GUATEMALA.* IN this volume Mr. Doraville-Fife, who has already written
authoritatively on Brazil and the great States of South America, turns his attention to the Central States, including all those which once formed the old kingdom, and later the first Republic, of Guatemala, viz., the State which now bears that name, Nicaragua, Costa Rica, Salvador, and Honduras. The area embraced is one very little known to the English reader and traveller. Mr. Fife, indeed, is not a little disturbed at our lack of curiosity in the matter. He points out that until 1904 Great Britain sold more goods to and carried more goods for Guatemala than any other nation, whereas now the United States holds the first place in the matter of imports and Germany the second, while the recent acquisition by a North American syndicate of a mining monopoly from the Govern- ment is an additional blow to British interests. This is indeed matter for concern, for it seems certain the Central States can look forward to a period of rapid development, and with the opening of the Canal and the linking up of the State railways to the Pan-American system this development should be a. matter of the near future. Meanwhile Mr. Fife's volume, which deals at some length with the commercial possibilities of the country, should form a serviceable introduction. But Mr. Fife does not confine himself to this aspect of his subject.
• Guatemala, and the Central States of Americo. By Charles W. Ihniivilffie Fife. London: Belinda Griffiths. tin. ffiL set,)
His descriptions of the social and political life of these countries are vivid and acute, though they present. a picture not strikingly dissimilar to that with which many writers on South America have made us familiar. The historical matter is less satisfactory. Mr. Fife has chosen to deal with the story of the five States under different headings. But the States did not become really separate until the break-up of the Federation in 1839, and the idmt of federation has dominated Central American politics from that day to the present, as the opening of the Central American International Bureau in Guatemala City in 1908 sufficiently testifies. None the less, Mr. Fife's historical sketches contain much that is of interest. Very romantic is the story (taken in the main from the American Stephen's Incidents of Travel) of the uneducated Indian, Carrera, who, when barely twenty years of age, defeated and slew the Liberal and Federalist general Merman in 1839, became President of the Republic, and retained office until 1865. Another fascinating story is that of the American filibuster, William Walker, who was engaged in 1855 to support the revolutionary party in Nicaragua, and, after a year of alter- nating fortune, actually proclaimed himself and was accepted as President of the State. He was not, however, destined to enjoy his position for long. Alumat immediately he made the incredibly foolish mistake of re-establishing slavery by pro- clamation. This roused the whole civilized world against him. Guatemala and Salvador joined the Legitimist Party, who were still unsubdued, and Walker, after some obstinate fighting, during which he owed much to the assistance of the English adventurer, Colonel Hennigsen, was forced to retire to the United States. In 1857 and 1858 he made attempts to re-eetablish himself in Nicaragua, but the second expedition proved his undoing. He was rash enough to violate the neutral territory of Honduras, was captured by a British gunboat, handed over to the local government, and shot. Mention may also be made of the remarkable antiquities with which the Central States abound. Mr. Fife does not attempt any detailed scientific treatment of these, nor of the story of the sixteen native races which are said to inhabit this part of the continent. He does, however, include an exceedingly interesting extract from the Papa Yule, the sacred book of the Quiche, which gives an account of the Creation and Flood curiously like that contained in the book of Genesis.
Previous page
