The Huhe Family. 171 



We had become rather intimate with Hube's, and Salm had 

 arranged that I should stay with them in Tacubaya during his 

 absence. 



Mr. Fred Hube had been formerly Mexican Consul-Gen era! 

 of Hamburg, and was engaged in some manufacturing business, 

 and a rich man. He was a very kind and respectable old gen- 

 tleman, and Mrs. Hube was the dearest, sweetest, and kindest 

 old lady in the world. I cannot find words strong enough to 

 express my feelings of gratitude towards her, for she did not 

 receive me in her house as a stranger, but could not have 

 treated me more carefully and lovingly had I been her 

 daughter. 



She had, however, besides a grown-un and very agreeable son, 

 a daughter of my age, with whom I made friends very soon, and 

 as we lived in the same room we became very intimate. He- 

 lena Hube was a dear good girl, and her only fault, for which 

 she was, however, not responsible, was that there was too much 

 of her, for she stood above six feet in her stockings. She was 

 not taller than usual before she fell ill with a fever ; but after 

 having recovered from that she shot up like asparagus, and be- 

 came quite a giantess. When she was sitting on a chair we 

 were of the same height. 



As I ^m writing my own memoirs and not those of my hus- 

 band, nor history either, I shall not say much about the siege 

 of Queretaro, and the less as my husband has done so him- 

 selfi 



y. For many weeks we heard nothing from Queretaro but vague 

 reports, and of a very contradictory unreliable kind. At last, 

 in Marcli, we received news that General Marquez had arrived 

 from Queretaro with three thousand men, and all Mexico was 

 in 'a flutter of excitement. As L was extremely anxious to hear 

 news of my husband, I requested Mr. Hube to accompany me 

 to the General, to which he readily consented. 



General Don Leonardo Marquez received us very graciously. 

 He was a little lively man, with black hair and black keen eyes. 

 He was now a great personage, and liked to show his impor- 

 tance. The Emperor had made him Luogoteniente of the 

 Empire, but he behaved and spoke as though the Emperor 



I *My Diary in Mexico,' &c., by Felix Salm-Salm, General, &c., 2 vols. 

 London : Richard Bently, 1868. ^ 



