The Wayfarer Advances

President Pedro Agnirre Cerda is popularly known as Don Tinto because of the excellent red wine of the vineyards that made him rich. Rich President Aguirre's Popular Front Government reduced the price of bread from 2.20 pesos (11-c-) to 1.70 (9-c-) and the price of some meats by 40%, made available to workers who had never tasted milk 12,000 litres a day at 80 centavos a litre, returned from Government-owned pawnshops some 9,000,000 pesos worth of hocked tools and clothing. "Don Tinto," says the poor man of Chile, "es un muy buen hombre" (TIME, Feb. 19, 1940).

Last week the poor man of Chile, his affection for Pedro Aguirre Cerda even stronger than it was two years ago, mourned his "muy buen hombre." For two days the body of Pedro Aguirre Cerda lay in state in the Hall of Honor of Santiago's Congress Building. From all over Chile special trains disgorged mourners for the President. More than 200,000 crossed themselves as they filed sadly past the remains of the wealthy lawyer and vintner who, as the Americas' first and only Popular Front President, had been the champion of Chile's swarming poor.

Early one morning Chile's National Symphony Orchestra played the great funeral march from Beethoven's "Eroica" Symphony. The black, copper coffin was placed upon a gun carriage and draped with the single-starred banner of the Republic. Then the cortege moved to Santiago Cathedral, where Archbishop Jose Maria Caro celebrated a two-hour Solemn High Mass for the soul of the man who had fixed low prices for the bread upon which millions of Chileans chiefly depend.

Afterwards, to the dirging of military bands, a great procession followed the coffin on its slow journey to Santiago Cemetery. A crowd of 400,000 filled the plazas and windows along the way, pressed against the ropes in hushed respect to the President who had given Chileans cheaper clothes and houses, more and better schools.

Through a portal inscribed "Wide is the gate--Wayfarer advance!" the funeral procession entered the cemetery. From the nearby hill thousands watched the full military burial ceremonies at the Aguirre family vault. As the body of Pedro Aguirre Cerda was laid to rest, guns boomed from the hills and Santiago's church bells joined in tolling concert. The President had long since pronounced his own epitaph: "I was born in the country and I have ever been faithful to my first love, the land."

By law, Chile must elect a new President within 70 days of a President's death. President Aguirre's Popular Front has been torn by dissension among Communists, Socialists and the President's own Radical Party. It has been attacked from the right by wealthy Chileans resisting the taxation on which President Aguirre built his general benefits. It has been threatened by such dictatorial ambitions as those of Chile's former strong man, General Carlos Ibanez del Campo. President Aguirre was elected in 1938 by a margin of only 2,111 votes, and if his devotion to Chile's masses was remarkable, his feat in holding the Front together was equally so.

But the President's untimely death might well have aroused so much sympathy that the Popular Front could win the coming election. Chile's masses at least were hopeful last week that not only the wayfarer, but his cause, might advance.

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