Chapter IV: Front Matter (4)

The United States Coast Survey ship _Ranger_, carrying four small guns, happening to enter at La Union, Nicaragua, engaged in its regular duties, was magnified into a fleet of hundreds of thousands of tons; and when the people of San Salvador and Nicaragua were convinced that submission to Barrios would require them to engage the combined forces of Europe and the United States, they rose in resistance and supported Zaldivar in his treachery.

The effect in Guatemala was similar, although not so pronounced. There was a reversion of feeling against the Government. The moneyed men, who in their original enthusiasm tendered their funds to the President, withdrew their promises; the common people were nervous, and lost their confidence in their hero; while the Diplomatic Corps, representing every nation of importance on the globe, were in a state of panic because they received no instructions from home. The German and French ministers, like the minister from the United States, were favorable to the plans of Barrios; the Spanish minister was outspoken in opposition; the English and Italian ministers non-committal; but none of them knew what to say or how to act in the absence of instructions. They telegraphed to their home governments repeatedly, but could obtain no replies, and suspected that the troubles might be in San Salvador. Mr. Hall, the American minister, transmitted a full description of the situation every evening, and begged for instructions, but did not receive a word.

The Government at Washington had informed Mr. Hall by mail that its policy in relation to the plan to reunite the republics was one of non-interference, but advised that the spirit of the century was contrary to the use of force to accomplish such an end; and acting upon this information, Mr. Hall had frequent and cordial conferences with the President, and received from him a promise that he would not invade either of the neighboring republics with an army unless required to do so. If Guatemala was invaded he would retaliate, but otherwise would not cross the border. In the mean time the forces of Guatemala, forty thousand strong, were massed at the capital, the streets were full of marching soldiers, and the air was filled with martial music, while Zaldivar was raising an army by conscription in San Salvador, and money by forced loans. His Government daily announced the arrival of so many “volunteers” at the capital, but the volunteering was a very transparent myth. A current anecdote was of a conscript officer who wrote to the Secretary of War from the Interior: “I send you forty more volunteers. Please return me the ropes with which their hands and legs are tied, as I shall need to bind the quota from the next town.”

In the city of San Salvador many of the merchants closed their stores, and concealed themselves to avoid the payment of forced loans. The Government called a “Junta,” or meeting of the wealthy residents, each one being personally notified by an officer that his attendance was required, and there the Secretary of War announced that a million dollars for the equipment of troops must be raised instantly. The Government, he said, was assured of the aid of foreign powers to defeat the plans of Barrios, but until the armies and navies of Europe and the United States could reach the coast the republic must protect itself. Each merchant and _estancianado_ was assessed a certain amount, to make the total required, and was required to pay it into the Treasury within twenty-four hours. Some responded promptly, others procrastinated, and a few flatly refused. The latter were thrust into jail, and the confiscation of their property threatened unless they paid. In one or two cases the threat was executed; but, with cold sarcasm, the day after the meeting the _Official Gazette_ announced that the patriotic citizens of San Salvador had voluntarily come to the assistance of the Government with their arms and means, and had tendered financial aid to the amount of one million dollars, the acceptance of which the President was now considering.

Barrios, knowing that the army of Salvador would invade Guatemala and commence an offensive campaign, so as to occupy the attention of the people, ordered a detachment of troops to the frontier, and decided to accompany them. The evening before he started there was what is called “a grand _funcion_” at the National Theatre. All of the military bands assembled at the capital--a dozen or more--were consolidated for the occasion, and between the acts performed a march composed by a local musician in honor of the Union of Central America, and dedicated to General Barrios. A large screen of sheeting was elaborately painted with the inscription,

“_All hail the Union of the Republic!_”
“_Long live the Dictator and the Generalissimo,_”
“_J. Rufino Barrios!_”

This was attached to heavy rollers, to be dropped in front of the stage instead of the regular curtain at the end of the second act of the play, for the purpose of creating a sensation; and a sensation it did create--an unexpected and frightful one.

As the orchestra commenced to play the new march the curtain was lowered slowly, and the audience greeted it with tremendous applause, rising to their feet, shouting, and waving their hats and handkerchiefs. But through the blunder of the stage carpenter the weights were too heavy for the cotton sheeting; the banner split, and the heavy rollers at the bottom fell over into the orchestra, severely wounding several of the musicians. As fate would have it, the rent was directly through the name of Barrios. The people, naturally superstitious, were horrified, and stood aghast at this omen of disaster. The cheering ceased instantly, and a dead silence prevailed, broken only by the noise of the musicians under the wreck struggling to recover their feet. A few of the more courageous friends of the President attempted to revive the applause, but met with a miserable failure. Strong men shuddered, women fainted, and Mrs. Barrios left the theatre, unable to control her emotion. The play was suspended; the audience departed to discuss the omen, and everybody agreed that Barrios’s _coup-d’état_ would fail.

The President left the city at the head of his army for the frontier of San Salvador, his wife accompanying him a few miles on the way. A few days later a small detachment of the Guatemala army, commanded by a son of Barrios, started out on a scouting expedition, and were attacked by an overwhelming force of Salvadorians. The young captain was killed by the first volley, and his company were stampeded. Leaving his body on the field, they retreated in confusion to headquarters. When Barrios heard of the disaster he leaped upon his horse, called upon his men to follow him, and started in pursuit of the men who had killed his son. The Salvadorians, expecting to be pursued, lay in ambush, and the Dictator, while galloping down the road at the head of a squadron of cavalry, was picked off by a sharpshooter and died instantly. His men took his body and that of his son, which was found by the roadside, and carried them back to camp. A courier was despatched to the nearest telegraph station with a message to the capital conveying the sad news. It was not unexpected; since the omen at the theatre, no one supposed the Dictator would return alive. All but himself had lost confidence, and it transpired that even he went to the front with a presentiment of disaster, for among his papers was found this peculiar will, written by himself a few moments before his departure.

THE WILL OF BARRIOS.

“I am in full campaign, and make my declaration as a soldier.

“My legitimate wife is Donna Francisca Apaucio vel Vecusidario de
Quezaltenanzo.

“During our marriage we have had seven children, as follows:
Elaine, Luz, José, Maria, Carlos, Rufino, and Francisca.

“Donna Francisca is the sole owner of all my properties and
interest whatsoever. She will know how much to give our children
when they arrive at maturity, and I have full confidence in her.

“She may give to my nephew, Luciano Barrios, in two or three
instalments, $25,000, for the kindness which this nephew has
rendered to me, and which I doubt not he will continue to render to
my wife Donna Francisca.

“She will continue to provide for the education of Antonio Barrios,
who is now in the United States of America.

“She is empowered to demand and collect all debts due to me in this
country and abroad. The overseers and administrators of my
properties, wherever they may be, shall account only to Donna
Francisca or the person whom she may name.

“It is five o’clock in the morning. At this moment I start forth to
Jutiapa, where the army is.

“J. RUFINO BARRIOS.

“MONDAY, _March 23, 1885_.”

The attempt to reunite the republic ended with the death of the Dictator, and the whole country was thrown into confusion. In Guatemala City anarchy prevailed. The enemies of Barrios did not fear a dead lion, and kicked his body. They came out in force, stoned his house, and his beautiful wife was forced to seek the protection of the United States minister, whose secretary escorted her to San José, where she took a steamer for San Francisco, and has since resided in New York.

Señor Sinibaldi, the Vice-president of the republic, called the Congress together, and a new election was ordered, at which Señor Barrillas, a man of excellent ability and wise discretion, was chosen President of the republic.

COMAYAGUA.

THE CAPITAL OF HONDURAS.

In 1540 Cortez, the Conqueror of Mexico, directed Alonzo Caceres, one of his lieutenants, to proceed with an army of one thousand men to the Province of Honduras, which had been subdued by Alvarado a few years before, and select a suitable site for a city midway between the two oceans. Caceres was a pioneer of most excellent discretion, and so good a judge of distance was he that if a straight line were drawn from the Atlantic to the Pacific, the centre would be just three miles north of the plaza of Comayagua. A modern engineer, with all the scientific appliances at his disposal, could not have obeyed instructions more accurately; and as for location, there are few finer sites in the world than the elevated plain upon which the little capital of Honduras stands. A semicircle of mountains enclose it, with a wall of peaks six and seven thousand feet high upon one side, while upon the other a great plain stretches away nearly forty miles, gradually sloping to the eastward. The altitude of the city is about twenty-three hundred feet above the sea, and the climate is a perpetual June, the thermometer seldom varying more than twenty degrees during the entire year, and averaging about 75° Fahrenheit. The soil is deep, rich, and fertile, and the productions of the plain are tropical; but beyond the city, in the foothills of the mountains and upon their slopes, corn, wheat, and other staples of the temperate zones can be raised in enormous quantities with a minimum of labor. The pineapple and the palm tree are growing within two hours’ ride of waving wheat-fields, while orange and apple orchards stand within sight of each other.

Comayagua is said to have at one time contained nearly thirty thousand inhabitants, but at present it has no more than one-fifth of that number; for, like all of the Central American cities, its population has been reduced since the independence of the country, and, like the most of them, it is in a state of decay. Everything is dilapidated, and nothing is ever repaired. No sign of prosperity appears anywhere. Commercial stagnation has been its normal condition for sixty years, and the indolence and indifference of the people has not been disturbed for that period, except by political insurrections. No one seems to have anything to do. The aristocrats swing lazily in their hammocks, or discuss politics over the counters of the _tiendas_, or at the club, while the poor beg in the streets, and manage to sustain life upon the fruits which Nature has so profligately showered upon them. Nowhere upon the earth’s surface exist greater inducements to labor, nowhere can so much be produced with so little effort; and the vast resources of the country present the most tempting opportunity for capital and enterprise, for nearly every acre of the land is susceptible to some sort of profitable development.

The area of Honduras is about the same as that of Ohio, and the inhabitants number from three to four hundred thousand, according to the guess of the well informed, but no census has been taken for a quarter of a century, and the last enumeration was so inaccurate as to discredit itself. In ancient times the population must have been very dense.

It is as difficult and as long a journey to reach the capital of Honduras from New York as the capital of Siam or Siberia. One must go by steamer to Truxillo, the chief Atlantic port, or to Amapala, on the Bay of Fonseca, on the Pacific side--a voyage of from fifteen to twenty days by either route--and then ride for twelve days on mule-back over the mountains, without any of the accommodations or comforts known to modern travel, and not even one clean or comfortable inn. When the capital is reached there is no hotel to stop at, and one must trespass upon the hospitality of the citizens, or seek some boarding-place through the aid of a local merchant or priest.

The President is General Bogran, a man who came into power by a peaceful revolution in 1885, to succeed Marco A. Soto, who fled that year to San Francisco, and from there sent his resignation to Congress. Bogran is a man of brains and progressive ideas, possessing more of the modern spirit

and broader views than most of his contemporaries, and if he is permitted to carry out his plans Honduras will make rapid speed in the development of her great natural resources. He is offering tempting inducements to foreign capital and immigration, has given liberal concessions to Americans who desire to enter the country, and is wisely endeavoring to induce some one to construct the Interoceanic Railway, which was surveyed fifty years ago, and twenty-seven miles of which has already been built and at intervals operated. But the discontented element in the country, in league with his predecessor, who now lives in New York, are surrounding him with obstacles and harassing him with all sorts of embarrassments, so that his success is made doubtful. Bogran spends very little of his time at Comayagua, and the seat of government has been removed to Tegucigalpa, the largest town in the country, as well as its commercial metropolis. Here the Congress sits also, and the place is to all intents and purposes the capital.

The cathedral of Comayagua is by far the finest building in the country, being an excellent specimen of the semimoresque style, which was so popular among the Spanish provinces. Its walls and roof are of the most solid masonry, but are considerably marred by the revolutions through which the country has passed, for in nearly all of them the cathedral has been used as a fortress and subjected to a shower of lead. Near the cathedral stands a monument originally intended to honor one of the Spanish kings, but after the independence of the country was established the royal symbols were erased by the order of one of the Presidents, the inscription was chiselled off, and the obelisk now stands to commemorate independence. This monument is the place of public execution, and criminals sentenced to death are made to sit blindfolded at its base, where they are shot by the soldiers.

In November, 1886, General Delgrado, the leader of a revolution, with four of his comrades, was executed here. It was the desire of President Bogran to spare Delgrado’s life, and any pretext would have been adopted to save him if the honor of the country could have been vindicated, but he was convicted of treason, and sentenced by the courts to die. The President offered to pardon him if he would take the oath of allegiance and swear never to engage in revolutionary proceedings again; but the old soldier would not even accept life on these terms, and much to the regret of the President,

against whom he had conspired, and the better portion of the people, the sentence had to be executed. On the morning of the day fixed by the courts, the five men were led from the prison to the Church of La Merced, where the last rites were administered to them, and were then conducted to the Peace Monument, where a file of soldiers was drawn up with loaded rifles. The last word of Delgrado was a request that he might give the command to fire, and he did so as coolly as if he had been on dress parade.

The residents of Comayagua are chiefly the owners of haciendas situated in the neighborhood, or small tradesmen, with four or five thousand lazy and worthless half-breeds, who live upon _tortillas_, or corn-cakes, and the fruits in which the country abounds. The most conspicuous feature of their life is the filth that surrounds them, and the freedom with which their pigs and chickens enjoy the shelter of the dwelling. A few stone jars of native make, a few rude calabashes, a couple of hammocks, and a few broken articles of furniture, constitute the equipment of a peon’s house. The man of the house swings in a hammock while his spouse brings water from the stream in a large stone jar upon her head, and the pigs and chickens and children lie upon the floor indiscriminately mixed. The pigs take the tortillas out of the mouths of the children, and the compliment is returned, while the chickens forage upon every article of food within their reach.

Both cotton and silk grow upon trees, the vegetable silk being of very fine and soft fibre, and frequently used by the natives in the manufacture of robosas, serapas, and other articles of wear, while the product of the cotton-tree is utilized in a similar manner.

There is said to be a greater variety of medicinal plants in Honduras than in any country on the globe, and the botany of the country contains nearly every tree and shrub and flower that is known to man. They are all of spontaneous growth, and might be made a prolific source of wealth, but are entirely neglected. There is one famous weed, called by the natives _el agrio_, which is a certain cure for sunstroke, or for prostration from exposure to the sun or over-exertion, and is used for both men and animals. As it is excessively bitter, the leaf of the plant is wound about the bit of the bridle of a sunstruck horse, and the animal gradually sucks the juice from it. The leaves are dried in the shade, and a tea made of them by the natives to cure sunstroke and other diseases of the brain or blood.

The interior of the country is beyond the reach of markets, because of the absence of transportation facilities. In this respect the people are no further advanced than they were two hundred years ago. The only wagon-roads in the country are one built by a party of Americans near San Pedro, in the west, and a few miles of a national highway that a century ago was begun for the purpose of connecting Amapala, the Pacific port, with Tegucigalpa.

Honduras has the finest fluvial system in Central America. There are few countries with such available water facilities, both for transportation and manufacturing powers, and it has the finest harbors on both coasts--all wasted because of the indolence of the people. The Government has given several liberal concessions in timber and agricultural lands to secure the opening of its rivers to navigation, and for the construction of railways from the coast to the interior. Some of these grants are in the hands of responsible and capable companies, and if the peace of the country is assured, and immigrants can be induced to settle there, a rapid development of its resources is promised.

Ten years ago the telegraph was unknown, and there was no postal system in the interior. All communications were transmitted from place to place by messengers, who were famous for their endurance and swiftness of foot. The letter or package to be conveyed was first wrapped in cloth and then fastened around the loins of the carrier. This system is still in vogue for the transmission of letters, packages, and money. The couriers, or _cozeos_, are noted for being trusty and courageous; they travel long distances over the mountains and through the forest, generally by routes known only to themselves.

Within the last eight years every town of importance has been connected with the capital by lines of telegraph. Before its construction information of the utmost importance could not reach the capital from the remote points in less than ten or twelve days. The Government saw the necessity of some better and quicker method for transmitting information, and constructed these lines. They are owned and operated entirely by the Government, and from them a considerable revenue is realized. For the purpose of sending a message, you must first purchase of the proper Government officer a stamped telegraphic blank, which varies in price from one real (twelve and a half cents) to one or two dollars, in proportion to the number of words which it is to contain. The distance the message is to travel makes no difference in the price, provided its destination is within any of the republics of Central America. When the message is written on the blank it is taken to the telegraph-office, and if the charge for the number of words contained in the message corresponds with the stamped blank it is forwarded.

Every department of Honduras possesses more or less mineral wealth, and within the limits of the country almost every metal known to man is found. The discoveries of gold and silver were made by the aborigines, who possessed much treasure when the Spaniards conquered them, and ever since the Conquest the mines have been worked with great profit; but their development was greater under the viceroys than since the independence of the republic, as this branch of industry has suffered more from civil wars than any other. As a consequence, mine after mine has been abandoned, and the districts where the best mineral deposits exist are marked with depopulated towns and villages.

The lack of roads renders it impossible to transport machinery to the mining districts. The mines are seldom worked to any depth, and the waste is enormous. But even under this system, rude and primitive as it is, much wealth has been acquired, and millions of dollars in silver and gold have been taken out annually for hundreds of years. Of late a good deal of attention has been given to the Honduras mines by American experts, and much capital has been invested in purchasing and prospecting them, but the hope of realizing upon the investment lies in the improvement of transportation facilities, for nothing that cannot be carried on the back of a mule can either reach the mines or come from them. And imported labor is quite as necessary, as the native of Honduras cannot be induced to do anything in other than the way to which he has been accustomed, and looks upon labor-saving machinery as the invention of the evil one.

The city of Tegucigalpa, the commercial metropolis and the actual capital of the country, stands upon both banks of the Rio Cholutica in an amphitheatre of mountains, and has twelve thousand inhabitants. The river is spanned and the two divisions of the town connected by an ancient bridge with some fine arches of stone. The suburb is called Comayaguaita (Little Comayagua). The streets are well paved, in the same manner as other Spanish American cities, with a gutter in the centre, to which they slope from both sides. This gutter is always full of weeds and dust and filth, but seldom of water; and although the hills which half surround the city are full of running streams, with a fall sufficient to force water to the tower of the cathedral, it has never occurred to the inhabitants to utilize them. Every drop of water used for any purpose in the city is carried, in an earthen jar on the top of some woman’s head, from the river at the bottom of a gorge a hundred feet deep.

The houses in Tegucigalpa show much more evidence of prosperity than those of Comayagua, and are kept more tidy and in better repair. They are usually painted either a dead white or pink, blue, yellow, green, or some other very pronounced color, while often a native amateur artist tries his hand at exterior decoration, and endeavors to make the walls of adobe look as if they were made of marble.

Somehow or another Tegucigalpa always looks new. The grass is growing in the streets, and there are many other indications of commercial stagnation, but the people do not let their houses show how poor and indolent they are. These two national characteristics, moreover, do not appear in any form in the city. It is not only the present headquarters of the Government and of commercial affairs, but it is the centre of fashionable life and the residence of the aristocracy of Honduras. Two-thirds of the white people in the republic live here, and the other third come here to get their clothes, so that the city is by comparison gay.

The numerous farms surrounding the city are capable of enormous production, and some of them are still profitably operated, while many have gone to waste. The staples are sugar, coffee, cocoa, and other tropical products, which require and receive little attention. The buildings upon these plantations are all very old, but are still in good condition. The chief dwelling is commonly large and comfortable, built of adobe and roofed with imported tiles, and located where it can secure a good natural water supply. There is usually but one floor, no ceiling, nor glass in the windows, for the climate does not require it, and glass is expensive. The windows are protected with iron bars and heavy mahogany shutters. As little timber as possible is used, because all dry wood is subject to destruction from a little insect called the _comojeu_, which honey-combs every rafter, joist, and beam in a building as soon as the sap is exhausted, and the interiors of the houses have to be restored at intervals of a few years.

Most of the churches are in a dilapidated condition, and have been divested of their former ornaments and riches by the hands of vandals during revolutions. The cathedral was erected at the expense of a devout and wealthy padre, and was once a fine building, but is now in a sad state of decay.

What will impress the traveller at once in Tegucigalpa is the entire absence of carriages. I do not believe there is one in the country, any more than there is a chimney or an overcoat, and for the same reason--the people do not need them. All roads, it was said, lead to Rome, but no roads lead to the capital of Honduras except a few short ones, narrow and stony, like the way of salvation, and hedged about with divers trials and pitfalls, from the neighboring plantations, and are used only by rude ox-carts. Everybody goes on horseback, and all the transportation is done on the backs of mules and men. Long caravans of pack animals are coming and going to and from the sea-coast daily over the mountain trails, and there is a class of Indians called Cargadors who carry a cargo of a hundred pounds or so upon their backs, and run at a jog-trot for hours at a time, making the same journey twice as rapidly as a mule. Their loads are strapped to their backs on a wicker frame, and by a broad band passing around the forehead.

At breakfast chocolate often takes the place of coffee, and it is prepared from the cocoa-bean in a manner different from that in use in other countries. A handful or two of cocoa-beans, with a few vanilla-beans or sticks of cinnamon, and a much larger amount of raw sugar, are ground up together by the _matete_--that is, by being rubbed between two stones--and moistened until it is reduced to paste; then it is rolled out in little balls as large as a chocolate cream, and allowed to harden. A plate of these is placed upon the table, each member of the family takes as many as he or she chooses, drops them in a cup, and pours boiling milk upon them. They soon dissolve, and are very palatable.

The shops, or _tiendas_, of Tegucigalpa display very few goods that are pretty or costly, and are usually “general merchandise” stores, such as are found in the country villages of the United States--a few drugs and dry goods, a little hardware, patent-leather boots and elaborately stitched kid shoes for ladies--often white or pink or blue, for the ladies affect bright-colored foot-gear--some cutlery and crockery, and other household articles. Nearly all sales are on credit, even if the purchaser have the money in his pocket, for the custom of the country is not to do anything to-day that can be postponed.

The ladies usually do their shopping in the morning before breakfast, which is served at eleven o’clock, for the afternoons are given up to siestas. Most of the business of the city is done before breakfast, and from eleven o’clock until four in the afternoon the streets are empty and most of the stores are closed. Activity is resumed at the latter hour, and continues until eight or nine o’clock in the evening.

Every woman goes to mass at seven in the morning, but a man is seldom seen to enter a church except on feast-day or to attend a funeral. All their religion is crammed into Holy-week, when they are very pious.

The schools of the republic are nominally free, but there are few of them; education is compulsory, but the law is not enforced. The school funds have usually been stolen, or diverted to other purposes, and only in the cities, where public sentiment demands it, are schools sustained. There is a university at Tegucigalpa which is said to have been once an institution of some importance, but is such no longer. It has a few students and a small faculty, but those who can afford it, and who are anxious to secure an education, go to Guatemala or to Europe.

Tegucigalpa is famous for having been the birthplace of Morazan, the Washington of Central America, and his descendants still reside there. He was undoubtedly the greatest man any of these republics ever produced, and had the broadest vision as well as the broadest views as to the nature of a republic. The fires of liberty were enkindled by him, and he led the fight against Spain which resulted in the overthrow of the Viceroys and the establishment of the confederacy. He was born in 1799; his father was a native of Porto Rico and his mother a lady of Tegucigalpa. He prided himself on the fact that his ancestors came from the birthplace of Napoleon, and his descendants, to whom strangers are usually introduced, seldom fail to forget that circumstance

in conversation. Before Morazan was of age he was prominent in Honduras, and became the governor of the city in 1824, when he was but twenty-five. For fourteen years thereafter his career was one of singular activity and success, and the people of the entire continent followed him with feelings akin to idolatry. He was so far ahead of them in ideas and enterprise that his counsels were not followed, and he was overthrown by a combination of priests, who took up a cruel Indian of Guatemala named Rafael Carera, and succeeded in overthrowing the power of Morazan, not only in Honduras, but throughout the entire confederacy. The patriot and liberator was afterwards assassinated at Cartago, Costa Rica, by men whom he trusted as his friends.

MANAGUA.

THE CAPITAL OF NICARAGUA.

A stranger landing at the port of Corinto, Nicaragua, asked the men who were taking him ashore in a _bongoe_ the name of the capital of the republic. There were three of them. The quickest of wit answered promptly, “Grenada;” both the others disputed it, one of them contending for the city of Managua, and the other for Leon. So animated did the controversy become that all three dropped their oars, and nearly upset the boat by their gesticulations. This question is, and always has been, a dangerous one, and thousands of lives and hundreds of thousands of money have been wasted in repeated attempts to determine it. If it were the only excuse for the blood that has been shed in the little republic during the last sixty-five years, its history would be a nobler and a prouder one; for bitter wars have been waged for less, and brother has fought brother to settle questions not only involving a preference for cities but for men. There is no spot of equal area upon the globe in which so much human blood has been wasted in civil war, or so much wanton destruction committed. Nature has blessed it with wonderful resources, and a few years of peace and industry would make the country prosperous beyond comparison; but so much attention has been paid to politics that little is left for anything else. Scarcely a year has passed without a revolution, and during its sixty-five years of independence the republic has known more than five times as many rulers as it had during the three centuries it was under the dominion of Spain. It was seldom a question of principle or policy that brought the inhabitants to war, but usually the intrigue of some ambitious man. It is a land of volcanic disturbance, physical, moral, and political, and the mountains and men have between them contrived to almost compass its destruction.

For sixty years the country has been going backward. Its population is less than when independence was declared, and its wealth has decreased even more rapidly. Its cities are heaps of ruins, and its commerce is not so great as it was at the beginning of the century. There is, however, a commercial elasticity, owing to the extreme productiveness of the fields and the ease with which wealth is acquired, that has kept the little republic from bankruptcy, and promises great prosperity if political order can be preserved.

Most of the people live in towns, and waste much time in going and coming between their homes and the plantations upon which they labor. This is owing to the frequency of revolutions and the milder forms of destruction and murder that are practised by highwaymen and other robbers. None but the very poor live along the roadside, and they have nothing to tempt assault.

Everybody rides on horseback, and the animals are plenty and fine. The horses of Nicaragua resemble those of Arabia, being small but fleet, spirited, and capable of much endurance. Great care is taken in training them, and they are taught an easy gait, half trotting and half pacing, called the _paso-trote_. A well-broken animal will take this as soon as the reins are loosened, and continue it all day without fatigue to himself or his rider, making five or six miles an hour. The motion is so gentle that an experienced rider can carry a cup of water for miles in his hand without spilling a drop.

There is only one road in the country suitable for carriages, and that is seldom used except by carts. It runs from Grenada, the easternmost city of importance on the shore of Lake Nicaragua, to Realjo, or Corinto, the principal seaport; and over this road, which was built three hundred years ago by the Spaniards, all the commerce of the country passes. There is now a railroad along this highway; the Government has several times made loans to construct it, but the money was wasted in revolutions, and the track was not completed till recently. The road belongs to the Government, and is managed by a citizen of the United States. The cart road passes through Managua, and thus unites the three principal cities of the land. Over it have passed hundreds of armies and no end of insurgent forces, and the whole distance has been washed with blood, shed in public and private quarrels. Wherever a man has been slain a rude cross is usually erected, and it is common to see wreaths of flowers hanging upon it, placed there by some interested or, mayhap, loving hand. At these places pious passengers breathe a prayer for the soul that has been released, and they are so numerous that it keeps them praying from one end of a journey to the other.

The carts which furnish transportation are rude contrivances of native manufacture, and the design has not been improved upon since the conquest. The body consists of a very heavy framework of wood, and the wheels are solid sections cut from some large tree, usually of mahogany. They are not sawed, but chopped into shape, and are generally about eight or ten inches thick and five feet in diameter, and weigh several hundred pounds. The oxen do not wear yokes, but the pole of the cart is fastened to a bar of tough wood, usually lignum vitæ, which is lashed by cowhide thongs to the horns. There are always two pair of oxen--one to haul the cart and the other to haul the load, for the vehicle is twice the weight of its cargo. Two men are required to navigate the craft; one goes ahead armed with a gun or a machete, which is a long knife, and answers for many purposes--a weapon as well as an agricultural implement--and the oxen are supposed to follow him, while the other sits on the load and yells as he prods the animals with an iron-pointed goad long enough to reach the leaders. The man ahead assists his colleague by uttering constant admonitions to the oxen without turning his face, and between the two, and the squeaking of the cart-wheels, which are never greased, there is noise enough to deafen the whole neighborhood. The approach of one of these vehicles can be anticipated half an hour.

Each cart contains five or six days’ forage for the animals, as well as rations for the _carreteros_. They camp whenever night overtakes them, even if it is only a mile from the end of their journey. The oxen are fastened to the cart and given their fodder, while the men light a fire, make their coffee, and either lie under the cart or upon it to sleep. Most of the carts have covers or awnings of cured hides, which are lashed over boughs to protect the loads in the rainy season. The average rate of speed is about a mile an hour over a good road, but ten miles a day is fast travelling, owing to the amount of time wasted by the roadside.

The cartmen are invariably honest in dealing with their employers, and always render a strict account of their cargoes, whether they are composed of silver or coffee, but

consider it a privilege, which they have inherited from their ancestors, to plunder along the road. Nothing is too hot or too heavy for them to carry away, and accordingly precautions are taken for the protection of whatever is likely to tempt them. They have an unorganized union to protect themselves, and permit no impositions to be practised upon any of their number, or underbidding or other irregularities among themselves. They charge so much a journey, no matter what their load is, and persons having small parcels to be carried have to club together to make up a cargo, or pay a high rate for transportation. Many of the carts and oxen are owned by those who drive them, but others are leased to the carreteros by capitalists who possess a large number. The cattle come from the savannas in the south-western portion of the republic, where there are immense and nutritious pastures extending over the line into Costa Rica.

Although the mineral resources of the country are undoubtedly rich, its future wealth will come, if peace can ever be made permanent, from the development of the agricultural and timber lands. Beyond the mining district down to the Mosquito coast there extends a forest of immense area, filled with the finest woods, and it has scarcely been touched. The most useful timber is the mahogany, although there are kindred varieties quite as good, but not so popular or well known. It is more easily obtained too, as it grows upon the ridges and keeps out of the swamps, which are full of miasma and mosquitoes. The tree is one of the most beautiful, as well as one of the largest, that are found in tropical lands, commonly reaching a height of sixty or seventy feet, and being from twenty-five to forty feet in circumference. Timbers forty feet long and eight feet square are frequent, although so heavy that they are difficult to handle; and the only way fine timber can be obtained is by taking saw-mills into the forest and cutting up the timber into sizes suitable for transportation. This is difficult, however, owing to the lack of roads. Logs five and six feet in diameter are common, and it is said that the largest trees have the finest color and grain.

The mahogany is one of the few trees in the tropical forests whose leaves change color with the season, and the Carrib Indians, who are employed to cut them, discover their presence by this peculiarity. They climb the highest tree they can find, sight the mahoganies, locate their position with great skill, and lead the choppers to them with unerring accuracy. When the tree is found, the underbrush around it and the lower limbs are first cleared away before the trunk is attacked. When it falls, the branches are chopped off; then the log is hewn into shape, after which it is dragged by oxen--sometimes a hundred yoke being employed--to the nearest water-course, the choppers going ahead and clearing away with their machetes the underbrush and small trees to make a road. When the timber is rolled into the river, it is branded and allowed to lie there until the rainy season, when the waters rise and carry it down to the sea.

There are other trees of great value in the forests, and not for timber alone. The caoutchouc, or rubber-tree--a name which when properly pronounced sounds like the plunge of a frog into the water--kachunk--is very plentiful in the Nicaragua forests, although this resource, like most of the others, is comparatively idle. The Mosquito Indians gather some, however, which is shipped from Blewfields and Greytown in small quantities. The quality is not so good as that which comes from Brazil, as the sap is not reduced with any skill or care.

The average North American supposes that the rubber is obtained like pitch, and comes from the exuded gums of the tree, but the process is altogether different, resembling our method of making maple sugar. When the sap begins to rise from the roots to the branches of the tree, expeditions of thirty or forty men are organized, who are furnished by the exporting merchants with an outfit of buckets, axes, machetes, pans, and provisions, and start into the woods. The _uleros_, as the rubbermen are called, from the term _ule_, which is the native name for the tree, are always paid a small sum in advance, ostensibly for the support of their families during their absence, but which is always exhausted in debauchery before they start. When they reach the forest of the ule-trees they build a shanty of palms and brush, if there is not one already standing, on the bank of some stream, as a great deal of water is required for the manufacture of the gum. There they distribute their large cans and buckets through the forest at convenient intervals and proceed to business. When the _ulero_ selects his tree, he clears the trunk of vines and creepers and climbs it to the branches. Then he descends, cutting diagonal channels through the bark with a single blow of his machete, or knife, left and right, left and right, all meeting at the angle. At the bottom of the lowest cut an iron trough about six inches long and four inches wide is driven into the tree, which catches the milk as it flows from the wound, and conducts it into a bucket on the ground below. This is done with great speed and skill by an expert; and necessarily so, to prevent waste, as the sap springs out instantly, and by the time the spout is driven into the tree is flowing at the rate of four gallons an hour. A large tree will produce twenty gallons of sap, and will run dry in a single day. The _ulero_ having tapped a dozen or eighteen trees has all the work he can attend to emptying the buckets into the ten-gallon cans that are provided for the purpose. In the evening the cans are carried to the camp, and the sap strained through sieves into barrels. In Brazil it is boiled, but in Nicaragua the natives have a peculiar system of reducing it. There is a plant or vine called the Achuna, whose sap when mixed with that of the rubber-tree has the singular property of coagulating it in a few minutes. By whom, or how, or where this process was discovered no one can tell. Undoubtedly it was an accident, for the vine hangs from all the trees in the _ule_ forest, and probably a cutting dropped into a bucket of sap some time or another produced the result for which it is now used. Having their barrels full, the _uleros_ cut short

pieces of this vine, soak it in water, and small bunches are thrown into pans upon which the sap is poured. In the morning the rubber has turned to gum--about two pounds to every gallon of sap. At the top of the pan is a quantity of dark brown liquid, like a weak solution of licorice. This is poured off, and then the gum is rolled under heavy weights of wood into long flat strips called tortillas, which are hung over poles under the shed to drip and dry. At first they are white, like the vulcanized rubber, but with exposure they turn black and become hard after a few days. Then the tortillas are stacked up under cover until the end of the season, and shipped to market.

The cocoa or chocolate tree grows wild in the forests of Nicaragua, and when cultivated yields the most profitable crop that can be produced; but the republic furnishes but little, comparatively, for export, although its possibilities in this direction are almost unlimited. The most of the world’s supply of cocoa comes from Ecuador and Venezuela.

There always has been a prejudice in Nicaragua against foreign immigration, inspired and stimulated by the priests, who inveterately oppose all progress and every innovation. A number of German families are settled throughout the country, engaged in mercantile pursuits. Most of the large commission houses and exporters are English, while the hotel or posada keepers are Frenchmen. England furnishes most of the money to move the crops, as the natives are impoverished by wars or their own extravagance. The country will never be prosperous until its peace is assured and its population increased by the introduction of foreign labor and capital.

Like other Spanish-American countries, the national vices are indolence and extravagance. The common people never get ahead, and have no need of purses, much less of savings-banks. They might make good wages, as they are naturally good producers, but they always spend their earnings before they receive them, and are encouraged to keep in debt to those who employ them, as, under the law, no laborer can leave a job upon which he is employed as long as he owes his employer a penny. This system of credit, although it amounts to only a few dollars in each case, is equivalent to slavery, a peonage which is permanent; for if the laborer really aspires to be a free man, he is persuaded or threatened or swindled into renewing the obligation under which his life is spent.

The aristocracy are equally extravagant. It is a part of their religion, apparently, to spend their incomes, even if they do not anticipate them; and the latter is generally the case. Nearly every crop is mortgaged to the commission man before it is harvested, and the planter is compelled to take the price that is offered. The peon is in debt to the planter, the planter to the merchant, the merchant to the commission-house, and the latter conducts his business on borrowed money; and so it goes on, year after year, without cessation, each person involved spending as much or more than he makes, and conducting his business on paper, like speculators in the stock market, the country growing poorer each year, with no possible hope of redemption except by an influx of fresh blood and capital. The climate is delightful, the land is wonderfully productive, and the products always in active demand in the markets of the world.

The chief cities are pictures of desolation, and along the roads in the country are the ruins of _estancias_ that were the abode of wealthy planters years ago. Much of the destruction was caused by earthquakes, but more by civil war. The population in 1846 was 257,000; in 1870 it had been reduced to less than 200,000, and since then there have been disturbances in which thousands of men were slaughtered or driven into exile by fear or force. The whites, or those of pure Spanish blood, number about 30,000; the negroes about half as many; the mixed races, Mestizos and Ladinos--the former of Spanish and Indian and the latter Negro and Indian blood--are probably 8,000; and there are supposed to be about as many pure-blooded Indians upon the Atlantic coast and scattered throughout the republic. The education of the common people is neglected and left to the priests, who teach them nothing but superstition and their obligations to the Church. In 1868 a decree was passed making education compulsory and free, and providing for the diversion of a liberal amount of the public revenue each year for the support of the schools; but the law is a dead letter, and in no year has the amount assigned to the Department of Education been appropriated. At present there are but sixty schools, with a normal attendance of twenty-five hundred, or an average of forty pupils to thirty thousand inhabitants. There is a university at Leon, with an average of fifty students, and another at Grenada, with a few more, at which law, medicine, and theology are taught, under the direction of the bishop; but most of the sons of wealthy families are sent to Europe to be educated.

The city of Leon is the commercial metropolis, and was the ancient capital. In 1854 the seat of government was removed to Grenada, during the great revolution, which lasted for five years, and in which our famous filibuster, Walker, figured; and the people of the latter city would not permit its return to the capital of the viceroys. After fighting over the question for several years, shedding much blood and destroying much property, a compromise was effected by locating the headquarters temporarily at Managua, a smaller place half way between the two, where, since 1863, the President has resided, and the Congress has assembled every year. The public buildings in Leon remain as they were at the time of the removal of the capital, and most of the archives are there, the expectations of the citizens being that they will be needed for the Government again in the near future; but Grenada keeps a threatening look in that direction, and any attempt to disturb the present situation would result in another war, so bitter is the rivalry.