquerque, the second aide, at the door, sobbing. He’s a nice young chap, a descendant of the great navigator, and just worshiped the President. I tried to console him. ‘Oui, mais j’ai perdu mon chef, mon Président,’ he sobbed, ‘and now he can never see it.’
‘What?’ I asked.
‘The telegram of congratulations, here, from President Wilson; it would have pleased him so, but now he can never see it: it came too late.’
Outside, a voice arose, ‘Well, now,
ain’t it a calamity, hey?’ It was K— the representative of an American firm, looking very solemn. ‘It certainly took the stuffin’ out of the old fellow, did n’t it though?’
On our way home, we left cards on various ministers. Thirty days of mourning now, no Christmas, no New Year’s celebrations, and a dismal outlook.

December 16.
Bands of men and boys were going through the streets last night, cheering for their murdered President: hoarse shouts of ‘Viva Sidonio Paes. Viva!’ We were dining with Colonel Darcy — Major Stone, Rossi, and I. Rossi was more scornful than ever and declared this a perverted and degenerate country. I stood up for it, and reminded him that his own dear Italy had not always been without internal dissensions. Besides, I added, if he believed all he said, why did he propose to marry a Portuguese girl?
Rossi’s eyes seemed to dilate, then he began to laugh. ‘That man is never serious!’
The colonel wanted to know if it were true that the plump daughter of a former minister of state had broken off her engagement with a Portuguese officer, for his sake.
‘I will never marry an aristocratic girl,’ declared Rossi; and he gave a mimic of his idea of an aristocratic lady wrinkling his honest chubby face into a grimace and squeaking in affected tones. ‘ I will marry an Italian girl who can do everything, work hard, wash and cook, and be a lady too, and she will obey me absolutely!’
We roared, but he was intensely serious.
‘ Mon cher ami,’ he glared fiercely at me, ‘do you think, perhaps, I am a man who will be afraid of his wife?’
I studied him, and said solemnly, ‘From certain characteristics, certain traits of your physiognomy, I should say yes.’
Rossi was astonished and a trifle worried, but he grew stubborn. We evidently did n’t know him—and so on.
‘Do you consider yourself stronger than Julio Cesare and Marco Antonio?’ I asked.
‘No.’
‘Well, what about Cleopatra?’
‘That was in the old days!’
‘Pshaw!’ said the colonel, ‘if your wife ever gets angry, you will crawl under the table and beg permission to come out.’
‘She will allow you two cents a day for pocket money,’ said the major.
‘And four cents on your saint’s day and on especial festivals,’ I added.
Rossi was too indignant to speak.
‘She will take away from you your monthly pay!’
‘She will take it away from me? Never, mon cher ami!’
Rossi is an amusing combination of ingenuousness and shrewdness, for he is shrewd, and knows when it is profitable to keep on playing the fool. As the good man Lafontaine says, ‘Le plus âne . . . n’est pas celui qu’on pense.’

December 17.
The first feeling of horror and grief over the murder of Sidonio Paes found expression in a general desire to rally around the government. Parliament has just elected the Minister of Marine, Rear-Admiral Canto e Castro, Provisional President, to serve until a general election can be held and the new constitution voted on. He is a fine elderly man, dignified, upright, respected by all, and can be absolutely relied upon to be loyal to his oath of office, although his personal sympathies are with the Royalists. But the situation is extremely difficult, and calls for a man of unusual vigor as well as wisdom. Wild rumors of all sorts are rife: foreign intervention, sympathy of the Allied governments with the opposition, and so forth, showing a dangerous state of agitation and uncertainty.
Little news has come out about the assassination. The murderer declares that he acted alone and on his own responsibility, but most people are convinced that it was a political murder. ‘The Democrats got him.’ Some see a Masonic revenge, the Freemasons’ lodge, on the Chiado, having been broken into, sacked, and completely wrecked a few weeks ago. I have gathered interesting details from various sources, among them Captain Smith. His chief sent him out, immediately after the shooting, to collect what information he could. He, doubtless mindful of his training as a Hearst reporter, managed to force his way into the council-chamber where an emergency meeting of the Cabinet was being held, and stayed there during the whole session, the Portuguese being either too excited or too polite to show him the door, or perhaps too overcome with awe at this incredible — enterprise — as were our British and French colleagues, later, when they heard of it.
It seems shots were fired by two men: the first missed, but in the confusion ensuing, the second murderer squeezed past between two policemen, seized the President’s arm uplifted to his cap in salute, and shot him through the body. The President’s brother received a sword-cut over the head, accidentally, perhaps. It is also reported that assassins were in wait at Entroncamento, the railroad junction, and at Oporto, so as to make absolutely sure. Stories of forebodings and warnings are current: although strongly urged, the President refused to put off this trip or even change the hour of departure. ‘They’ll get me sooner or later,’ he answered. He was unusually depressed, and said to his aide upon leaving the palace, ‘I fear I’ll never come back from this trip.’ At the railway station, he expressed displeasure at the sight of the double line of infantry and police drawn up. ‘One would think the Tsar of Russia was expected! ’
A remark supposed to have been made by our minister, as he viewed the body at the palace, Sunday, is being repeated. It even came out as a headline in one of the papers. ‘He was too great a man for this small country.’ Colonel Darcy haw-hawed considerably about it and wondered whether it was a compliment!
Sidonio Paes was, without doubt, a strong man, and one whose services the country could ill afford to lose, at this time especially. A conservative, he sought to rally the various political groups: he had practically succeeded in winning the confidence of the Monarchists and was bringing about a reconciliation with the church. His programme of political and social reform was enlightened and broad, Albuquerque, his confidant, told me. ‘You must remember that he had been in power a few days over a year only,’ he said, ‘and that he was kept too busy thwarting constant plots and intrigues to be able to undertake any serious constructive work; but it was coming.’
It is a fact that he kept the jails filled to capacity, and the African colonies of Angola and Mozambique amply supplied with labor. The work of repression was carried out effectively and quietly, and only the very rare early risers ever met the heavy trucks bristling with policemen’s rifles and well laden with prospective colonists. Occasionally, too, you passed a procession of a dozen or so pale, sordidlooking men, the small fry, tramping toward prison under escort. I was told there were as many as ten thousand under arrest!
Sidonio Paes was suspected, by some, of pro-Germanism. They pointed out that he had spent many years as ambassador in Berlin, and that the activity of Portuguese troops at the front practically ceased after he came to power. A friend of his intimated, also, that he greatly disliked the British. It must be remembered, however, that the Portuguese troops received a terrific mauling from the Germans in the March drive, and that their losses were probably such as to incapacitate them for further action until they had had a long period for rest and reorganization.
Incidentally, this March drive is the cause of much ill-feeling between British and Portuguese. The British declare that the ’little blighters ran like rabbits,’ while the Portuguese side is that their troops were surrounded and suffered tremendous losses, from the fact that they kept on holding their line, unaware that the British had given way on both wings — some neglect or blunder in the communication services. It may be, too, that Sidonio Paes, determined by purely local considerations and without being in the least pro-German, decided that it would be foolish for Portugal to incur further losses in men and treasure, when her interests were not directly menaced, and especially with small prospect of adequate compensation. She had chosen the right side, proved herself true to the historic friendship with England, and might decently withdraw, without actually seeming to, by remaining inactive. I believe Sidonio Paes was, above all, a patriot, and his last words may well have been those reported: ‘Salvem a patria!' Save the country!

III

January 23.
This has been a day, and is still a night, for, at this very minute, motortrucks are rumbling down the Avenida, greeted all along with hoarse shouts; a confused clamor rises from the Rocio, four squares away, with now and then a shriller yell, and there is the intermittent boom of cannon far off, scattered rifle-fire, snipers are very active, and — bang — there goes a bomb with sullen roar, a peculiar, short, deadened sound. One wild day of revolution; I’ve never seen the like, nor a day more perfect. An indigo-blue sky, luminous and deep, a languorous heat, almost tropical. Women were at their windows with parasols; the only clouds were little fleecy bursts of shrapnel and ‘Viva Republica!’ ‘V’a r’poob艂l’ca,’ it sounds like, with a very strong ‘poob.’ Bullets sing past my windows. Jolly life, this, when perfectly irresponsible creatures, superexcited, mad with yelling, and intoxicated with the smell of powder, go about brandishing army rifles!
To begin properly: it was about time to start for the office when, boom! I looked out of the window and saw white smoke rising beyond the Rotunda, over the fort, which, with the Castello São Jorge, guards the city. What’s up now? I wondered. A few minutes later, boom, boom, and so on with increasing frequency. I was opening the door, when Maria rushed out of her kitchen, followed by Doña Pinto. ‘Não, the senhor must not go out!’ she said, barring the way. ‘They are all doido [crazy], and firing in the streets, and the Monarchist blue-and-white flag floats over the Rocio.’
That was startling news! I went back to my window. Nothing unusual, apparently: a boy shouting the morning paper ‘Yo Sec’; two or three men walking along; a woman balancing a huge hamper of turnips; ragged wretches basking drowsily on the benches.
I decided to go on. Doña Pinto and Maria were still in the corridor, discussing. An ‘ oficial estrangeiro,’ Lady Pinto declared, would be absolutely safe; while Maria argued that stray bullets make no distinctions. She ran down ahead of me, and mustered six or seven women and children at the street door to say a last farewell to the reckless foreign devil.
Of course, there was nothing extraordinary — no blue-and-white flag over the Rocio; only numerous groups talking excitedly. With the approach of ‘business hours,’ however, things livened up. The crowds grew, more ‘ Viva Republicas ’ resounded, and there were the usual senseless rushes to one or the other side of the square, to see, to hear, to miss nothing. A man finds he’s forgotten his pocket-handkerchief and starts back for it on the run, and immediately two hundred men trot at his heels. And — boom, boom, boom — the cannonading grew more intense. Gray military autos flying large Portuguese flags dashed noisily in all directions, raising clouds of dust; motorcycles with side-cars, fluttering the red or green cross; such racket and smells! A squad of firemen in shining brass helmets disappear in a side street; the crowd suddenly flocks to the rua Aurea side, to cheer a company of volunteers, as they swing up the Avenida; small groups of civilians, bundled up in cartridge-belts and reckless with their rifles, start vociferously for the front, waving their arms, shouting themselves red in the face in impassioned eulogies of their heroic sacrifice to the ‘Repoob艂lica.’ Very few policemen — I suppose they ’re all drafted. My stenographer girl appeared, ashen-faced, and asked if she might not go back home now, with her uncle. I told her to go and stay there.
At luncheon, I heard the inside of the story: some of the regular troops of the garrison of Lisbon went over to the Monarchists, while the others are remaining strictly neutral in their barracks. At dawn the Fourth Cavalry from Belem, with various civilians, joined the rebels and occupied the hills of Monsanto, which dominate the city two or three miles away, near the wireless station. It is from there that they are firing on the fort, with a few batteries of seventy-fives. They have no heavy artillery. Why they did not actually seize the fort itself, which was practically stripped of its garrison, is a mystery. I was told they had sent the government an ultimatum demanding a surrender before 2 P.M. We took a stroll in the afternoon, Colonel Darcy, Major Stone, Aerts, and I. The crowds on the Rocio were watching the evolutions of some airplanes — friendly, I hoped. Our three friends were there looking desperately forlorn, all clubs being closed. I gathered that their secret sympathies were with the Monarchists. ‘Ah, the old days!’ sighed Cardozo in my ear. ‘The King was so democratic; he often walked on the street, unattended, like anybody else, his umbrella under his arm, puffing his cigar.’
‘The social life, too!’ Bastos shook his head sadly; ‘you can’t imagine how gay, how brilliant it was.’ I judged altogether that the King of Portugal must have had much in common with the good Roi d’Yvetôt.
We continued up the Avenida, which was practically deserted, to within several hundred yards of the fort, and stopped to watch the effects of the bombardment. Presently an ambulance clanged by us and removed a tooventuresome spectator, who had got in the way of a piece of shrapnel. We ourselves were not in the line of fire, but one can’t always count on the perfect accuracy of the enemy, and I proposed my windows as a safer place to watch the show. There we went and stayed until driven away by the intense sun.
The excitement seemed to grow toward nightfall; the tootings of the ambulance trumpets sounded more frequently; there were harangues and vivas from grimy heroes returning from somewhere. A truck-load of volunteers came tearing down the street at top speed, those in front standing unsteadily, with rifles leveled; and there was a lunatic who passed by at the head of a wild-eyed squad, revolver in hand, bellowing his ‘Viva Repoob艂lica’ with a challenging note, just aching for a chance to fire. I’d really feel uneasy without my uniform! An apparently harmless citizen, walking calmly ahead of you, suddenly throws up his arms with a delirious ‘Viva,’ immediately echoed all around; and bands of hoodlums are having a glorious time, patriotically swinging dirty caps round their heads and shouting to force others to answer.
Of course, all this is only a local aspect of the rebellion; the Monarchy is established in the north, and the troops are even reported to be marching down on Lisbon!

January 25.
The revolution is over so far as Lisbon is concerned, and the Republic stays. Up north, Braganza and Vizeu have surrendered, leaving Oporto practically isolated. Yesterday was the decisive day. The cannon thundered from 8 A.M. until 3 P.M. The firing was intense, a government destroyer on the Tagus joining in with its nine-inch guns. The cold wind that arose during the night must have made bivouacking on the hills of Monsanto anything but a joy, and perhaps hastened the end! The minister ordered all our officers and men to stay on board, as there was considerable sniping on the streets and we don’t want complications. The excitement was much less, the crowds having yelled themselves tired and hoarse the day before. An airplane dropped silvery proclamations on the town. It was rumored during the morning that the Monarchists had wiped out many Republicans by hoisting the white flag and turning on machine-guns. At four o’clock, the French Legation called me up to ask about the report that the Monarchists were in retreat; but the official confirmation came only later. Toward evening, bodies of troops began to return amid cheers; then came straggling, weary, mud-covered individuals, their red faces streaked with sweat, each surrounded by a chattering group of admirers. There was joy-firing, off and on, throughout the night, but otherwise no great celebration.
At the hotel I ran across Albuquerque, who was Sidonio Paes’s aide and confidant. He was extremely despondent, and told me he had just resigned his post as aide to the Provisional President, as well as his commission in the army, because ‘he did not want to be associated with the murderers of the President who would now surely come to power.’ All around us I noticed many uneasy and gloomy faces. ‘Monarchist sympathizers,’ said Albuquerque, adding that he himself was one and expected to be arrested soon, but did n’t care anyway.
I got further light on the murky political situation. President Paes, a Republican, was in alliance with the Monarchists, forming the Conservative party. He was murdered by the Democrats, who, according to Albuquerque, are rowdies, the dregs of the population, led by demagogues and clever crooks. Fearing their return to power, the Monarchists started the present revolt, with the tacit approval of the Republicans. All the Lisbon troops had pledged their support, and success seemed so certain that the Monarchists did not even trouble to take ordinary precautions, and started out with only two days’ provisions and scanty ammunition. Three regiments, however, went back on their word and refused to move for either side! Imagine! Government troops remaining neutral with the existence of the Republic in the balance! The government was thus left practically without troops, and had to raise a volunteer army, some ten thousand men.
The Monarchists, who had all the regulars, officers, and men, were most contemptuous of the low rabble — ‘that made them run!’ I said.
‘No,’ answered Albuquerque, ‘it’s only that they were out of food and ammunition!’
I told him my opinion of men who start to upset a government with no more preparation than for a picnic! And as for the Democrats, they might be the scum of the population, but I had more respect for poor devils who, out of pure patriotism, took up their rifles and rushed to the defense of their country, than for the noble élite, who, while posing as defenders of law and order, went out to slaughter their fellow countrymen. And if the rabble should commit excesses later, from the lack of decent leaders, whose fault would it be? Where were those leaders?
Albuquerque said he had begged his friends not to start the revolt; but there was no stopping them, and, as they stood for the principles he believed in, he could not but wish them success. He had been sorely tempted, he said, on Thursday night, to bring out the ‘neutral’ regiments. They knew and trusted him and would have obeyed. He walked as far as the barracks of the Fort São Jorge, and then turned back, feeling he could not do it. I felt sorry for the poor chap, he was so evidently sincere, and all broken up. But it’s a queer mentality these people have! Politics and party above patriotism and country. Aerts told them they’d cut a pretty figure at the Peace Conference! What the government, whatever it is, ought to do now, is to line up the ringleaders against a wall. But it won’t; it prefers to give them a chance to live — to fight another day.
The two colonels and I — Stone has been promoted — strolled over the ground about the Rotunda this afternoon. The damage did n’t seem very great; the rebels had good direction, but overshot the fort. There were a few abandoned gun-carriages and ammunition-vans here and there, and large dark stains indicating casualties among the mule-train. People were prying into shell-holes, hunting for fragments. We wandered on, to see how that part of the town had fared. Houses were all somewhat scarred, and a few had gaping shell-holes.
Unconsciously we joined in with the stream of people, and presently found ourselves in sight of Monsanto. A wavering black line, cut by the great white aqueduct at the bottom, was winding up the hill, ant-like, toward the rebel positions. I urged my colonels on, and we soon got to the top. The view over the city and the wide Tagus is magnificent. Lisbon, like Rome, is built on seven hills, and the deep ravines between some of them form natural boulevards. The ground was pitted and furrowed, especially around an abandoned battery of Krupps, attesting the excellent marksmanship of the ‘rabble.’ The wireless tower had been hit, and what remained of the wreck of the station looked like a sieve. We found two guileless youths, at the back, slyly cutting out of the plaster two unexploded shells! A smell of powder clung to the place, but the only signs of carnage were variegated chicken feathers blowing about in the wind. We met many friends, among them General and Mrs. Brainard, on top, and got home at sunset.