Emilio Rabasa was born in the pueblo of Ocozautla, State of Chiapas, on May 22, 1856. He studied law in the City of Oaxaca, being licensed to practice on April 4, 1878. He returned to his native State, where he was a Deputy to Congress and Director of the Institute during the years 1881 and 1882. He then removed to Oaxaca, where he was Judge of the Civil Court, Deputy to the State Legislature and Secretary to Governor Mier y Teran, during 1885 and 1886. Removing to the City of Mexico in 1886, he there filled various judicial and other offices. In 1891, he was elected Governor of Chiapas, which office he filled for two years, particularly interesting himself in improving the financial condition of the State. In 1894, he was elected Senator from the State of Sinaloa, an office which he still fills. He resides in the City of Mexico, where he is engaged in legal practice.

The work which has given him literary fame is a four volume novel, written under the nom-de-plume of Sancho Polo. These volumes bear special titles—La Bola (The Local Outbreak), La gran Ciencia (The Grand Science), El cuarto Poder (The Fourth Power), and Moneda falsa (False Money). These novels have their importance in Mexican literature. Victoriano Salado Álbarez, speaking of the notable advancement of the Mexican novel in recent years, says: “The works of Sancho Polo, precious studies,—initiated this truly fecund and permanent movement.” Luis GonzÁles ObregÓn says of these books: “These are notable for the correctness of their style, for masterly skill in description, most rich in precious details, for the perfect way in which those who figure in them are characterized, for the natural and unexpected development, as well as for many other beauties, which we regret not being able to enumerate here.” Emilio Rabasa’s active public life has prevented his following up his early success in literature. Since the Sancho Polo series, he has written but one brief novel, La Guerra de tres aÑos (The Three Years War). In 1888, in connection with the well-known publisher, Reyes Spindola, he founded El Universal (The Universal), which is still published, and which really initiated a new era in Mexican journalism.

The hero in the Sancho Polo novels is a youth named Juan QuiÑones. Born and reared in an obscure village, he loves a pretty girl who lives with her uncle, a man of common origin and mediocre attainments. Don Mateo is, however, a rising man, and, as he mounts, his ambitions for his niece mount also. The boy has real ability, but is petulant and precipitate, throwing himself into positions from which there should be no escape, and learning nothing by experience. He passes through a series of remarkable experiences—a local outbreak, a State revolution, anti-governmental journalism in the capital city, a discreditable love affair—finally, of course, gaining the girl.

THE DAY OF BATTLE.

I attempted in vain to restrain and reduce the uneasiness and disquietude, by which I was possessed and which Minga and her mother but increased, now dragging me away from the window, now preventing me from drawing the bolt to open the door, now bringing me back from the courtyard whither I had desired to go to escape their oversight.

“What a Don Abundio!” said Minga, jeeringly. “Trust him! But have no fear; he will not now let the girl go.”

Nevertheless, I sent the old woman back to see Felicia, to beg her, if preparations for the journey were not immediately discontinued, to send me word by her servant. And the good old woman, who was brave and fearless, started out again, cautioning her daughter not to allow me to commit any imprudence.

What a day was that for me. The sun ran its course with desperate slowness, but finally stood in mid-heaven. The old woman had not yet returned, nor had Don Mateo made his attack, nor had I news of any one. I do not understand how I could remain shut up all those hours, without breaking out and letting myself be killed.

While thus chafing, and more often than ever peeping from the window to catch a distant glimpse of the old woman, a choked and panting voice, at my shoulder, cried:

“They are coming.”

It was ‘Uncle Lucas,’ who seemed in that one day to exhaust all his remaining life’s force. He seated himself on Minga’s bed, with his mouth open, his chest puffing like a blacksmith’s bellows, his head nodding in time to his heavy breathing.

In spite of his breathlessness, I made him speak, although his words were broken by his gasps for air. Don Mateo and his force were organizing at half a league’s distance. Uncle Lucas had told the Colonel all that the Sindico[26] had said and had returned with the order to unite as many men as possible from our quarter of the town, in order to impede and disconcert Coderas’s force, when it should return to town, as probably it would only skirmish in the open field. Just as he arrived at the creek, Uncle Lucas saw five men on horseback, the advance guard of Coderas, descend from the terrace.

In fact, while he was speaking we heard the noise of horses running through the street and the clank of swords against the stirrups. Almost at the same moment the door opened and Minga’s mother burst into the room, her face pale, her eyes flashing fire.

“A little more and those dogs had had me!” she cried angrily and hurled forth a tirade which I cannot repeat.

“What is the matter?” I asked, agitated.

“What is it! If it were not for my nephew Matias, who was in the trenches by the church, they would not have let me go. Cursed wolves. When Pedro comes I will tell him that they would not let me go and the foul words they said to me. As I told you, were it not for Matias, I would still be there in the Plaza.”

“And what did Felicia say?” I interrupted, impatiently.

“The horses are all ready; but Don Abundio told her to tell you to have no concern; Remedios need not go. But remember, Juanito, this man has no shame.”

Keeping her to the point, I made her tell me all that could concern us. Coderas and Soria had agreed upon a plan of defense, believing that Don Mateo could not take the Plaza in several days; meantime the auxiliaries from the next district, whose Jefe politico was in communication with San Martin, could arrive. At the last moment, it had been decided that Coderas should sally with two hundred men, for a skirmish just outside the town, falling back upon the hundred, who remained in the Plaza with Soria; if fortune should prove averse to them, which the intrepid leader did not believe, they would withdraw to the best entrenchments, in order to force Don Mateo to attack them there.

“Now for the main thing,” said the old woman to me. “Remedios told me to say that they plan to take the prisoners from the jail and put them in the trenches, to terrify the other party, who cannot fire without killing their own friends and relatives.”

My hair stood on end, I felt a giddiness and almost fell, with my face convulsed with emotion and with shortened breath, I could scarcely turn to Uncle Lucas. Terrified, he rose and tried to detain me; but I promptly regained my self-control and assumed the voice of command which, in such cases, constitutes me a leader of those about me.

“Run!” I said to him quickly. “Immediately collect all those who last night promised to follow us and bring them here at once.”

My voice was so authoritative and commanding that I scarce awaited a reply. The old man made none and directed his way to the door; on opening it, he started violently.

“There they come! they come!” he said in a whisper.

Minga drew me violently back from the window, and Coderas and his force galloped down the road from the creek.

Some villagers followed the force from curiosity, others appeared in their doorways, and some few shut themselves in, cautiously barring their doors.

My wisdom and patience were now completely exhausted, and, my excitement depriving me of all prudence, I rushed forth with Uncle Lucas, ordering him to promptly meet me at that spot.

With no attempt at concealment, without precaution and without fear, I ran to Bermejo’s house, to the houses of the imprisoned regidors, to the houses of all those who were suffering in jail, alarming all with the terrible notice which I had received. In this house, I secured a man; in that one, some weapon; from here I led forth a terrified son; from there, a half-crazed father. Everywhere I carried terror and awakened the most violent manifestations of hatred and affliction.

Half an hour later, in Pedro Martin’s patio, I had collected some thirty men, who, worthy followers of a leader such as I, would fight like tigers and would not be sated with three hundred victims. One proposed hanging the wife and children of Coderas; another proposed dragging Soria through the streets and casting his lifeless body on the dungheap; another suggested sacking of the house of the Gonzagas, and another, cutting the throats of all who lived in the ward of Las Lomas, with a few exceptions. To me, this all appeared excellent and I energetically approved these savage propositions, while I distributed arms to those who had none and issued my orders to Uncle Lucas.

At that moment, the first discharge of the battle was heard; a cold chill ran through my body, mixture of terror and of impatience for the combat. I felt myself impelled toward the Plaza, and from my lips issued a torrent of foul words, which I was astonished at myself for knowing. Evil predominated in me; under the kindled passions of the bola, I was unconsciously transformed, my nature becoming that of the mass around me.

In such moments I had no idea of forming a plan of campaign. I only knew that I was going in defence of my mother, whose life was gravely imperilled, and that I ought to hasten to achieve my object. I did not think how I should attain it, nor did it occur to me to think. Uncle Lucas ventured to remind me that the Colonel’s plan was for us to hamper the enemy in his retreat.

“All follow me!” I cried with authority.

And all, with resolution equal to my own, followed me.

Passing behind Minga’s house, to the edge of the village, we took the road to the right and marched at quickstep up the street parallel to that which led to the Plaza. On arriving in front of this we halted, to the terror of the neighbors, and then cautiously advanced until the jail was in sight.

Not dreaming of enemies so near, the soldiers in the Plaza were listening to the fusillade which was taking place, almost on the banks of the creek. In front of us was a gentle slope, from the gully up to the Plaza and the prison door; at that place, which could scarcely be seen, because of the village corral which intervened, a sentinel was visible.

“They have not yet taken out the prisoners,” I said to my companions; “we will wait here until we see some movement showing that they are about to remove them.”

Among our arms was a single gun; the rest were machetes, darts, or knives tied to the end of staves. I nevertheless believed myself invincible.

The distant noise of musketry, which, to tell the truth, was not great or terrible, consequent on the small number of the combatants and the still smaller number of the firearms, became less at the end of a few minutes, and the few shots heard seemed to me to be already discharged within San Martin. I ordered my party to approach the foot of the slope, I myself remaining where I was so as not to lose sight of the jail; and I ran to join them, when the discharges from the entrenchments showed me that Soria had entered the Plaza and that Don Mateo was in front of it.

We mounted to the jail, before the sentinel could give the alarm and at the moment when Coderas and Soria repulsed Don Mateo in his first assault. Taken by surprise, the sentinel fled to the Plaza, and we, without thought of the imprudence of our hasty action, hurled ourselves against the prison door, and, after a few efforts, burst it in, broken into fragments.

LA BOLA.

How many then, as I, wept orphaned and cursed the bola! In that miserable village, which scarcely had enough men to till its soil, and in which the loftiness of citizenship was unknown, its victims had floods of tears and despair, instead of laurels, the reward of right. Here the father, love and support of the family, was mourned; there, a son, hope and stay of aged parents; there, again, a husband, torn from the fireside to be borne to a field of battle, which had not even tragic grandeur, but only the caricaturing ridiculousness of a low comedy.

And all that was called in San Martin a revolution! No! Let us not disgrace the Spanish language nor human progress. It is indeed time for some one of the learned correspondents of the Royal Academy to send for its dictionary, this fruit harvested from the rich soil of American lands. We, the inventors of the thing itself, have given it a name without having recourse to Greek or Latin roots, and we have called it bola. We hold the copyright; because, while revolution, as an inexorable law, is known in all the world, the bola can only be developed, like the yellow fever, in certain latitudes. Revolution grows out of an idea, it moves nations, modifies institutions, demands citizens; the bola requires no principles, and has none, it is born and dies within short space, and demands ignorant persons. In a word, the revolution is a daughter of the world’s progress and of an inexorable law of humanity; the bola is daughter of ignorance and the inevitable scourge of backward populations.

We know revolutions well, and there are many who stigmatize and calumniate them; but, to them we owe the rapid transformation of society and of institutions. They would be veritable baptisms of regeneration and advancement, if within them did not grow the weed of the miserable bola. Miserable bola? Yes! There operate in it as many passions as there are men and leaders engaged; in the one it is avenging ruin; in the other a mean ambition; in this one the desire to figure; in that one to gain a victory over an enemy. And there is not a single common thought, not a principle which gives strength to consciences. Its theatre is the corner of some outlying district; its heroes, men who perhaps at first accepting it in good faith, permit that which they had to be torn to tatters on the briers of the forest. Honorable labor is suspended, the fields are laid waste, the groves are set on fire, homes are despoiled, at the mere dictate of some brutal petty leader; tears, despair, and famine are the final harvest. And yet the population, when this favorite monster, to which it has given birth, appears, rushes after it, crying enthusiastically and insanely, bola! bola!

Albar came down into the editorial room and, approaching me, picked up, one by one, the yet fresh sheets. He was satisfied, extremely so.

“Very good,” he said to me, “this will cause a sensation, and will exalt your name yet more. Attack fearlessly.”

At twelve, he called me up to his writing-room, not without my feeling a strange fear, presentiment of danger.

“I want you to take one matter on yourself,” he said, “because this Escorroza is of no use sometimes. Besides, I know you are from the State of X—— and I suppose you know its men, its history, its conditions, better than anyone else on the force.”

“I think so,” I replied, trembling.

“It is so,” affirmed Albar. “Put special care on the articles relative to the matter, to which I refer; because it is of importance to me and I entrust it to you because you are the best man on the staff.”

“You are very kind——”

“Not at all; it is mere justice——”

“And the matter——”

“In a moment, in a moment; you shall hear.”

The interest of the Director must indeed be great, when he was so friendly and courteous with me. His dark skin wrinkled more violently and a forced smile incessantly contracted his lips, separating yet more widely from each other, the two halves of his typically Indian moustache.

We heard, sounding in the patio, the footsteps of several persons. My suspicions had grown with Albar’s words, my fears increased, and that noise caused me such disturbance that I was forced to rise from the sofa to conceal it.

In spite of my efforts to control myself, I felt that I turned pale, when Don Mateo entered the room, accompanied by Bueso and Escorroza. Instinctively, I stepped back a step or two and appeared to occupy myself with something lying on the table.

Don Mateo awkwardly saluted Albar, with scant courtesy, and passed with him and Bueso into an adjoining room. As he passed near me, I noticed that the General looked at me and hesitated a moment as if he wished to stop. Albar, who went last, indicated to Escorroza, by a sign, that he might retire, and when he, in turn, repeated the signal to me, Albar said, shortly, “Wait here; I will call you.”

Escorroza withdrew, casting at me a glance of terrible hatred, which in some degree compensated me for my anxieties, by the vain satisfaction it caused me; but, hearing the first phrases exchanged between the three men, I understood at once that Pepe was right in telling me that I had lost my cause. I should have fled from the place, on feeling myself so completely routed, at comprehending the event and its significance to me; but, I know not what painful desire to know the end, held me, as if bound, to the chair in which I had seated myself near the door.

At first Don Mateo himself desired to present the matter; but his rustic awkwardness, little suited to the presentation of so difficult a matter, overcame him, and it was necessary that Bueso should take up the conversation for him.

For some minutes his tranquil, unvarying, and unemotional voice was heard; for him, no matter was difficult of presentation, no circumlocutions were necessary to express the most delicate affairs. The General had seen, with surprise, a paragraph in El Cuarto Poder which demanded evidence proving what El Labaro had stated concerning him; that his surprise was the greater from the fact that he had before considered Albar as his friend, although they had had merely business relations through correspondence. All that was printed in El Labaro, and much more, was true, as could be testified by thousands of persons, who knew the General as their own hands. It could be proved (indeed it could!) with documents from State and Federal governments; with periodicals of different epochs which he had preserved; with this and with that——

But, why? Albar could not doubt the word of a gentleman. The important matter now is that the eminent Director should recognize in the General a good friend, and in place of raising doubts in regard to his glorious past, should strive, as a good friend, to make it well known, appreciated, and recompensed by the applause to which a man so distinguished as the General is entitled. While he understood this involved considerable expense, that was no obstacle.

At this critical point Albar interrupted Bueso with a grunt, which said neither yes nor no. It is not necessary to mention that; no, sir. The unlucky paragraph in question had crept into the paper, without the Director’s knowledge; but, as soon as he discovered it, he determined to apply the remedy; which would consist in publishing a complete biography of the General, stating that it had been written after inspection of convincing and authentic documents; and, even, that the portrait of the General should be printed in the paper, if he would have the kindness to furnish a photograph.

Clouds of blood, blinding me, passed before my eyes; my whole body trembled convulsively; with my contracted fingers I clutched the arms of the chair and dug my nails into the velvet upholstery. In the fury of my rage and anger, I scarcely heard some words about thirty subscriptions, which Don Mateo would send the following day, to be mailed to his friends in the State. Bueso asserted that this was important for the General, because the General was a man with a great political future, that he ought, therefore, to act promptly and vigorously, to augment his prestige and propagate his renown everywhere.

To me, nailed to my chair, that scene appeared for some minutes the horrible illusion of a cruel nightmare. I was perspiring and choked.

The door suddenly opened and the three actors in the comedy entered the writing-room. Trying to compose myself, and rising, I heard Albar, who, pointing at me, said:

“Here is the best pen on my staff; this young man will be charged with writing all relative to your life.”

Don Mateo and I faced each other, exchanging a glance of profound hatred; hatred, kneaded with the passion of purest love, as mud is kneaded with water from the skies.

I knew not what to say, much as I desired to speak, but Don Mateo, incapable of controlling himself, said insultingly:

“This young man going to write? And what does he know?”

And, filled with rage, he turned his back on me, pretending to despise me.

“I know more than will suit you, for writing your biography,” I replied, “but I warn SeÑor Albar that my pen shall never be employed in the service of a man like you.”

Don Mateo made a motion as if he would throw himself upon me, and I made one as if seizing a bust of bronze to hurl at him.

Albar leaped between us.

“What is this?” he cried, in terror.

“You are a miserable puppet,” thundered Don Mateo, shaking his fists at me above Albar’s head. “When I meet you in the street I will pull your ears.”

“We shall see,” I replied.

“Wretched, insignificant boy.”

“Stop! enough of this,” cried Albar, with all the force of his lungs. “What is the matter?”

“SeÑor Albar,” I said, “I heard all that was said. I can write nothing about this man; not a word.”

“Nor will I permit that he shall write,” bellowed Don Mateo, choked with rage; “I will not consent to it.”

“Then he shall not write; enough said,” replied Albar.

Bueso stood before me undisturbed; with his hands in his pockets he looked me over with an air of curiosity.

“That means that Javier will write it,” he said completing Don Pablo’s thought.

Escorroza, at the sound of voices, had come upstairs and, at this moment, arrived.

“Very well,” said the Director, “let it be so. As QuiÑones refuses and the General does not consent, Escorroza will be charged with writing all relative to——”

“To the SeÑor General? With the greatest pleasure,” broke in Don Javier.

“And he will do it much better,” said Bueso.

Don Mateo looked at me with an air of triumph and derision.

“The SeÑor Director may order what seems best to him,” I said, restraining myself with difficulty, “but I ought to inform him that I withdraw from the staff, the moment when the paper publishes the least eulogy of this man.”

And without saluting, with clenched fists and gritted teeth, I left the room. While in the corridor I heard the voices of Cabezudo, Bueso, and Escorroza, who cried at once:

“Canasto! this puppet——”

“Talked to you, in that manner!”

“How can you permit——”

The noise of the loud voices reached the editorial room. Pepe and Carrasco asked me what had happened, but I simply shrugged my shoulders and the two became discreetly silent.

The noise continued for half an hour. At the end of that time the footsteps of the three men were heard in the patio, and their yet angry voices. As they passed the doorway I heard them saying:

“Astonishing how much Don Pablo thinks this boy to be!”

“Canasto! recanasto! this I will never forgive.”

Elevated pride, satisfied hatred, gratified and exalted vanity, almost choked me and I had to rise for breath. Pepe and Sabas looked at me astonished, and I, my face twitching and working with a nervous smile, threw my pen upon the table.

“This pen is worth more than most persons imagine.”