Panama and the canal in picture and prose .. . her hand if Colombia madethis treaty thecapital cityBogota wouldget the lionsshare of thespoil, and forthat matterall the prov-inces wouldshare in thedivision withPanama,which had thegoods for sale. What morenatural thanthat the Pan-amaniansshould turntheir thoughtstoward seces-sion from Co-lombia? Itwas no novelchannel for their meditations, for, as has been pointedout already, there had been 53 revolutions in Colom-bia in 57 years. Red revolution had become a com-monplace except for the poor fellows who got them-selves killed in them, or the wid
Panama and the canal in picture and prose .. . her hand if Colombia madethis treaty thecapital cityBogota wouldget the lionsshare of thespoil, and forthat matterall the prov-inces wouldshare in thedivision withPanama,which had thegoods for sale. What morenatural thanthat the Pan-amaniansshould turntheir thoughtstoward seces-sion from Co-lombia? Itwas no novelchannel for their meditations, for, as has been pointedout already, there had been 53 revolutions in Colom-bia in 57 years. Red revolution had become a com-monplace except for the poor fellows who got them-selves killed in them, or the widows and childrenthrown on the charity of a rather uncharitablepeople. Always hitherto the result of the revolu-tions had been the same—Panama had either beenwhipped into subjection, or had voluntarily returnedto the domination of Colombia. But that was be-fore there was a $10,000,000 prize at stake. In several of these revolutions the United Stateshad interfered, always in behalf of Colombia andalways with fatal effect upon the hopes of the. Photo by Underwood & Underwood THE BEST RESIDENCE SECTION, COLON revolutionists. For the key to the military situa-tion in Panama was the railroad. In every wellordered revolution—for the business of revoltinghad become a science—the conspirators began bycorrupting the federal soldiers at Panama city wherealone any garrison was maintained. This done theyproclaimed Panama a free and independent there was no land communication betweenBogota and the Isthmus the federal government wascompelled to send its troops to Colon and thence across theIsthmus toPanama byrailroad. Ifthe revolu-tionists coulddestroy or ob-struct the rail-road theirchances forsuccess wouldbe greatly en-hanced. But undera treaty withColombia in1846 the Uni-ted Statesguaranteedthe neutralityof the rail-road and thisguarantee wassensibly con-structed to include the task of keeping the line openfor traffic. In several revolutions, therefore, UnitedStates marines
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Keywords: ., bookauthorabbotwil, bookcentury1900, bookdecade1910, bookyear1913
