The corps of translators struggled with their monumental task of rendering each day's deliberations into both languages. Martí notes that at the beginning the Spanish of the daily minutes was "miserable", but by late January 1890 was "fluid and elegant". The oral interpretation of speeches, especially when they became heated, was more difficult. There were, of course, no electronic facilities for simultaneous interpretation, as we would expect in any international conference today. Thus, any speech had to be interpreted consecutively into the other working language after the delegate finished. This was a lengthy and taxing process, and delegates who did speak both languages frequently would interrupt the interpreter to make corrections or points of order, further adding to the confusion. Some of the sessions became quite intense, with delegates speaking forcefully to each other. In these situations the interpreters frequently fell behind and the result was linguistic and diplomatic anarchy. In his contemporary published writings Martí was fairly discreet in his descriptions of the various delegates. He was less so in his private letters to Quesada, which frequently provide less than flattering sketches of the various representatives. These 27 delegates were few enough in number, and the conference was so long (October–April) that they became well known to each other and to those who, like Martí, followed the conference closely. An even more frank description of the delegates was provided later by the first secretary of the conference, Fidel G. Sierra, in correspondence which was subsequently cited by Quesada. Martí was especially effusive in his description of the Argentine delegation, which was recognized by all concerned as being the most prestigious (its two chief delegates, Roque Sáenz Peña and Manuel Quintana, later were to become Presidents of their nation). In a typical passage Martí describes Sáenz Peña as "a noble elder", and Quintana as "a vigorous young man, striding forth as if to battle"   His characterizations of the U.S. delegates are less flattering. Emblematic of this treatment was the way Martí presented the Secretary of State (and prime mover of the conference) to his readers. Early in his exile in the United States Martí had much admired James G. Blaine, especially during his first tenure as Secretary in the Garfield administration in 1881, when he praised Blaine for his efforts to resolve border disputes among South American countries. But by the time of the 1889-90 conference, Martí saw another side of Blaine: his role as leader of the annexationists and expansionists in American politics, men who argued that the U.S. ought to possess Cuba after expelling the Spaniards, and that Latin America should be the logical market for the expanding industrial base of the United States.