CHAPTER V

SALVADOR

Geographical Description--History--Improvement of Political Conditions in Recent Years--Activities of the Government--Agricultural Products--Social Conditions--Means of Transportation--Relations with the United States--Prospect for the Future.

Salvador is the most important of the Central American republics, after Guatemala, although she has a far smaller territory than any of her neighbors. Almost all of her total area of 7,225 square miles is suitable for cultivation, and there are few parts of it which are not inhabited by a dense population. Notwithstanding the fact that she has no coast line on the Atlantic and has thus been deprived of direct communication with Europe and the Eastern United States, her foreign trade is far greater than that of Honduras and Nicaragua, and but little behind that of Guatemala and Costa Rica, while her upper classes are more closely in touch with the outside world, and have shown a greater tendency to adopt foreign customs and practices than those of the majority of the other countries. Her capital, San Salvador, is a busy, up-to-date commercial center, which impresses the traveler as one of the most progressive cities of the Isthmus.

Extending from Guatemala on the west to the Gulf of Fonseca on the east,[18] the Republic occupies a section of the broad plain along the Pacific Coast of the Isthmus, and like the similarly situated section of Guatemala, is traversed by a chain of volcanic peaks, many of which are still active or have been active within very recent times. The soil, consisting mainly of decomposed lava, is extremely fertile. The slopes of the mountains are excellently adapted for the cultivation of coffee, and in the lower altitudes, although much of the country is rough and broken, nearly all of the other characteristic Central American products can be grown. There is a plentiful rainfall from May to October, and an abundant water supply for the dense population is provided by several lakes and by a number of streams which do not dry up during the rainless season. The Lempa, which divides the eastern from the western half of the country, after flowing through the northern departments from its source near the Guatemalan frontier, is by far the largest river on the Pacific side of the Isthmus. As the more important cities are situated in the valleys at the foot of the volcanoes, or in the low plains along the coast and on the banks of the Lempa, few of them are more than two thousand feet above sea level, and their climate is consequently less agreeable than that of the most densely populated parts of Guatemala and Costa Rica. Except in the lower Lempa Valley, however, the people are fairly healthy, probably because the porousness of the soil discourages the breeding of mosquitoes and thus holds in check some of the diseases most prevalent in other parts of the tropics.

The people are of much the same racial character as those of Nicaragua and Honduras, although there seems to be rather more Spanish blood in their veins, and less admixture of negro, than in those countries. The majority are in part at least of Indian ancestry, but all speak Spanish, and there are only a few communities where the aborigines have maintained their individuality and their primitive customs. Among the upper classes, the greater number are of pure or nearly pure European descent, but Indian blood is no bar to social or political prominence. The people as a whole are fairly industrious, considering the climate and the prevalence of hookworm and other intestinal parasites, and the standard of living among the laboring classes is considerably higher than in Guatemala or Nicaragua. The landowning class is perhaps the wealthiest and the most enterprising in the Isthmus.

The early history of Salvador was as turbulent as that of her neighbors. For many years after the declaration of independence she was almost continuously in a state of civil war, partly because of the rivalry between the political leaders and the jealousy between the cities within the state itself, and partly because of the incessant quarrels between the state authorities and those of Guatemala. As we have seen, her people played a prominent part in the struggles which accompanied the first attempt to establish a Central American federation. The prolonged war in which the citizens of Salvador and of one section of Honduras overthrew the Conservative government in Guatemala in 1829 was followed within three years by new difficulties which led President Morazán in his turn to remove the state authorities in San Salvador and to transfer to that city the seat of the federal administration. From then until the final fall of the great unionist leader, Salvador was frequently involved with one or another and at times with all of her neighbors, because of the opposition of the latter to the federal authorities. She was the last of the five states to admit the dissolution of the union, and at the present time she is the chief center of the party which favors its restoration.

The Liberal party, which had supported Morazán, was driven from power by the intervention of President Carrera of Guatemala in 1840, and for five years the government was under the control of Francisco Malespín, one of Carrera’s friends, who used his position as _comandante de armas_ to make and unmake presidents and to dominate the policy of the civil authorities. The Liberals were able to return to power in 1845, after a bloody struggle in which Malespín, although now estranged from Carrera, was assisted by the government of Honduras. They were again driven out in 1852 by Carrera, and four Conservative leaders occupied the presidency for short terms. The Liberals, under the leadership of Gerardo Barrios, regained power in 1860, but were forced to relinquish it two years later as the result of another war with Carrera. In 1863, the Conservative leader, Francisco Dueñas, became president, and conducted the government efficiently and successfully until 1871, when the Liberal party, which was at the same time carrying on successful revolutions in Guatemala and Honduras, defeated him and placed at the head of the state Santiago González, who remained in office until 1876. His successor, Andrés Valle, became involved in another war with Guatemala, arising from an intervention by both states in the internal affairs of Honduras, and was replaced by Rafael Zaldívar, one of the leading followers of the former president Dueñas. This able ruler remained in office until 1885, maintaining the friendliest relations with President Barrios of Guatemala, despite the fact that one belonged to the Conservative and the other to the Liberal party. When Barrios attempted to renew the Central American Union by force, and entered upon the campaign which ended so disastrously for him at Chalchuapa, however, Zaldívar took the field against him. A short time after this war, Zaldívar was forced to resign by a revolution headed by Francisco Menéndez, and the latter was president until his death in 1890. After him, the Republic was ruled by the Ezeta brothers, two military leaders who seized the presidency by a _coup d’état_ and maintained themselves in office by despotic and rather barbarous methods until they were overthrown by an uprising in the city of Santa Ana in 1894. Rafael Gutiérrez, who became president in that year, was an able and patriotic executive, but some features of his administration caused considerable discontent, and his participation in the Treaty of Amapala, by which Salvador entered into a loose union with Honduras and Nicaragua, caused his fall in 1898.

The new president, General Tomás Regalado, served his full term and passed on the chief magistracy in an orderly manner to Pedro José Escalón in 1903. From that time there has not been a successful revolution in Salvador, although discontented political leaders have occasionally made ineffectual attempts to overthrow the government. In 1906, General Regalado, who was very influential in the administration of President Escalón, brought about a short and purposeless war with Guatemala, which ended with the death of its author on the battlefield. In 1907 there was another war, between Salvador and Nicaragua, about the presidency of Honduras, and in that and the following year President Zelaya of Nicaragua attempted several times, without success, to promote revolutions against the governments of Escalón and of Fernando Figueroa, who succeeded him. The Government of the United States exerted its good offices to put an end to the hostilities between the two countries, and finally threatened to use force if necessary to put an end to Zelaya’s attacks on his neighbor, but peace was not entirely re-established until the Nicaraguan president was overthrown in 1909. Figueroa was succeeded by Manuel Enrique Araujo in 1911. This president was assassinated in 1913, and the vice-president, Don Carlos Meléndez, completed the unexpired term and was re-elected to the chief magistracy in 1915.

In the confused political history of Salvador, two important facts stand out: first, that the revolutions which occurred so frequently during the seventy-five years following the declaration of independence were due more to the interference of the other countries, and especially of Guatemala, than to the strife of factions at home; and second, that in recent times, when this kind of interference is no longer so frequent, there has been a remarkably rapid progress towards the establishment of a more stable form of government. For three-quarters of a century after 1821, the internal tranquillity of the country may be said to have been almost entirely dependent upon its relations with its neighbors. The parties which were formed during the turbulent years of the Central American Union continued to act together long after the states which made up the Union had become independent nations, and Conservative governments in Guatemala continued to regard themselves as the natural enemies of Liberal administrations in Nicaragua and Salvador, largely because of the bitter animosity between the leaders, which had been engendered by the events of the years 1821-40. Discontented factions in Salvador never hesitated to call in assistance from other countries to overthrow a hostile government at home, and the presidents of the other countries on their side were always ready to intervene to secure the establishment of a friendly administration in Salvador, in order to increase their own influence and to make more secure their own position. As the leaders who had

## participated in the wars under the Federation died, however, and the

## parties lost their fundamental economic and social characteristics, so

that there was little real difference in principles or point of view between the Liberals of one country and the Conservatives of another, factional politics ceased to a great extent to be international. Intervention to overthrow a government of opposite political complexion was then no longer so necessary as a measure of self-preservation, as it had been when every Liberal or Conservative who came into power in one of the states felt it his duty to use all of the resources at his command to secure the domination of his own party in the others. Guatemala has not played a decisive part in overthrowing a president of Salvador since the battle of Chalchuapa in 1885, and Honduras and Nicaragua have now fallen so far behind their neighbor in population and resources that their intervention is no longer seriously to be feared. The attempts of the president of the latter country to encourage revolutions in Salvador in 1907 and 1908 were failures, although they caused the government considerable uneasiness and expense.

Since 1908, moreover, international wars between the Central American states have been made practically impossible by the fact that the United States has employed diplomatic pressure and sometimes actual force to secure the observance of the Washington Conventions of 1907, by which the five countries pledged themselves to abstain from interfering in each other’s internal affairs. At the present time it is not probable that an army from one state would be allowed to invade one of the others for the purpose of bringing about a change of government. The prevention of this kind of aggression, of which there were instances almost every year before 1907, has done much to discourage revolutions in Central America, because there is little chance, except in cases where there is a very general and very violent popular discontent with the government in power, for a revolt to succeed without active assistance from outside.

Since the character of her international relations has changed so that external influences no longer make the establishment of internal peace impossible, Salvador has become one of the most orderly and best governed of the Central American republics. Her political affairs are almost entirely in the hands of a small educated class, among whom landed proprietors are more powerful and professional politicians and revolutionists on the whole less numerous and less influential than elsewhere in the Isthmus. This class was for many years divided within itself into hostile factions, which were kept alive, long after the disappearance of their original sources of difference, by the intrigues and interventions of the neighboring governments. After the violent animosities created by the wars during the first Central American Union died out, however, and after the cultivation of coffee and the development of commerce had opened up greater opportunities for the acquisition of wealth and power than were offered by the contest for public offices, the ruling class as a whole turned its attention from politics to agriculture. The damage inflicted by the frequent civil wars was severely felt by the proprietors of the plantations, who were realizing for the first time the possibilities of the new life which the importation of foreign luxuries and the ability to travel abroad placed before them, and they consequently became almost a unit in their desire for peace and a stable government. An attempt to start an old-fashioned revolution at the present time, unless there were some strong reason for desiring to overthrow the government, would probably meet with determined hostility among the greater part of the wealthier and more intelligent classes.

It cannot be said, however, that Salvador is inherently a peaceful country in the same sense in which this is true of Costa Rica. The lower classes have no more inborn respect for authority and love of peace than have those of Nicaragua and Honduras, whom they strongly resemble in their racial characteristics and customs, and a large element among them have always taken part in wars and revolutions with the same gusto that is shown by the _mestizos_ of the more turbulent countries. If they are on the whole less prone to revolt, this is due to the fact that they are fairly contented under present conditions, and that they are held under control by a much stronger and better organized military power than in those countries. The government is maintained in office, not by popular respect for authority or by the will of the people, but by force, for there are always elements, even among the upper classes, which are awaiting an opportunity to overthrow it.

There is at present, however, no organized opposition, as the old historical parties have nearly died out and the formation of new ones has been discouraged by the policy of the government, which generally either wins over discontented political leaders by the gift of offices or money, or forcibly prevents them from carrying on propaganda hostile to it. In former times, opponents of the group in power were exiled or even murdered, but recent administrations have attempted rather to conciliate their opponents and to maintain the good will of the common people, and there has been little of the severity towards defeated rivals which has helped to keep alive factional hatred in Guatemala and Nicaragua. Nevertheless, opposition to the government is still suppressed with a firm hand, and murders for political purposes are by no means unknown.

The political institutions are no more democratic than those of the neighboring countries. Except where a successful revolution intervenes, the presidency is passed on by each incumbent to a successor of his own choosing, and all of the other nominally elective offices are filled in accordance with the wishes of the administration, since the authorities control the elections by preventing the nomination of opposition candidates and by exerting pressure on the voters. Every department is under the absolute personal control of the president, so far as he wishes to exercise his authority, and the responsibility for everything which occurs during the administration rests upon his shoulders. The Congress has at the present time some degree of independence, and the judiciary is not subjected to the same dictation by the executive as in some of the other countries, but neither is in any real sense co-ordinate with the latter, nor would be able to resist it if a serious difference of opinion arose.

Of late years, however, the presidents of Salvador have made little attempt to exercise the absolute and arbitrary authority which some of the recent rulers of Guatemala and Nicaragua have enjoyed, for they have generally been content to abide so far as possible by the provisions of the constitution and to relinquish their office to one of their supporters at the end of their legal term. Since 1898, with a single exception, changes of administration have taken place without the intervention of force, and the one president who was assassinated was followed by the constitutionally elected vice-president, without disorder or further bloodshed.

The chief support of the government is the army, which is better trained and better equipped than that of any other Central American country. A large proportion of the soldiers, apparently, serve voluntarily. Moreover, many remain with the colors for long periods, and learn to take a certain amount of pride in their calling. The officers are of an unusually high type, because the comparatively good salaries and the education offered by the Polytechnic School have induced many young men of the better classes to adopt the military profession as a career. Both officers and men seem on the whole to be loyal to the government and show little tendency to political intrigue,--a statement which cannot be made with regard to the forces of some of the other republics. The army is far larger than the wealth or the actual necessities of the country would seem to justify, and heavy expenditures upon it have been a source of some discontent; but the existence of a well-organized and well-trained body of troops has undoubtedly been a strong factor in favor of stable government and a valuable protection against attack from without.

The civil police is also efficient and well equipped compared with that of the neighboring countries. Besides the usual city forces, there is an organization called the _Guardia Civil_ in the rural districts near the capital which patrols the roads and does much to protect life and property. Crimes of violence, however, are by no means uncommon, and are very frequently allowed to go unpunished, for the activity of the army and the police, as in the other Central American countries, is directed more towards the maintenance of the authority of the government than towards the prevention of wrongdoing. The suppression of revolts and the control of all parts of the Republic by military force is easier than in any of the neighboring countries, because of the small area to be policed and the denseness and compactness of the population.

The chief functions performed by the government are the preservation of order, the management of the customs houses and the other sources of income, and the operation of such fundamentally necessary public services as the postal and telegraph systems. A comparatively small amount of money, considering the wealth of the country, is available for other purposes, because of the heavy cost of the military establishment and the losses due to inefficiency and peculation in the collection and expenditure of the revenues. Sanitary measures and public instruction have not received the attention which might be expected among so progressive a people and little has been done, except by private initiative, to develop the resources of the country or to stimulate foreign commerce. Although abortive attempts have been made from time to time to establish agricultural and industrial schools, the government has little interest in such institutions, and has never given them sufficient funds to accomplish anything of great value. The system of highways, which is of especial importance because of the lively internal commerce, leaves much to be desired, but its defects are due more to almost insurmountable difficulties arising from heavy rainfall and from the physical formation of the country than to lack of interest. There are, however, cart roads, which are fairly good in the dry season, in all parts of the Republic, and near the capital there are several roads suitable for automobiles, which are owned by many of the wealthy people of the city.

The public schools have received less attention than in some of the other countries. The Department of Public Instruction, which possesses many well-informed and able officials, has done what it could with the scanty resources at its command, but the government has not supported it with adequate appropriations, and has not always shown care or impartiality in the appointment of teachers. Only about one-fourth of the children between six and fourteen years of age are receiving instruction.[19] The schools in the capital and in the larger cities, although badly equipped and very badly housed, do excellent work, and the visitor cannot fail to be impressed by the enthusiasm shown by the children and by the teachers. The latter are generally inadequately trained, but they appear to have a natural gift for arousing the interest and holding the attention of their pupils. In the country, educational opportunities are much more limited, for the rural schools have but three regular grades, with a complementary year in which instruction in some trade is given, and there is little opportunity for the children to receive a secondary education unless they can afford to spend five years completing their primary course in one of the cities. The education of the lower classes has been purposely restricted to a few fundamentals, because the authorities have desired to discourage the tendency, so harmful in all parts of Central America, towards the adoption of the learned professions at the expense of agricultural pursuits. No government aid is now granted to poor children for advanced study either at home or in foreign countries, and every effort is made rather to encourage those who have completed their primary course to fit themselves for the cultivation of the soil or for some trade. In the capital, schools have just been inaugurated where practical instruction for this purpose is given. There are a number of secondary institutions in the larger cities which compare favorably with those in other parts of Central America, although they also suffer from lack of funds and from the absence of well-trained teachers. The same is true of the University, where law, engineering, pharmacy, and other professions are taught. The wealthier families educate their children in private institutions rather than in the public schools, and more and more young people at the present time are being sent to complete their studies in foreign countries, and especially in the United States.

The administration of public affairs is considerably less corrupt and somewhat more efficient than in Guatemala, Nicaragua, or Honduras. The integrity of many of the higher officials is above suspicion, and theft is apparently not practiced on a large scale in any department of the government. The judiciary is neither so hopelessly venal nor so inefficient as in some of the other countries, and the Supreme Court is a body which commands general respect. The administration of the postal and telegraph systems is fairly reliable, although it is typically Central American in its methods and in its spirit. Conditions are nevertheless very far from what they should be. Even at the present time, under a president whose honesty and whose progressive ideals are doubted by no one, public officials are too often appointed for purely personal reasons rather than with any regard to their fitness, and graft is practiced more or less openly in all of the departments, with the knowledge, if not with the consent, of the higher authorities. Large amounts of money are paid from the public treasury on different pretexts to political leaders whom the administration desires to conciliate, and men of little ability or patriotism are given positions of responsibility and authority for which they are not at all fitted, and in which their conduct is not infrequently scandalous. These conditions are to a great extent beyond the control of the government, for an administration which failed to consolidate its power by such methods probably could not maintain itself very long in office. The old-style professional revolutionists, many of whom have a considerable following among the lower and middle classes, are still too powerful to be disregarded, and the idea that offices and graft are the legitimate rewards of political activity is no less paramount than formerly. There is every prospect, however, that political conditions will improve as the government becomes more stable, and as public opinion, already a powerful influence for good, becomes more enlightened and exerts more control over the factional leaders.

Economically, Salvador is one of the most prosperous countries of the Isthmus. Her principal product is coffee, grown on the slopes of all the higher volcanoes and hills, which is exported to the amount of from sixty to seventy million pounds annually to France, the United States, and other countries. In the lower parts of the country, there are many large cattle ranches and cane plantations, which produce meat and sugar for local consumption. Corn is raised everywhere, even more than in other parts of Central America, because of the denseness of the population and because of the large _per capita_ consumption. One small section of the Pacific Coast, called _La Costa del Bálsamo_, is notable for its exports of balsam of Peru, a forest product which is found in its wild state only in this one spot.[20] The trees from which this medicinal gum is extracted have within recent years been brought under systematic care in large plantations, and have proved a source of considerable wealth to the native capitalists, as well as to the Indians who collect the balsam in the forest by primitive methods.

The upper classes are as enterprising and progressive as any social group in Central America. A large proportion of them have traveled abroad and have adopted foreign ways of living at home, and as a whole they have shown a responsiveness to new ideas and an energy and patriotism which promises much for the future of their country. The owners of the large plantations live in the cities, but they take a deep interest in the management and development of their properties, and usually spend a portion of the year upon them. Few are free from the Central American tendency to extravagance and improvidence, but they have nevertheless been sufficiently enterprising and progressive to maintain their dominant position in the economic life of the country while the resources of the other republics have been falling more and more into the hands of Europeans and North Americans. There are some rich agriculturalists who are foreigners, but they are relatively few as compared with those in Guatemala and Nicaragua. The great majority of the more valuable plantations still belong to citizens of Salvador, and much of the stock in the banks and in the more important industrial enterprises is controlled by native capital. This fact is of great significance, because it indicates that the people of the Republic have adapted themselves to modern conditions more readily than have their neighbors. The preservation of the class which furnishes the natural leaders and rulers of the community cannot but have a beneficial social and political effect.

The lower classes, housed in dirt-floored thatched huts, and subsisting on a diet in which the corn _tortilla_ is the chief feature, offer a striking contrast to their wealthy and Europeanized superiors, but they are nevertheless somewhat better off than in any of the neighboring republics except Costa Rica. The majority of them have regular work on the plantations, where they are supplied with homes and food and receive wages which compare favorably with those paid in Honduras and Nicaragua. Their standard of living is somewhat higher than in those countries, and they are in general better treated both by their employers and by the authorities. A large proportion of the laborers on the bigger plantations are given patches of land to cultivate for themselves. In the central part of the country there are many small landholders, who find a ready market for their products in the cities, and are enabled by the possession of a regular money income to enjoy many little luxuries which are unknown in the more backward parts of the Isthmus.

In the cities, and especially in the capital, small-scale commerce and manufacturing are very active. Great quantities of vegetables, milk, firewood, and other country products are daily brought into town in ox-carts by the peasants, who exchange them for the manufactured articles which they need, and the market and the countless small stores in the vicinity are always a scene of great animation. There are a number of little manufacturing establishments, where candles, shoes, soap, and cigarettes are made, chiefly by hand labor, and the products of these are bought by the lower classes in surprisingly large amounts. Only a few of the smaller commercial establishments, however, belong to natives of the country, for the greater part of the retail trade is in the hands of foreigners.

External commerce has attained large proportions, despite the fact that the Republic has no access to the Atlantic. As in the other countries of the Isthmus, there are few North American merchants; and English, German, and Dutch houses control the import and wholesale trade. Until the outbreak of the European war, Salvador purchased a smaller proportion of her imports from the United States than did any of the other republics of the Isthmus, but this condition has necessarily changed within the last two years. Of the exports, the coffee, which is the only item of first importance, is shipped to some extent to San Francisco, but more to France and Germany.

Both external and internal commerce have been greatly aided by the fact that the territory of the Republic is so small, and that all parts of it are so close to the Pacific Coast. The problem of transportation has not been nearly so difficult as in some of the other countries. There are now few important towns which have no railway connection. The most important line is that of the Salvador Railway Company, an English corporation which provides a cheap, rapid, and in every way excellent service from the capital and Santa Ana to Sonsonate and Acajutla. Over this passes the greater part of the freight and passenger traffic, for Acajutla, although merely an open roadstead, where loading and unloading is difficult and expensive, is the principal port of the Republic. Another line is being built by the International Railways of Central America, the American concern which operates the Guatemala system, from La Union on the Gulf of Fonseca to San Salvador. This passes through many important cities in the eastern departments, and has now reached San Vicente, about forty miles from the capital. The service is not so good, and the rates are higher than on the Salvador Railway Company’s line, and the usefulness of the road is greatly diminished by the fact that its builders have as yet failed to construct a permanent bridge over the Lempa River, to cross which freight and passengers must submit to a disagreeable and hazardous transfer in scows during the rainy season. It is, however, of immense importance to the rich sections through which it passes, and when it is completed, connecting the capital with the land-locked harbor of La Union, it will not only provide a new outlet for the commerce of Salvador, but will also open a much more rapid and convenient route to Honduras and Nicaragua, which are reached in a few hours by water from La Union. The same company plans to build a line from Santa Ana to Zacapa, on the Guatemala Railway, which will make both San Salvador and La Union accessible directly by railway from Puerto Barrios on the Atlantic. When this is done, the journey from the United States to each of the three central republics of the Isthmus will be shortened by several days.

Besides the ports mentioned, Salvador possesses two others. La Libertad, immediately south of the capital but separated from it by a steep range of hills, is an open roadstead from which a large amount of coffee produced in the neighborhood is shipped. El Triunfo, on a rather shallow bay east of the Lempa River, is close to another coffee-growing district, but it will have to be greatly improved before it can be made a regular port of call for large steamers. Both of these are connected with their tributary country by cart roads, which are good in the dry season, but become very bad when it rains.

As elsewhere on the Pacific Coast of Central America, there has been hardly any steamship service at these ports since the beginning of the European war except that of the Pacific Mail, whose ships touch there at irregular intervals and afford expensive and rather unsatisfactory accommodations for freight and passengers. The Pacific Steam Navigation Company also operates one small steamer, formerly the property of the Salvador Railway Company, between Panama and Salina Cruz, stopping at most of the ports on the way, and the government of Salvador owns a still smaller vessel which plies between the ports of the Republic and San José, Guatemala. Salvador suffers far more from the inadequacy of the West Coast steamship service than do any of the other countries, for Guatemala and Costa Rica have excellent connections with the United States and Europe by way of their Atlantic ports, and Nicaragua and Honduras have comparatively a small amount of foreign commerce. The Republic will not be able to develop as it should until its connections with the outside world are greatly improved.

The relations between Salvador and the United States have never been so close as in the case of those republics where more American capital has been invested and where regular and direct steamer communications have encouraged commerce and travel; and in recent years the friendship between the two countries has been endangered, although it has by no means been destroyed, by political questions. The influence exerted by the United States in the internal politics of some of the nearby countries, especially in the case of Nicaragua, and the proposal to establish an American naval base in the Gulf of Fonseca, close to the port of La Union, have greatly alarmed public sentiment in Salvador, and have called forth strong but ineffectual protests from her government. This fear of what the people of the Republic regard as American tendencies towards expansion has caused a rather marked distrust and dislike of the United States among certain classes,--a feeling which can be dispelled only by the most careful regard for Central American rights and susceptibilities in the future. With frankness and fair treatment on both sides, however, the relations between the two republics are bound to grow more friendly as they grow closer; for the influence of the increasingly large number of natives of Salvador who travel and study in North America, and of the Americans who are now in Salvador, should do much to bring about a better understanding.

The prospect for the future of Salvador seems very bright. Political and social conditions are improving steadily, and the prosperity of the Republic, with its fertile soil and industrious population, seems secure. The progressive spirit of the ruling classes and their rapid absorption of foreign ideas afford reason to believe that the control of the economic life of the country by foreign interests, which is becoming more and more marked elsewhere in the Isthmus, may here be avoided. The introduction of foreign capital is of course very necessary for the development of the country, as is the immigration of foreigners of the better class, but it is to be hoped that this may take place without resulting in the impoverishment and the decay of the leading native families. If the best people of the Republic can continue in the future to play the part which they play at present in politics and agriculture, the little country promises to remain one of the most prosperous and most civilized states in tropical America.

FOOTNOTES:

[18] It should be noted that the Isthmus is bounded by the Atlantic on the north and the Pacific on the south in Guatemala, Salvador, and Honduras, whereas the former ocean lies east and the latter west of Nicaragua and Costa Rica.

[19] According to figures furnished to me by Sr. Juan Lainez, Director of Primary Instruction, there are 245,251 children between the ages of six and fourteen in Salvador, of whom 60,860 are enrolled in public and private schools. The average attendance is considerably less than the number enrolled. The budget for Public Instruction for the year 1916 was $1,205,074.44, or approximately $408,000 in U. S. currency.

[20] It has been introduced into Ceylon. _Encyclopædia Brittanica_, article on “Balsam.”

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