Reviews

“A finely proportioned narrative.” The New York Times

“Worth its weight in gold. A warm dramatic story of a man whose career was one of the most astonishing and colorful the world has known.” Parents Magazine

More from the New York Times, New Books for Younger Readers, March 15, 1942.

By Ellen Lewis Buell. HE WOULDN'T BE KING. The Story Of Simon Bolivar. By Nina Brown Baker. Illustrated by Camilo Egas. 306 pages. New York: The Vanguard Press.

SIMÓN BOLÍVAR was a hero not merely through force of circumstances and period. He was truly cast in a heroic mold and should be known wherever greatness of spirit as well as deed is revered. His life is of special significance to us of the United States, not only because of our growing sympathy with South America, but because it was from our own Revolution and our first leader, Washington, that he drew much of the inspiration to win freedom for his own part of the Americas.

It was a life so full and so dramatic that there is plenty of room for both the fine biographies for young people which this year has brought forth. It would indeed be difficult, and is unnecessary. to make a final choice between Elizabeth Waugh's "Simón Bolivar: A Story of Courage," previously reviewed in this department and Nina Brown Baker's "He Wouldn't Be King," which has won the 1941 Intra-American Award annually presented by the Society for the Americas. Mrs. Baker's is perhaps more dramatic in its presentation of an essentially dramatic life, and certainly there is a twinkling humor to throw into perspective some of the lighter aspects of a career and a struggle which inevitably took on at times a certain comic opera flavor, which really emphasizes the size of the task performed.

This would be good reading if only for the sketches of the colorful figures which surrounded Bolívar: the picturesque, incredible Páez: the dashing and equally incredible Manuela Sáenz, his eccentric tutor, Rodriguez; the loyal and charming Irishmen who fought under him. A host of such friends, and enemies too. come to life, but all these are properly dominated by the Liberator himself, and as the pattern of his life is unfolded in a finely proportioned narrative so is the greatness of his vision and of his achievement.

SIMON BOLIVAR (1783-1830) Liberator of South America

HE WOULDN’T BE KING

THE STORY OF
SIMON BOLIVAR

BY NINA BROWN BAKER

WITH ILLUSTRATIONS BY CAMILO EGAS

Washington, D.C.

Copyright

© 1969 by Nina Brown Baker and her estate.

All rights reserved. No part of this book may be reproduced or transmitted in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system, without written permission from the publisher.

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FOR SIDNEY

Foreword

Now that there has come a realization that the future of our country is inevitably interwoven with that of Latin America, there is developing a constantly increasing interest in the man south of the Rio Grande. We want to know the kind of man he is: what he thinks, says and does; what are his customs, his traditions, his likes and his dislikes. We are late in stretching out our hand in good-neighborly fashion, but we are trying to make up for it by the warmth of the gesture. All over the country, schools are taking note of the trend in commerce, travel, cultural interchange, and everywhere are teachers and, through them, pupils learning about the older American brother. With our democratic way of life threatened, all the Americas, North, Central, and South, sense the common bond that unites the peoples of the western hemisphere, all veterans in the struggle for liberty and the rights of man.

The people to the south of us have always looked up to us as a model of government based on democracy. They know our Declaration of Independence and our Constitution. Many of their pronunciamentos and instruments of government are based on them. They know and revere our Washington and Lincoln. Plazas, streets, banks, hotels are named after them. A prized possession of Caracas is a lock of George Washington’s hair that was sent to Simon Bolivar because of his reverence for the father of our country.

How much do we know about Simón Bolívar, the Washington and Lincoln of South America—a rich man and an aristocrat like Washington, who offered his fortune, his happiness, and his life to liberate South America—a man like Lincoln in his love for the common people, who brought about abolition of slavery a generation before we did? If we, Norte-americanos, don’t know Simón Bolívar—statesman, diplomat, soldier, doer of the impossible—then our good-neighbor talk is merely lip service and will lead nowhere.

Nina Brown Baker has done a highly commendable piece of work in her simple presentation of the life of Bolívar. She gives us the background that enables us to understand not only Bolívar, but the Latin America of today. She has so portrayed the ideals of the man that we are the better for knowing him.

The American who would be well informed must know Bolívar. Miss Baker gives us the opportunity to do so in a most delightful way.

DR. HENRY E. HEIN

Principal, James Monroe High School

Executive Director, Student League of the Americas

I

Lieutenant of the Guard

On December 31, 1798, in the city of Caracas in Venezuela, His Spanish Majesty’s representative in the Western world was giving a grand ball to welcome in the new year.

In the great salon of the governor’s palace, with its thousands of candles reflected in precious mirrors brought all the way from Paris, the fashionable world of Caracas had assembled. Don José, the governor, moved among his guests, welcoming them with the stiff, formal courtesy of the Spanish grandee. But Her Ladyship had not yet appeared, and from time to time the company turned expectant glances toward the wide central staircase. Gorgeous young officers in white and gold, standing woodenly at attention, lined the steps. It was the whim of the pretty, spoiled young wife of the governor to make her dramatic entrance upon this staircase, under an archway of drawn swords.

A stout lady, resplendent in velvet and lace, shifted uncomfortably upon her small gilt chair and whispered behind her fan to her nearest neighbor.

“Already it is an hour that she has kept those boys standing there! My Rodrigo is furious, I can see by the set of his lips. Surely this is unnecessary?”

The second matron shrugged. “The queen herself requires no such service. But what would you? This is the governor’s lady! Do you notice something, my dear? There is a gap in the White Guard—see, there on the lowest step no one stands opposite the Valdéz boy. Who is missing, can you tell?”

“One, two—” her friend was counting. “You are right, Doña Rosa, there are only twenty-three. And I think—yes, it is the young Bolívar who is absent.”

“That boy!” Doña Rosa rolled her eyes expressively. “He was ever a problem. As you know, his departed mother, poor María de la Concepción, was my dearest friend. The other children gave her no trouble. The elder son, Juan Vicente, is a sober, earnest lad who comforted her widowhood. Little Juana is a sweet, pious child. Only Simón—”

“You forget, my dear,” the other reminded her. “There is María Antonia, the older girl. One could scarcely say that she gave her mother no trouble.”

“Alas, that is true! Yet those wild, unladylike pranks of hers—what were they, after all, but the escapades of a girl who wished to imitate the games of her brothers? There was no real harm in the child.”

“No harm in it! Climbing trees, wading in the brook at San Mateo—and going about the very streets of Caracas unveiled and ungloved! How can you say there is no harm in such things, for a young girl of noble family? To me it is a scandal of consequence!”

“But it is over now,” Doña Rosa urged. “Her mother’s death sobered her, and her aunt did succeed in arranging a good marriage for her. But the boy Simón, idle, restless, impertinent—I cannot think what his end will be!”

“To my thinking, he has the spending of too much money. I do not know if the Bolívars actually are as rich as—”

“Rich? My dear! Twelve hundred slaves on the San Mateo plantation alone, and the indigo and the cacao plantations also! Then there are cattle ranches in the west—at least three that I know of! To say nothing of the silver mines, and the richest copper mine in the province. Those were Bolívar holdings, but you must not forget that María de la Concepción brought her share of the Palacios wealth, too. The town house, several parcels of rental property, docks and warehouses at the port of La Guaira. Rich? Why—”

“Sh!” The other woman rose hastily, pushing her chair back and kicking her train out of the way to make room for a curtsy. “Her Ladyship comes!”

A roll of drums, a flourish of trumpets had stilled all conversation, had brought the guests to their feet. Every eye turned toward the staircase as, with a single motion, the swords of the honor guard swept through the air to form a glittering arch. At the head of the stairs a slight figure in billowing crinoline appeared.

Slowly, gracefully, one step at a time, the great lady made her descent. She was midway of the flight when her gracious smile changed to a petulant frown. There was a commotion at the door, booted feet clattered across the polished boards, and a breathless young officer took his place on the lower step, one hand fumbling to button his tunic while the other brought his sword into position.

Her Ladyship spared him one scorching glance, and then resumed her smile as several distinguished gentlemen surged forward to kiss her hand. Musicians struck up the grand march, and the guard of honor broke ranks to claim their partners. But the governor’s aide touched the late arrival on the shoulder and spoke briefly:

“Repair to the library, Lieutenant Bolívar, and await His Excellency. He will speak with you later.”

Simón Bolívar—like all Spanish words, pronounced with the stress on the marked syllable, making it “See-moan Bo-lee-var,” and never, as North Americans so frequently mispronounce it, “Sigh-man Ball-ivar”—waited in the library for an hour until the governor came to him. He selected a book from the shelves and made himself comfortable in the governor’s armchair. When finally that gentleman entered he laid down the book, rose without haste, and cheerfully saluted.

“You desired to see me, sir?”

“I desire nothing less!” Don José answered feelingly. “It would please me thoroughly never to set eyes on your impudent face again, you insufferable young puppy! What do you mean by creating that ridiculous scene at my wife’s party?”

“I regret it deeply, sir. I only await your permission to tender my abject apologies to Her Ladyship!”

“Apologies!” the governor snorted. “I demand not apologies, but an explanation. Why were you late? Why did you appear with your uniform in disorder, your hair wild? Out with it!”

“I dressed hastily, sir, because I wished to make my tardiness no worse than it must be. As for the tardiness itself—the White Guard was on maneuvers this afternoon.”

“I know that! It is no excuse. Your brother officers of the Guard were on maneuvers also. They arrived here in proper time, and in proper attire. Lieutenant, do not curl your lip in that disdainful fashion when I speak! What have you to say?”

“Only this, Your Excellency. It may be that I take my duties more seriously than those others. To my mind, maneuvers in the field are best conducted there, and not from the vantage point of the nearest comfortable inn.”

“So! You presume to criticize your superiors, then? And yet I think you are the youngest officer in the corps. What age are you now? Seventeen? Sixteen?”

“Well past sixteen, sir,” the boy answered proudly. “My birthdate was the twenty-fourth of July in the year 1783. I entered the corps as cadet two years ago, and I have held my commission for six months.”

“Marvelous! And in that space of time you have learned so much of military science that you can sneer at officers of experience! What are you, then—a budding Frederick the Great?”

“Scarcely, sir.” Young Bolívar smiled. “Venezuela is no country for a Frederick, whose methods depended upon the precise disposition of huge troop masses, and therefore required the road-wrinkled map of Europe for their success. Here in our swampy plains and trackless mountains we should rather study the tactics of the great North American, General George Washington, whose problems—”

Don José, leaving the young man standing, had seated himself behind his desk. Now, with a sound Spanish oath, he brought his fist down upon it.

“I did not bring you here to lecture me upon military commanders, young man! I am still awaiting your explanation of your tardiness tonight. Get on with it!”

“Gladly, sir. As I was saying, it is from the great Washington that we here must learn the art of warfare. Particularly from his early campaigns, when in the king’s service he engaged himself against the French and Indians. It so happens that this afternoon I was endeavoring to reproduce the advance upon Fort Duquesne, where Washington saved the day for General Braddock. I posted half my men in the Aragua Forest, representing the enemy, and then with the others—”

Again the exasperated Don José smote his desk. “Will you have done with this nonsense? ‘Half your men’—half a platoon, was it not? Yet to hear you talk one would think you a general with a score of divisions under you! Let us get down to plain facts. You rode out into the hills with the corps, and took your own command deep into the forest for some petty soldier game of your own, failing to return when the others did. That is the case, is it not?”

The boy flushed. “You may put it so, sir.”

“Good. That is one question answered. Now another. Why?”

“Why, Your Excellency?”

“You heard me. Why should you concern yourself to learn the art of warfare, from Washington or from any other? You will never fight. You know as well as I do, all the world knows, that this ‘White Guard’ is nothing but a toy, a pretty little plaything to amuse the idle-rich young Creoles of the city. It is no part of the regular Spanish Army, nor can any native-born Venezuelan ever hold a commission in the king’s own forces. We allow you lads to organize the slaves from your own plantations, to drill them a little, and to call yourselves officers. It satisfies your vanity and does no harm. My lady is graciously pleased to use you as her guard of honor. But surely you are not so foolish as to take this make-believe soldiering seriously?”

Simón Bolívar’s eyes looked steadily into those of the older man.

“I am not ignorant of these things, sir. I am well aware that among your Spanish Army officers our corps is known as ‘Her Ladyship’s white mice.’”

“Is it indeed?” Don José chuckled. “I had not heard that one. Very good, very amusing. I must remember it when next I write to my cousin in Madrid. But knowing these things, young sir, will you tell me why in the name of heaven you take these White Guard activities to heart? You will never lead men into battle. What does it concern you how battles are won?”

The young man made a helpless gesture. “I cannot tell you, sir. Military strategy, tactics—they fascinate me as the game of chess fascinates some men. I can say no more.”

“But it is so useless,” the governor protested. “You have youth, wealth, leisure; there are a thousand pleasant ways in which to spend your time. Why interest yourself in the one career which is closed to you?”

“George Washington was born to wealth and leisure, too,” young Simón answered dreamily. “There was no more reason for him to concern himself with military matters than for me. Yes, and there is another likeness. His colonial birth also denied him a commission in the army of his king. Did you know that, sir? He was only a colonel by courtesy when he set out with Braddock. Yet had it not been for his genius—”

Don José frowned. “Young man, you talk too much of George Washington. That he was a great general is true, and a great statesman also, or so the North Americans claim. But we must not forget that he was also a rebel who took up arms against his king. As a loyal subject of Carlos of Spain, Lieutenant Bolívar, it ill becomes you to choose such a man as your model.”

“Thank you, sir. It is most kind of you to interest yourself in my poor aspirations.”

If there was mockery beneath the lad’s humility, it escaped the worthy governor. And because he was not an unkindly man at heart, being only irritable and pompous and sorely vexed by colonial problems and a feather-brained wife, he took young Bolívar’s arm as he got to his feet.

“Well, well, consider yourself thoroughly trounced,” he said gruffly. “And hereafter, see to it that you get your little games over with in good time to wait upon Her Ladyship when she requires it. You may accompany me back to the ballroom and offer her your apologies.”

The boy glanced into a near-by mirror, smoothed his hair, and adjusted his sword belt.

“I shall prostrate myself at her feet,” he promised lightly. “If she prove only one-hundredth part as kind as she is beautiful, I need not fear her wrath.”

“Now you show sense,” Don José approved. “A well-fitting uniform, a gallant bearing, pretty speeches for the ladies—these are the matters with which a young gentleman of Caracas should concern himself. Come then, and let me hear no more nonsensical talk of soldiering and George Washington. Such things have no part in the life to which you were born.”

In the ballroom, where gentlemen in powdered wigs and ladies in French brocades moved gracefully through the steps of the minuet, Simón Bolívar quickly made his peace with the governor’s imperious lady. Before the evening ended he had danced with a score of dainty señoritas, he had paid a hundred pretty compliments and had sung, to rapturous applause, a charming ballad of his own composition. He did these things with careless ease, and with real enjoyment. For this, as Don José had truly said, was his world, the world to which he had been born some sixteen years before.

Other boy babies had been born in Venezuela on that same July day. Black babies who saw the light as chattel slaves, livestock on the same footing as the mules and goats of the plantation. Indian babies who could look forward to toiling unceasingly in mine and workshop, but never to the hope of knowing, just once before they died, how it feels to have enough to eat.

They had their worlds, and the fortunate young Bolívar had his. The Spaniards felt that such an arrangement was right and fitting, because Heaven and the king decreed it so. The blacks and Indians felt it, too. If they doubted, there was always the lash and the rack and the firing squad to teach them.

The day was to come when Simón Bolívar would shatter his own pleasant world to bits, and with it the vise around those other wretched ones. Out of those bits he was to build a new free world for all men, white and black and red alike. And if one ask, with Don José, “Why?” the answer is not easy. A boyish hero worship for George Washington certainly played its part. But there were other causes, other influences at work. One in particular, reaching back into early childhood, was important.

Young Bolívar was barely ten years old when Simón Rodríguez first crossed his path. That strange man had gone his own strange way before the night of the governor’s ball; he reappeared only twice, and briefly, in the years to come. What Simón Bolívar’s life might have been had his uncle chosen another tutor for him we shall never know. But it seems certain that Rodríguez had his part, and a large one, in shaping the dreams of the boy who was to become known to us as “the George Washington of South America.”

II

At San Mateo

Even now, in late afternoon, the Venezuelan sun was hot. It beat down upon the huddled buildings of the hacienda of San Mateo. The great house itself, stone-walled around its inner patio, was well shaded by towering old ceiba trees. But the cluster of barns and sheds and roofless corrals lay exposed to the full rays of the sun, and the mud huts of the slave quarters were baked to a scaling flakiness.

The coolest spot on the plantation, at this hour of the day, was a low stone building with a rounded roof, set conveniently near the kitchen quarter of the big house. This hut, known as the well house, covered the well from which the water supply was drawn, and served also as a primitive system of refrigeration. Great pottery jars, suspended by ropes, dangled just above the water level, keeping perishable foods cool and sweet.

The well itself, surrounded by a flat stone coping, took up most of the room inside the little house. On the coping a boy of about ten perched, his knees drawn up to his chin, supporting a heavy book and at the same time bringing it close to his face.

It was about as uncomfortable a position as he could have chosen and, with the deep well yawning at his elbow, it was also dangerous. The light was dim, and the book’s lettering was very small. The boy, automatically balancing himself as he turned the pages, read on in blissful content.

He was small for his age, with thin pipestem arms and legs and a long, pale face. Already there were the beginnings of faint wrinkles across his forehead which would have warned a modern mother of eyestrain. In the Spanish colony of Venezuela in 1793—or indeed in any other part of the world at that time—eyeglasses for a child were unthinkable. Spectacles were reserved for old men who happened to be scholars.

The boy’s eyes, nearsighted though they must have been, were beautiful. They were unusually large, dark, and brilliant: so much so that throughout his lifetime everyone who met him commented afterward upon his eyes, describing them as “burning.”

His hair, a deep brown with reddish glints, was long, curling down upon his lace collar. He wore the buckled shoes, satin knee breeches, velvet jacket, and lace-ruffled shirt of a young Spanish gentleman. Except for the white shirt, all the garments were the black of deep mourning.

“Simón! Are you there? Something is happening!”

The girl who came plunging in from the sunlight stumbled and caught at her brother’s shoulder. María Antonia, at fifteen, was rapidly outgrowing the tomboy ways which, during her mother’s lifetime, had so shocked the good ladies of Caracas. It was more than a year now since Doña María de la Concepción had passed away, leaving her four fatherless children in the stern guardianship of her sister-in-law. From the girls, at least, Aunt Josefa would stand no nonsense. Here at San Mateo, when she could escape her aunt’s eyes, María Antonia might venture once in a while to climb a tree, but it did not happen often.

She sat down beside her brother now and asked in simple wonder, “Are you studying?”

The boy laughed, and closed the book so that she might see the title.

She peered at it. “Don Quixote—I might have known! Surely, Simoncito, you must have it by heart. Do you never tire of reading it over and over?”

“Never,” he answered earnestly. “It is the greatest book in the world. Such excitements, such adventures...wait, let me read you this bit here—”

“No, no! There are other things to talk about now. Listen, little brother. Uncle Carlos is riding up the valley road now, and he has a strange man with him. I think it is your new tutor. And Simón, he is a strange man!”

“He would have to be.” The boy smiled wryly. “All the scholars we know have already given me up. Only a stranger would attempt the task.”

“How true! But I did not mean that, foolish one. This man is strange—odd, queer. Like no one on earth.”

“How did you see him? Where did you see him?” the boy demanded. “The hedge hides the valley road. You are making this up.”

“No, Simón, I did see him. From—well, if you must know, I just happened to be on the roof of the sugar mill. You can see the whole road from there, and—”

“Then let us go!” The boy sprang up, stuffing the book into the front of his shirt. “I want to see him, too. If Uncle Carlos is bringing a stranger it must be the tutor, because he told Aunt Josefa he would scour Caracas to find a man who would make me learn. Come on, María Antonia, don’t waste time here.”

With a wary eye on the house, where Aunt Josefa slept away the hot afternoon, they skirted the outbuildings and made their way to the sugar mill, standing out of sight in the midst of a canebrake.

The mill was a substantial wooden shed open on one side. An old red ox went round and round in the trodden space in front, working the crude press into which the stalks of sugar cane were fed. Half a dozen slaves at work looked up and grinned at the young people. María Antonia snatched a few stalks to suck the pleasant juice.

They did not go inside the shed, where the juice from the press drained into a stone trough with a wood fire blazing under it. Two Negroes with long sticks stirred the brown bubbling mass, and at intervals drew it off to make way for a fresh batch. Some of the thick rich sirup went into earthenware jugs. Some of it was poured into flat clay molds to be exposed in the sun until it dried into rocky chunks of coarse brown sugar.

The mill was forbidden ground to the Bolívar children. Silks and velvets, their everyday wear, were not improved by contact with the sticky sirup. These fine fabrics had to be brought all the way from France, and while the money cost of replacing them was no factor in this fabulously rich household, the time element was. French goods must come by way of Spain, in Spanish ships, so that between an order to Paris and the delivery of the merchandise a year or two might well elapse.

We might suppose that a boy and girl in the country could be allowed to wear the washable homespuns of humbler folk, but that would be to reckon without local standards. “Persons of gentility” wore clothing suitable to their station, not to the occasion.

María Antonia, as she scrambled to the roof of the shed and turned to give her brother a hand up, kilted her long skirts recklessly above her sturdy knees. She, too, was all in somber black, a dull-finished Lyon silk with its wide hem adorned by rows of narrow black-velvet ribbon. The jet buttons of the pointed bodice strained perilously at the waistline; for María Antonia, as was her reprehensible custom, had secretly loosened her stays the moment Auntie retired for her siesta. Her shining hair, however, was primly covered with the black-lace mantilla. In these days there were limits to her daring, and she no longer ventured into the open air with her head uncovered.

Avoiding as best they could the trays of drying sugar with which the flat roof was spread, they settled themselves side by side. From this vantage point they had a good view of the valley through which wound the stony carriage road from Caracas. At the moment it was disappointingly empty.

“I did see them, Simón!” María Antonia insisted. “I think they must be passing through that clump of woods down there. They were riding very slowly, because of the sun. You will see them soon.”

“I suppose it is the tutor?” The boy wriggled his nose distastefully.

“I am sure of it. Poor Simón, having to go back to lessons again! How many tutors have you worn out already, I wonder?”

“Six, I think. First there was Don Miguel, and then Padre—”

“I know. Why do you do it, Simón? Why don’t you let them teach you? Don’t you ever want to learn anything?”

“Of course I want to learn! I do learn, too, very readily, everyone says so. I fence much better than Juan Vicente, although he is two years older. And I read very well indeed, almost as well as the priest. Also I sing nicely and play both the mandolin and the guitar. My verses might perhaps be better, but for a person of my age they are very well conceived. How can you say that I do not learn?”

“Ah, but you learn only the things you like!” the girl accused him. “And really, Simón, your conceit is growing beyond all bounds. You must not speak so flatteringly of yourself. It does not sound well.”

“Very well, Aunt Josefa! As you say.”

His sister laughed. “Forgive me, Simoncito. Did I sound like our beloved aunt, then? Truly, I do not want to scold. But I am concerned about you, little one. You must begin to get a proper education sometime!”

“A proper education—how I hate the thought! Dull, dull, dull! Latin is bad, but Greek is worse. And all for what? Don Miguel himself said that they are dead languages. No one speaks them any more. Why must I spend my time learning the tongues of dead men? I tell you it is dull!”

“Well, but—” the girl floundered, and gave it up. “Perhaps this tutor will be better,” she said hopefully. “I think we shall soon know,” she added in her next breath. “For look, Simón, down on the valley road. There comes Uncle Carlos now.”

“But he is riding alone, sister! There is no one—oh, merciful Heaven!” The boy began to laugh. “María Antonia, our uncle has brought the squire of Don Quixote with him! See, there is Sancho Panza trailing behind on his mule, for all the world like the picture in my book!”

The rider following behind Don Carlos was a grotesque spectacle. He rode his tiny mule without stirrups, unconcernedly dangling his feet in the dust of the road. He wore a shabby suit of drab woolen cloth, without a hat. His high, bony forehead was bald all the way back to the crown, whence sprang a shock of bushy red hair which seemed never to have known a comb. The reins lay loose on the mule’s neck. He let the animal pick its own way, while he read aloud from a book in his hand, making extravagant gestures with the other. Although he was far below the two children, the excited tones of a cracked, high voice came faintly up to them.

Don Carlos Palacios, brother to the young people’s mother and their guardian since her death, rode steadily upward, paying very little attention to his eccentric companion. The riders passed across the range of the watchers’ vision and toward the great stone gateposts where a drive led up to the house.

Simón, still laughing, turned to his sister. “Surely that cannot be the new tutor? Anyone less like a schoolmaster I have never seen. But if it is, I think we shall do well together. Something tells me that I could like that little man.”

III

“As the Twig Is Bent”

Uncle Carlos, distressed at the poor progress little Simón was making under the really excellent tutors who had been found for him, had turned in desperation to a man of an entirely different type.

Dr. Simón Rodríguez—the title was self-conferred, for he held no university degrees and is believed to have had no formal education whatever—was a lowly-born Venezuelan who ran away to sea at the age of ten. He was middle-aged when he returned, with a story of adventures more fantastic than any found in the Arabian Nights. As a matter of fact, he included an Oriental yarn among them, saying that he had been captured by Moorish pirates and sold as a slave to a scholarly Arab who taught him algebra and astronomy. He claimed also to have spent several years at the famous monastery of Mount Athos in Greece, reading the philosophy of Plato from the original manuscripts.

There was a tale of shipwreck, too, with details of life upon a desert island which might have been taken from the pages of Robinson Crusoe. Perhaps they were. He was a great admirer of that immortal work, and is known to have called himself “Robinson” during his stay in London. Bolívar addresses him as “my dear Robinson” in some of the letters which have come down to us.

How much truth there may have been in his tall tales it is impossible to say. Somewhere, somehow, he had picked up an extremely good knowledge of the classics, and he had a daring, original mind. In the field of what we now call social science he had read widely and had thought much. His vanity, which expressed itself in incredible self-glorifying stories, was harmless enough, and certainly added to his glamor in a small boy’s eyes.

How the conservative Don Carlos came to choose this eccentric scholar to educate his nephew is a mystery. But tutors of a more conventional pattern had not been very successful, so perhaps the uncle thought the experiment justified. At any rate, he did choose him, and on that hot summer day he called Simón into the San Mateo drawing room to make the acquaintance of his new master.

The association was a success from the very beginning. Don Carlos waited only a few days to make sure that master and pupil found each other satisfactory. Then, with a sigh of relief, the good man gathered up his wife and María Antonia and returned to Caracas, where other responsibilities awaited him.

Patiently and conscientiously the uncle dealt with them. Juan Vicente, making his home with the Palacioses, was a day pupil at the Franciscan Brothers’ school. He spent his free time with his uncle in the La Guaira warehouse, dutifully learning the ways of commerce. The future of the “good” brother offered no difficulties.

Doña Josefa did not conceal her anxiety to get the two girls married. Her own daughters were long since off her hands; she had no desire to return to the tiresome business of playing duenna to two pretty señoritas. Upon her urging, Uncle Carlos began to canvass the family connections for suitable husbands.

This was the common practice. A girl who is old enough to marry, among the Spanish people, is far too young and giddy to make a proper choice. In her folly she might be influenced by the fact that a youth has curling eyelashes or a talent for composing love songs. Her parents, with the wisdom of age, know best those sterling qualities which make for a happy married life, and they would consider themselves unfit for parenthood if they failed to protect their daughters by the exercise of their superior judgment.

This system, greatly modified to meet present-day conditions, still prevails among conservative Spanish families. Harsh though it seems to North Americans, it does not work out too badly. There are few old maids in such families, and no divorces. The devotion of Spanish women to their husbands and children is proverbial, and discontent among them is at least less evident than among their freer North American sisters.

María Antonia Bolívar, a rebel by instinct, might have given her guardians some trouble in the matter of her marriage, but she did not. She realized quite well that marriage was her destiny, and she was anxious to escape from the aunt she disliked. She approved quietly enough the first young man suggested by her uncle.

Don Pablo Clemente was a cousin on her mother’s side, a comparatively poor relation dazzled by the immense dowry. As Aunt Josefa bluntly pointed out, a girl with a past, a girl whose scandalous conduct at the age of twelve had set the whole town talking, could not afford to pick and choose. María Antonia went about decorously veiled and gloved in these days, but mothers of sons have long memories.

Young Pablo had no mother, a distinct advantage in María Antonia’s eyes. It was true, Auntie admitted, that he was slightly pimpled, and that he demanded the payment of his gambling debts before he would sign the betrothal contract. But what of that? And where else was one to find a young man of such admirable broad-mindedness?

In after years the broad-minded Don Pablo was to gamble away most of María Antonia’s share of the Bolívar fortune. Theirs was definitely not one of the successes among arranged marriages. María Antonia, however, accepted it with calm courage and common sense.

The rental property in Caracas and La Guaira, which had been her inheritance, was run down and producing little under Don Pablo’s handling. After her fifth child was born she proposed to her husband that he return the management to her, offering to pay him a fixed allowance as long as he kept out of her sight.

He agreed, and with her children she returned to the Casa Bolívar to live. She had inherited her father’s business ability, and after a fashion she did carve out a business career for herself. Eventually Uncle Carlos’ death and that of Juan Vicente, together with Simón’s preoccupation with national affairs, made her the “man of the family.” Few men could have held the dwindling estates together through the years of war and revolution as well as she did. Her brother consulted her upon all important matters, and the tie of deep affection between them was never broken.

Placid, dutiful little Juana was married in that same summer to another cousin, a Palacios. She was not yet fourteen. She owned twenty dolls at the time of her marriage, and she took them all to her new home, saying that there would be one each for the twenty children she meant to have. She had only two, a boy who later died in battle and a beautiful fair-haired daughter who was to become the belle of the patriot army posts. Juana was widowed at twenty. She lived a vague, rootless life, trailing around after her famous brother when circumstances permitted it, quarreling childishly with María Antonia, who thought she spent too much money on clothes. She lived to be almost a hundred years old, and there are people still in Caracas who knew her. Her portrait might easily be mistaken for one of Mary Todd Lincoln.

Dr. Rodríguez brought Simón down from San Mateo for the weddings, but as soon as the elaborate ceremonies were over the two returned to the plantation. Uncle Carlos was pleased to note that in the few weeks since he had seen him the boy had gained a healthier color. The tutor reported that studies were progressing well, and the guardian willingly agreed that they should continue in the health-giving country air.

Life at San Mateo settled down into a routine mutually pleasing to man and boy. Their needs were well looked after by a staff of African slaves, chosen from the more intelligent and docile of the “black ivory” imported to work the plantation.

Their housekeeper was one Hipólita, a Zulu woman who had been Simón’s nurse. From babyhood the boy had been devotedly attached to this black “mammy.” Hipólita claimed to have been a priestess of her tribe. However that may be, she seems to have had an unusually thorough knowledge of her own people, of their legends, their poetry, and their strange wild music. Young Simón’s bedtime stories had been of war and glory, of highhearted courage that laughs at disaster and sees in defeat only the incentive to fight on.

Perhaps Hipólita’s tales still echoed in General Bolívar’s ears many years later, when time after time he led what seemed the most desperate of enterprises to final victory. What is certain is that, through his early association with her, he formed a deep and sincere respect for the Negro peoples. Many colored officers and men served under him in his campaigns, and to them his praise and promotions were given as freely as to those of his own race. Colonel Carvajal, a mulatto, was one of his most valued counselors and a close personal friend.

Dr. Rodríguez and Hipólita were on the best of terms. After Doña Josefa’s fussy housekeeping, it must have been a relief to the colored woman to have this bachelor household to cater for. Quite often the only meal required throughout the day would be a handful of bread and cheese, a little fruit, to be stowed in a knapsack and carried out upon the hills.

There was a well-equipped schoolroom at San Mateo, but it was never used. Rodríguez was a disciple of the “sermons in stones, books in the running brooks” school of pedagogy. Early in the dawn he would rout the boy from his bed. They would be out and away until the darkness drove them home.

Rodríguez’ pockets were stuffed with books, his head was stuffed with theories. Pell-mell and at random, he turned them out for the benefit of his pupil. Much of what he read and spouted was far above the boy’s head. That bothered neither of them.

Here was no tiresome insistence on the intricacies of Latin grammar. Rodríguez possessed a vivid storytelling gift: Caesar and the ancient Greeks emerged as real men under his inspired handling. When he remembered, he would set Simón a few lines of the Iliad or of Virgil to translate, but the lesson was quickly lost in excited, free discussion. For the first time Simón learned that there existed in the world of fact and fancy other heroes fit to be set beside his beloved Don Quixote.

So many other things he learned, without method and with bewildering speed, that his small head fairly whirled. Dr. Rodríguez was passionately concerned with those problems of man’s estate which have vexed so many greater minds. It was unjust, he argued vehemently, that little Simón Bolívar should go in silks while little Simón-in-the-village went in rags. Both, certainly, had come into this world clothed only in their own skins.

When Simón, moved by so much eloquence, would offer to present his silken jacket to the Indian urchin who had caught his tutor’s eye, Dr. Rodríguez would shake his head.

“You miss my point, boy. It is not you who are at fault, but society. Of yourself you can do nothing. The system, that must be changed. It cannot be done, you say? Ah, but look at France! With my own eyes I saw it, the Revolution there! The heads of the aristocrats, how they toppled and spun into the gutters! Why, I remember—”

He would be off on his gory reminiscences, to which Simón listened in shuddering fascination. It was impossible to know from one moment to the next what subject would form the day’s “lesson.” An ant colony across the path would call for a dissertation on the Greek city-state; the sight of a greedy bird making off with an oversized worm would bring forth a reading from Tom Paine’s Rights of Man.

Few pupils have experienced such teaching. At its best it approached the method of Aristotle and his “Peripatetics.” At its worst, and it was more often worse, since poor romantic Dr. Rodríguez was no Aristotle, it poured into the mind of an impressionable boy a confused jumble of undigested facts and ideas.

It was no educational system at all, but it was glorious fun. Never in his short life had Simón had a companion so exciting, so delightful, so uncritically friendly. In no time at all he learned to form his own opinions on such ideas as he could fish from the stream of his tutor’s talk, and to maintain them in hot debate. His naturally fine mind, willfully inert under the efforts of his earlier teachers, roused itself into full vigor. He read and talked, walked and argued, and by such means was his education made.

The companionship continued for several years. Simón and Dr. Rodríguez did not remain at San Mateo all that time. The tutor had a contempt for what he called the “softness” of civilization; he believed that all the injustices which distressed him rose from a selfish love of comfort. With fine disregard for consistency, he argued that the little Indian in his ragged loincloth actually lived a fuller, freer life than young Don Simón in his ancestral home.

If all men would turn about and live like the savages, as he interpreted Rousseau to advocate, then the troubles and cares of a sick world would magically disappear.

It was quite easy for Simón and his mentor to live, if not like savages, at least like those early Spartans who also held Dr. Rodríguez’ admiration. For this it was necessary only to go to the llanos, those great rolling western plains where cattle fattened upon the Bolívar ranches. When the boy idly suggested this one day, the tutor seized upon it as a heaven-sent inspiration. To the llanos they would go.

And to the llanos they went, at first for only a brief stay in the dry season, but later for months at a time.

The llaneros (cowboys) were either Indians or the half-Spanish, half-Indian mixture called mestizo. Of all the workers who served the landowning classes, these men lived the most tolerable lives. Riding, roping, their homes the clump of trees where they swung their hammocks at nightfall, they felt the white man’s hand but lightly. Few of the town-bred aristocrats ever saw the herds of cattle whose twice-yearly sale brought such gratifying torrents of gold into their coffers.

Into this primitive environment the young Don Simón fitted as though he had been born to it. His short, slight figure toughened, his delicate, pale skin took on a deep tan, his slender, girlish hands grew strong and calloused from the grasp of rein and lariat. He learned to sleep soundly in an uncushioned hammock or on the bare ground. He found that he could eat coarse cassava bread and sun-dried beef with relish.

Dr. Rodríguez was too old and too clumsy for the sports which the cowboys taught their young master. Not for him to ride full speed straight at a wild steer, grab its tail, and throw it to the ground by a quick turn of the wrist. The game of “chicken pulling,” whereby a dozen fowls, buried in the ground to the neck, are swept up by a rider galloping past, was not for his timid horsemanship. But with all his heart he approved as Simón garnered these skills. He held that when a man has learned to do a new thing well he is, by that much, more of a man. The ideal, the perfect man would know how to do all things; a little regretfully Dr. Rodríguez admitted that this particular thought had come to him too late in life for it to be of much use in his own case.

The llaneros welcomed the two friends hospitably. Dr. Rodríguez they set down as simply a madman, treating him with the profound respect which the Indians accord to the mentally afflicted. Young Don Simón, after the first stiffness wore off, they took to their hearts.

In the long evenings over the campfires they forgot that he was their master. To this lad who shared their sports and their rugged living, and to each other before him, they talked as they would never have dared talk had Uncle Carlos been present. He learned many things around those campfires, things that were to prove of inestimable value to him in the unguessed days ahead. How the common man feels about things, what he resents, what he will and will not die for.

It was a pleasant life, the one which Simón and Dr. Rodríguez found for themselves, and it seemed as though it might go on for years to come. It ended, very abruptly, when Simón was fourteen.

They had been at San Mateo for the winter, and for the first time the boy found his tutor irritable and restless. Dr. Rodríguez went frequently into Caracas, and sharply repelled any questions on his return.

Then one day he went and did not return. Simón, increasingly anxious, waited until a week had gone by. Then he mounted his horse and rode into the town.

Uncle Carlos received him, grave and troubled. Dr. Rodríguez had involved himself in a crazy scrape, a plan to release by force two prisoners held in the town jail for sedition. Simón might as well know the truth. His tutor had been arrested.

By discreet use of Uncle Carlos’ influence and a bit of Bolívar money, the charge against Dr. Rodríguez was dropped. But a certain high police official hinted that it would be a very good idea for him to leave the country without delay.

Simón saw him off at La Guaira and returned, lonely and forlorn, to his uncle’s house. Faithful Uncle Carlos had already found for him a new tutor.

Don Andrés Bello was a scholarly young Venezuelan, only two years older than Simón. Their families were friends, and in early boyhood they had shared the same teachers. But Bello had possessed that gift of “application” which little Simón appeared to lack; he had already made a name for himself in the university world. He is often referred to as Venezuela’s greatest poet, and the Spanish grammar which he compiled was approved by the Royal Academy at Madrid.

Under his friend’s direction Simón continued those classical studies for which Rodríguez had awakened an interest. The considerable literary skill which he showed later on must be largely attributed to Bello’s instruction; very likely he owed most of his academic education to his learned young friend. The association was a happy one, and it continued for two years. The friendship which it fostered continued for Bolívar’s lifetime.

Nevertheless, Simón Bolívar’s temperament was not one to be satisfied with the quiet pursuit of learning. He was too active, too restless to settle down to books for long. To fill in his time between lessons he joined the White Guard, that splendidly uniformed corps of young aristocrats which was the only military organization open to native-born Venezuelans.

His brother officers, who regarded the corps merely as an exclusive social club, were both amused and annoyed at his effort to learn the art of warfare in their company. They could not prevent him from devouring all the textbooks available, but they did discourage any attempt to apply the principles he had learned. An easy canter into the hills, with the young ladies of the countryside joining them for a picnic lunch, was their conception of field maneuvers. For the rest, there were frequent full-dress parades, and attendance upon Her Ladyship’s formal parties. Surely this was enough of soldiering to satisfy any reasonable man!

Uncle Carlos, observing his nephew’s bored restlessness, at last came forward with a suggestion. Perhaps the time had come for a change of scene. After all, a young gentleman of fortune owed it to himself to see something of the great world. His two years in the White Guard, if it had done nothing else, had perfected him in the social graces. Even the governor’s lady acknowledged that he could be a most graceful cavalier when he chose to exert himself.

Something like the Government House society, but on a much grander scale, was what Uncle Carlos suggested now. Why should he not go to Europe, to the Spanish court itself? And to Paris, Rome, wherever he liked. The world was wide, and Simón was young. This was the time to see life at its best, Uncle Carlos thought.

Simón agreed with alacrity. To his restless, inquiring mind all places were good until they had been explored.

Uncle Carlos at once began to make all the arrangements. The Palacios family had relatives in Spain, persons highly esteemed at the court of King Carlos IV. The Marquis of Ustáriz, a grandee cousin, undertook to receive Simón into his Madrid home and to sponsor him in the proper circles.

On January 17, 1799, in his sixteenth year, Simón Bolívar left his native land for the first time. Unaccompanied, he took ship upon the brigantine “San Ildefonso.” Several weeks later he stepped ashore at Bilbao, Spain.

IV

Love’s Young Dream

To the boy from the colonies the court of Carlos and María Luisa appeared a veritable fairyland. Caracas, the only city he had known so far, now seemed a dull little provincial town, crude and commonplace beside the brilliant luxury of Madrid.

The king was an amiable nobody. It was about Queen María Luisa that all the gay social life of the capital revolved. María Luisa, no longer young, and perhaps never quite so beautiful nor so witty as her flatterers said, was tireless in her pursuit of pleasure. Banquets and balls crowded upon each other; afternoons at the cockpit and the bull ring were followed by long nights at the gaming table. The queen’s extravagance was a byword, and her followers delighted to emulate her.

Simón Bolívar found himself lodged with a bachelor kinsmen a few years his senior. Don Esteban Palacios was very much the elegant young courtier, in high favor at the palace.

If he had feared at first that a rustic cousin from overseas would embarrass him, he soon knew those fears unfounded.

Young Don Simón, handsome with his dark curls and great lustrous eyes, possessing the knack of wearing rich court clothing with distinction, quick of wit and adept at turning a pretty compliment, was an instant success. In addition to these qualifications he fenced well, danced perfectly, rode superbly, and sang melting ballads in a pleasant tenor voice. It is no wonder that the queen and her ladies did their best to pamper and spoil the “little Caraqueño,” as they called him.

Bolívar, who adored gaiety to the end of his days, thoroughly enjoyed this life. But it is significant that when first love flamed in his heart it was for no sophisticated young belle of the royal circle. And in his second year at Madrid, when he was barely seventeen, love did come to him.

Doña María Teresa del Toro had an uncle in Caracas, an old family friend of the Bolívars. This uncle commended Simón to the hospitality of his brother’s house in Madrid, and it was there that the young people met.

Doña María Teresa did not frequent the court parties. It is not likely that the mad dance of pleasure would have attracted her. In any event, she was too young. Some historians say that she was fifteen when Simón first asked her father for her hand; others, that she was only thirteen. We know at least that she was a child. A sweet, artless, devoutly religious child; in the words of the old fairy tale, “as good as she was beautiful.”

History has not recorded the beginning of their romance; nor its progress. It may have been thought that Simón looked upon the daughter of the house as a little sister—it would be quite safe for the duenna to snatch forty winks while they bent over a book in the shady patio. Perhaps the sheaf of blooms which the caller ceremoniously presented to his hostess held a secret message for her daughter, couched in the age-old language of flowers.

All this is the purest speculation. The known fact is that when Simón made his formal declaration to Don Bernardo del Toro, he was able to inform the thunderstruck father that Doña María Teresa returned his love.

The little lady was summoned and, trembling but resolute, confirmed the statement. She hoped Papa would not be angry. But truly, Papa, she could not help it. She did indeed love Simón with all her heart and soul, and she would love him so until she died. And her only hope of happiness in this world lay in becoming his wife.

The astounded grandee fell into a storm of rage. He sent posthaste for the Marquis of Ustáriz, Simón’s guardian. That gentleman, too, was infuriated and outraged. Between them they berated the hapless sweethearts as though it were the blackest crime under heaven to fall in love.

Simón and María Teresa, their young faces pale, their eyes strained and desperate, stood their ground. Neither would ever, ever consent to give the other up. Because—oh, Papa, Cousin, try to understand! God had made them for each other. This was not, they vowed passionately, “puppy love,” as María Teresa’s father called it. This was real!

Hours and hours of this, and finally Simón’s guardian wiped his brow and proposed a compromise. Uncle Carlos in Caracas was anxious for the lad to see other European cities besides the capital of old Spain. Would this not be a fitting time for Simón to pay a visit to Paris, say?

Stirring events were afoot in France in that year 1801. The last debris of the Revolution had been cleared away; the First Consul, Napoleon Bonaparte, was resolutely going about his tremendous task of reorganization. Simón had frequently expressed great admiration for the Little Corporal. In Paris lived a cousin, a Venezuelan girl, married to a French officer. Cousin Fanny had influence; she might even obtain for her young kinsman an introduction to the great man. What did Simón say to that?

The bait was tempting, and for a moment the lad’s eyes sparkled. Then he met the anguished appeal in María Teresa’s gaze. His jaw hardened. He opened his lips to refuse, but his guardian spoke quickly.

“For a year, my boy, only for a year. You will scarcely notice as it speeds by. I do not say that you are to be eternally banished from Madrid, mind you. In a year you will be older and wiser. Pay this visit to Paris; make the grand tour which your uncle considers essential to your education. And then—ah, then we shall see.”

Simón turned to María Teresa’s father. “Believe me, sir, I seek only a reasonable solution to this unhappy situation. You have heard my cousin’s suggestion. If I accept it and exile myself for one year, may I hope then to return and pay my addresses to your daughter? For indeed it is upon no other condition that I could consent to this intolerable separation, which may Heaven give me strength to endure!”

The wretched Don Bernardo glanced at his child. María Teresa sat, a forlorn, small figure in the great red-velvet armchair. Tears were falling silently on her white lace collar; her lips moved, her eyes were raised to heaven. The childish hands unsteadily counted the beads of her rosary. There was unearthly beauty in the picture, and heart-stirring pathos too. With a sigh the old man who loved her surrendered.

“It shall be as you say, Simón,” he gulped. “If, at the end of one year of separation, you and my daughter are still of one mind, I—I shall not stand in your way.”

The young man jumped up, his face alight. “Done, sir! I shall take the diligence to Paris tonight. And I give you my word of honor not to return, nor to attempt to communicate with Doña María Teresa, until the year is over.”

Vigorously he shook the hands of the two older men, and then approached the chair where the girl sat. Her tears had ceased to flow; her great eyes were fixed upon his face.

Simón dropped to his knee before her, raising the two small hands to his lips.

“It is farewell, my dear one,” he said huskily. “But ah, my beloved, you must not grieve! A year, only a year, and I shall return to you. What is one year out of the life we shall have together? They tell us we are young, as though that were a reproach. But think, dear one, think of the long future which lies before us, just because we are young! Years and years, and yet more years, and never another separation after this first painful one. Surely we can bear it, knowing that it shall never happen again?”

Her trusting eyes scanned his face. “Never, Simón?” she asked.

“Never, my little love! I swear it. For time and for eternity, you are mine and I am yours. Never again shall we be parted.”

Her tremulous smile was very sweet. “Then I am content, my darling. Go with God.”

In one year to a day Simón Bolívar returned to claim his bride. What Don Bernardo must have suffered, seeing his cherished daughter sail away to a far land with this bold young man, we can imagine. But he was a man of honor, and he had given his word. Simón and María Teresa were married in the cathedral at Madrid. They took ship immediately afterward for Venezuela.

They went at once to the plantation of San Mateo, where the new lady of the manor was warmly received by kindly new relatives and adoring retainers. Grapes were ripening on the vines, the stately old house was half hidden by flowering trees, bees hummed through the golden air. Loneliness and heartache were past like a dream. The lovers had entered into paradise.

Of all the years and years together that Simón had promised his beloved, they had only the better part of one. Ten happy months, and the golden dream was shattered. The tropical climate of Venezuela breeds obscure fevers, viciously cruel to unacclimated Europeans. Such a one seized upon Simón Bolívar’s bride. She died in his arms, and was buried upon the plantation where she had known an earthly happiness too heavenly to last.

Good Uncle Carlos, confronted with a youth so distracted by grief that his very reason seemed in peril, brought forward the old remedy. Europe again, the diversions of travel, the amusements of Madrid and Paris—poor consolations enough, he realized, but one must pass the time in some way. Life does not end when happiness dies.

With sick loathing the bereaved husband rejected the idea at first. Madrid, whose very stones cried aloud the name of María Teresa? Never, never could he bear to look upon Madrid again!

Eventually the kind old man’s counsels prevailed. Paris—well, perhaps. Fanny du Villars was there, the gentle older cousin who had sympathized so wholeheartedly with the young romance. And in Paris there were no reminders of the lost love to wrench one’s heart, for María Teresa had never walked those streets. Since Uncle Carlos urged it, Simón would go. What did it matter? As well Paris as any other place, in this dreary world where one place was as comfortless as another.

V

The Aventine Oath

Fanny du Villars, reclining gracefully upon her sofa, greeted her caller with a frown. She snatched away the hand which he bent to kiss, and cut short his opening compliments.

“Yes, I know that the rose of my gown goes well with the old gold satin of my sofa. I chose it for that reason,” she said tartly. “Sit there, my cousin, where I can see your face. I am very, very angry with you, Simón.”

“So I imagined, from the curtness of the note by which you summoned me.” He smiled wryly. “What is it now, my beautiful cousin? In what have I offended?”

“You can ask that!” She raised herself on one elbow to speak more emphatically. “Simón, when you visited me first, before your marriage, we here in Paris found you enchanting. You were gay, witty, always eager for any frolic. The great world of Paris does not lightly open its arms to strangers, but you won all hearts. I was not alone in anticipating your second visit with keen pleasure. And, Simón, I was not alone in being bitterly disappointed over the person you had become.”

For a moment the young man was silent. Then he spoke quietly. “As you know, my cousin, certain events had occurred between those two visits. Perhaps they, rather than I, are to blame for the change you hate.”

“My poor boy!” Fanny’s vivacious face sobered. “Indeed we are not insensible to the pathos of your bereavement. To be wedded and bereft in one short year, and this before the age of twenty-one—ah, it is most sad! But Simón,” she went on determinedly, “one cannot dedicate one’s life to sorrow. It may be that you thought me heartless. But indeed, I had your interests at heart when I urged you to go out into society, to take your place among the youth and fashion of our capital. And when I found that you had no spirit for frivolity, I offered other distractions. Is it not so?”

“It is so, gentle cousin. What a tender heart and a clever head could do to appease my pain, you did. I had hoped that you had not found me ungrateful.”

“Spare the soft words, Simoncito. I am serious. Here in my salon you met the great minds of our time. Madame de Staël, General Oudinot, Eugène de Beauharnais, Chateaubriand—all these persons and many more have bestowed upon you the benefit of their wit and wisdom. You in turn impressed them most favorably. Von Humboldt, the greatest living naturalist, sings your praises wherever he goes. His opinion is not one to be lightly held, Simón.”

“Nor do I hold it lightly,” the young man answered.

“To be praised by Monsieur von Humboldt is a great honor. It is true that his recent journey through our country has disposed him kindly toward those of my nationality. Would that more Europeans would follow his example and see us at home, where we are at our best.”

“Yes. Do not attempt to change the subject, Simón. I sent for you to scold you. Have you forgotten?”

He folded his hands in mock humility. “Scold on, fair cousin. I am defenseless before your wrath.”

“Defense would avail you little,” she said grimly. “You made me but a poor return for my efforts in your behalf, Simón. On one day you would exert yourself to be the life and soul of a gay party; on another you would sulk moodily in your lodgings and refuse to come near us. Do you think it was pleasant for me to have to make constant apologies for your irrational conduct? No, wait, do not answer. I have more to say.

“This last escapade of yours—truly, it is too much! I had invited you especially to accompany me to a reception of the Empress Josephine. Instead, in the most cavalier manner, you send me a note. You are departing at once for Vienna, to join your old tutor Rodríguez on a walking tour. I ask you, Simón, was that gentlemanly? Was it kind?”

He lifted her white hand to his lips. “It was unpardonable, dear Fanny. I have admitted it. Yet, as you know, my distaste for these imperial functions had long been mounting. Restlessness had seized upon me, and I thought to soothe my troubled soul by the company of my dear old ‘Robinson.’”

“That man!” Fanny wrinkled her pretty nose. “An uncouth, mannerless person, continually spouting the maxims of Rousseau. What you see in him I cannot imagine.

“Simón, you must see for yourself that this will not do. You are a young man of wealth and position, the bearer of a noble name. That you should desire to visit Vienna, Naples, Rome, is understandable. But to go on foot, eating at humble winehouses, sleeping Heaven knows where, like a pair of penniless vagabonds—ask yourself, Simón, where will this end?

“What will you make of yourself if you continue in such courses? You have youth, good looks, a hundred talents which Heaven has denied to ordinary men. When are you going to justify our high hopes and put these gifts to use? As a lad, Simón, you used to say to me, ‘Some day I’ll make you proud of me, Fanny.’ I ask you now, when is that day to come? And how is it to come?”

“Dear cousin!” He smiled affectionately into her flushed, earnest face. “I had not dreamed that my poor fortunes weighed so heavily upon your mind. Since you speak seriously to me, I shall answer you in the same way. The answer may not please you, but I beg you to hear me out and try to understand.

“I hope—yes, and I dare to assert!—that I shall yet justify your hopes and make you proud of me, my dear. I am not remaining in Paris. This is but a flying visit to bid you farewell. By the earliest ship available I am returning to our homeland.”

“To Venezuela?” she asked. “But Simón, why? The estates prosper under the care of your Uncle Carlos and your brother. What of importance can you find to do there?”

“Much, my cousin,” he answered firmly. “There is a work to be done there whose importance even you must acknowledge. The time has come when our unhappy country must throw off the Spanish yoke and take her place among the free nations of the world.”

“Simón, no!” Her protest was instant. “You don’t mean that you intend to involve yourself with those wretched plotters against the king? Oh, that man Rodríguez has done this, with his silly ranting about the ‘Rights of Man’! I knew that no good would come of your association with him! Simón, be reasonable. This business has gone on for years; it is the laughingstock of Caracas and Madrid. I beg of you, do not mix yourself up in it.”

“You do not think it right that we Americans should be free, Fanny?” he asked slowly.

“Right? Certainly I think it right! I am a French subject now, but my blood boils when I think of the injustices visited by the Spanish crown upon our people. Nevertheless, Simón, we must be sensible. It is simply not possible that revolution should succeed.”

“Why not?” he demanded. “It succeeded in North America. The people of the United States have made the word ‘American’ a synonym for freedom. Well, we are Americans too—indeed, we have the prior right to that name, which was first applied to America of the South. Why should not ‘America’ mean a land of freedom for us, as it does for them? Answer me, my cousin. Why not?”

She waved her hand helplessly. “But it is impossible, Simón. The North Americans had a leader, the great George Washington, who had the happy faculty of uniting all patriots behind him. In Venezuela it is very different. Those who profess to work for freedom bicker constantly among themselves, hatching each his little schemes which shall enhance his own glory. Or, if they are disinterested, then they are wild eccentrics, like your friend Rodríguez, filled with impractical dreams which they have no ability to translate into reality. Simón, surely you are not planning to ally yourself with these madmen?”

“The Norteamericanos were called madmen in England,” he said stubbornly. “They pledged their ‘lives, their fortunes, and their sacred honor’—the words of Jefferson—to the cause of freedom. If it was madness, then the Western world was the gainer by such insanity.”

“But Simón!...” The ready tongue of Mme. du Villars seldom found itself at a loss for words, but she floundered now.

“It is all so hopeless!” she went on despairingly. “Within this very year General Miranda tried to organize our people for revolt, and he barely escaped with his life. He is a military man of genius, who has campaigned with the forces of Lafayette in America and with the French Revolutionary Army. Others of lesser abilities have tried and failed, many of them paying for the attempt with their heads. How can you hope to succeed where he and they have failed? Oh, my dear little cousin, give up this rash scheme, I pray you, before your future is ruined!”

Simón Bolívar fixed her with those great, glowing eyes whose brilliance so kindled his thin, dark face.

“Fanny, my dear,” he said gently, “I have a little story to tell you. Hear me to the end, and see if you have the heart to discourage my purpose further.

“On a certain evening during our recent walking tour, my old tutor and I ascended at sunset that Mount Aventine which the Romans call the Holy Hill. The ancient city lay before us, dyed red in the rays of the sinking sun. Old Don Simón sank upon a stone to rest, for the evening was warm and we had been long afoot. But my weariness had fallen from me; I was caught up in an exaltation of spirit like unto nothing I had ever known.

“As I gazed, it seemed to me that the valley before me was peopled with the ghosts of those men who had built Rome into a mighty empire, yet had failed to build into that structure the elements of immortality. Augustus, Nero, Caesar, Trajan, Vespasian—what were they now but dust, and what was Eternal Rome but the dust of her former glory? Red dust, I seemed to see her, imbued with the blood of common men, humble soldiers who had bought that glory with their lives.

“These men whom we are called upon to honor: what, in the end, had they done for their country? What had they left her except their names? With blinding clarity I perceived that glory is not enough.

“My cousin, I despair of describing to you the ecstasy which came upon me. I spoke aloud, and knew not that I spoke. Don Simón rose from his stone, affrighted. For in a loud, clear voice I was crying out to the ghosts of those vanished Caesars. As one strong man to another I spoke to them, nor felt any diffidence in my soul.”

Simón Bolívar had risen from his chair. His slender shoulders were thrown back. His voice, usually so light and pleasant, had deepened into rolling thunder tones. The watching woman shivered as with sudden chill.

“Thus I spoke!” he declared. “‘Ye masters of old Rome!’ I challenged them. ‘You wrought mightily in your time, but it was not enough. What you have failed to do for your country, another shall do for his. Hear me, ye shades! I swear before you. I swear by my fathers and my fathers’ God; I swear by my honor and I swear by my country, that I will never permit my arm to rest nor my soul to repose, until I have broken the chains which oppress us!’”

For a long minute the words echoed through the room. Then, coming to himself, with a shrug and a smile he sank back into his chair.

“Well, Fanny? You have listened very patiently to my story. Do you still counsel me to abandon my plans?”

She shook her head. The bright color had fled her cheeks; her answering smile was forced.

“Simón, you frighten me! For an instant, as you stood there, it seemed to me that another stood behind you. A strange, towering, veiled figure whose hand rested upon your shoulder...” The strained smile died, and her voice grew somber.

“Dear Simón, I think that you have been touched by the hand of Destiny. Oppose you? I should not dare. But oh, my Simón, my dear little cousin whom I have loved and laughed at, my heart yearns over you. Your feet will be set in strange places, for I seem to see a long, weary road winding before you, and at the end is darkness. Must you tread it, my dear? Can you not yet turn back?”

“I think you know that I cannot, Fanny,” he answered quietly. “I think you know that I would not if I could. I have chosen the path, or it has been chosen for me. If, as you foresee, the end for me is darkness, I shall go down into it contentedly. For before I go, God helping me, I shall kindle such a flame of freedom in America as will never be quenched.”

VI

Spain in America

At the beginning of the nineteenth century, just before the Wars of Independence, the continent of South America belonged to Spain and Portugal. The only lands not in the possession of those two powers were the small French, Dutch, and British Guianas.

Brazil, the great Portuguese colony, has her own story, connected in no way with that of American Spain. Briefly, Napoleon’s invasion of Portugal caused the mother country to move the seat of government to Brazil, and for several years Brazil was Portugal, home of king and parliament. When the king returned to Europe after Napoleon’s defeat he left his son, Dom Pedro, behind as viceroy. In 1822 Brazil, with a long list of grievances, declared her independence of Portugal. A monarchy was decided upon, and Dom Pedro remained as the first head of the Brazilian Empire. He was succeeded by his son, Pedro II. It was not until 1889 that Brazil, by a bloodless revolution, overthrew the throne and became a republic.

Spain governed her colonies from two points. Mexico City was the capital for North and Central America. At Lima, in Peru, a second viceroy had dominion over all the Spanish part of the southern continent.

Under the viceroy representing the king were the viceroy’s own representatives, called captains general. There was one of these provincial governors in each large city. He had a force of the Spanish Regular Army under his command, and for all practical purposes his rule was absolute.

Chile, Argentina, Uruguay, and Paraguay made up the district of Río de la Plata, with its center at Buenos Aires. These provinces fought their own battle for freedom under their own great leaders. Like Brazil, they are no part of the Bolívar story.

The section with which Simón Bolívar is identified is that northern and northwestern part of the continent appearing on our maps as Venezuela, Colombia, Ecuador, Bolivia, and Peru. When he began his work they were three colonies: Venezuela; Colombia and Ecuador united as New Granada; and Peru, which included Bolivia. Ecuador was commonly referred to as Quito, and Bolivia as Upper Peru.

“Colombia” was the name which Bolívar himself invented for all free South America. At one time, as we shall see, he united Venezuela, New Granada, and Ecuador under that name. Later, Venezuela and Ecuador withdrew from the union, leaving the old province of New Granada to become the Colombia of our own day.

When Simón Bolívar took his oath upon the Holy Hill, the country which he swore to free was his own native province of Venezuela. The idea of liberating the adjoining countries came later, arising naturally enough from the turn of events.

The wrongs of Venezuela were no greater than those of her neighbors, and no different from them. They concerned Bolívar most, in the beginning, only because he knew them best.

Venezuela, discovered by Christopher Columbus on his third voyage in 1498, is the only continental land in the Western Hemisphere upon which the great explorer actually set foot.

Two years later Alonso de Ojeda, one of his companions on the first voyage, explored the region and gave it its name. Venezuela, “Little Venice,” was called so because Ojeda chanced upon an Indian village built on a marsh, with its huts on high posts, and canoes used for passage about the “streets.”

When a few years later Pizarro conquered Peru and the Spanish rule was firmly established in South America, Venezuela became a captaincy general ruled from Caracas. Vast allotments of land were made to Spaniards, and these allotments included all native inhabitants residing upon them. Later, African slavery was introduced. The Negroes were chattel slaves, and could he sold at the master’s will. The peons, or Indian laborers, could not be sold in this way, but they were bound to the estate, so that their condition was actually slavery.

It should not be forgotten that the Indians whom the conquistadores encountered were not savages. Far in the interior, in the low-lying jungle lands, were the naked, primitive little men, the head-hunters and the wielders of poison darts. Their remnants exist there today, now, as then, little affected by the ways of the white men.

But on the coast where the conquerors landed, the peoples of the Incas had built up a civilization of their own. They had great cities, scholars and scientists and poets. Land was held in common, with each head of a family assigned a plot of ground to till. One-third of the crop must go to the king, one-third to the temple, and only the remaining third could be retained by the man who produced it. However, in times of famine, or in case of individual misfortune, the storehouses of temple and palace were freely opened to the needy.

The system certainly had its faults. Whether on the whole it was better or worse than the European system with which the Spaniards replaced it is a question of no great importance now. The Spaniards did destroy the Inca civilization, with a ruthless thoroughness which left very little evidence to tell us what that civilization was like.

The conquest was a cruel business, and the early treatment of the native inhabitants cannot be defended. However, as the Spanish rule lengthened, a colonial system was worked out which seemed tolerable by the standards of those times. Laws were passed forbidding inhuman treatment of the Indians; various religious orders instituted what we should call “welfare work” among them. The laws were frequently broken, and the missionary methods were not those of modern social agencies. But those early days saw the beginning, rude and inadequate though it may have been, of Christianity, of education, of modern civilization in the Western world.

The early missionaries were zealous for education. In 1551, only fifteen years after the date of the conquest, they founded the University of San Marcos at Lima. The National University of Mexico was established at about the same time. That makes these schools, still in operation, more than a hundred years older than Harvard University, the oldest college in the United States.

Besides education and religion, a new factor soon began to operate in the lot of the native Indians. This was intermarriage with the whites. The Spanish nobles who held the great land grants customarily brought their wives from Spain, and prided themselves on keeping their blood pure. The common soldiers, however, married Indian girls, and from these unions a new race came into being. The Spanish called these Spanish-Indian children mestizos.

As they grew up special laws were passed defining their place in the community. Mestizos could serve in the army, thereby escaping from the land to which their Indian relatives were bound. They could engage in mechanical trades; and though the law forbade a mestizo to set up shop, many of their descendants found work in the commercial establishments of the towns. Some of these people of mixed blood became more Spanish than the Spanish, fanatically devoted to the crown and contemptuous of anything colonial. It was this class—not all of it, but a very large proportion—which formed the background of opposition to those who dreamed of seeing the New World free of Spain.

The revolutionary movement did not start among the most oppressed classes, the Negro and Indian slaves or the half-white mestizos. It had its beginning in the third and upper class to which Bolívar belonged, the native-born whites of Spanish blood called Creoles.

Not all of these were wealthy landowners like the Bolívars. Many were merchants, schoolmasters, priests, lawyers, and doctors. Of the three groups, only the Creoles resented their bitter wrongs and dared to dream of righting them.

This is not to be wondered at, when we remember that education was confined rigidly to this upper level. These men had, as the others had not, the opportunity to contrast their lives with those of Europeans. More particularly, they knew what was going on to the north of them, where the newly established United States of America was riveting the attention of thinking men the world over. The ideals upon which that republic had been founded were not unknown in Caracas. There, too, thoughtful men were discussing with passionate interest the teachings of Rousseau, of Montesquieu, of Thomas Paine. “The Rights of Man,” “liberté, égalité, fraternité,” were new slogans, and thrilling ones. The concept of freedom was a strong wind blowing about the earth, boisterously overturning long-sacred institutions and mercilessly exposing ancient rubbish for what it was.

Mother Spain took no heed of these modern falderals. In three hundred years she had changed her methods of colonial administration very little, and her philosophy not at all. As Pizarro had put it bluntly to his king, “The New World is a cow for our milking.” The wrongs of which the Creoles complained were no products of their fancy.

It might be interesting here to compare those wrongs with the injustices which brought about the North American Revolution. Ours were indeed intolerable. What shall we say of these?

Communication and trade with any nation except Spain were strictly forbidden. There was eager demand throughout Europe and on the much nearer North American continent for the products of mine and field, but the colonists could sell nothing except to the mother country. They had no ships of their own, and ships of any foreign nation were forbidden their ports. Prices for their produce were arbitrarily fixed in Madrid, with little regard for a profit to the colonists. Profits on the resale, which were tremendous, went to the Spaniards.

If the colonists could not sell to foreign nations, neither could they buy from them. Their new and growing country had a thousand wants for its proper development. These wants Spain filled in her own time and to her own advantage. Although the first missionary priests had planted vines and olive trees and delighted in their growth in the rich tropic soil, the colonists were forced to uproot them and buy oil and wine from Spain. Trade even between neighboring provinces was limited and heavily taxed.

The ban upon communication was even more severe. No newspaper could be published or sold in America without the consent of the king, nor any book. The ownership of printing presses was forbidden to all persons of native birth. In New Granada (now Colombia) a daring intellectual, Antonio Nariño, was sent to prison for smuggling in a printing press and circulating Spanish translations of Thomas Paine. Paine’s writings had played an important part in bringing about our own Revolution. He scoffed at the prevailing doctrine that a king was a superior being chosen by God to rule a people; instead, he argued, the people had a God-given right to choose their own rulers. Such ideas, shocking though they had been to the Tory supporters of George of England, were a thousand times more horrifying to the bigoted Spanish. It is scarcely surprising that Carlos IV went to the most cruel lengths to suppress the spread of such dangerous teachings.

All of these restrictions worked more oppressively upon the Creoles, the whites of Spanish blood but American birth, than upon any others. They were intended to do so. Madrid always feared any growth of power among these colonial families. Her idea was to govern the colonies from the outside, by officials and army officers constantly replaced from home, who would not be tempted to take root in the New World and forget their allegiance.

The “Peninsulars,” as the officials from the Peninsula of Spain proudly called themselves, were often inferior in birth, wealth, and education to the Creoles. Colonial posts were not sought by the aristocrats of Madrid, who preferred to remain within reach of the brilliant European capitals. The men who were willing to put up with the boredom and discomforts of colonial life were likely to be shady adventurers, soldiers of fortune who sometimes had good reason to put as much salt water between themselves and Europe as possible.

Yet by Spain’s own decrees, these second-raters enjoyed in America a set of social privileges highly irritating to the native-born aristocrats. The best places in church, the choice seats at theater and bull ring were roped off for the Peninsulars and must not be encroached upon by any Creole, however noble. At a Government House ball a young Venezuelan must relinquish his lady in the middle of a waltz if a base-born Spanish Army captain took the fancy to claim her.

The Creoles were by no means excluded from the social life of the colonial capitals. It was their wealth which largely supported that life. The White Guard, bearing about the same relation to the king’s forces as a Boy Scout troop to the American Army, was nevertheless in great demand to lend glitter to official functions. The Creoles were not excluded. They were merely relegated to second place and kept firmly in it.

It was a senseless policy. In her own interest, Spain would have done better to put the government of the colonies into the hands of the Creoles, rather than to exclude them so jealously from all participation. They knew the needs and problems of their land as the imported Peninsulars could not know them. They never dreamed of rebellion until they were forced into it by Spain herself.

However, there it was. Spain never deprived her Creoles of the wealth which the original land grants brought them; she allowed them to play the part of feudal lords upon their own plantations. She permitted them leisure and luxury. In a sense she treated them like children, petting them sometimes, whipping them sometimes, but never under any circumstances allowing them to assume the rights and privileges of grown men. And there were men among them. Men to whom this perpetual nursery life was a sickening and a monstrous thing.

VII

The Spark Is Kindled

Bolívar took his farewell of Fanny in Paris and made his way to Hamburg. There, in 1806, he sailed for Boston. A ship for La Guaira was not available for some time, and he spent the intervening weeks in visiting New York, Philadelphia, Baltimore, and Washington.

No one has told us any details of this visit, the only one Bolívar made to our own republic. If he had letters of introduction to various notables, apparently he did not present them. Probably he preferred to spend his time quietly making his own observations, seeing for himself how democracy worked in the first American nation to try it.

He reached Caracas at the end of the year and at once associated himself with that group of revolutionaries of whom Fanny du Villars had spoken so contemptuously.

There was José Félix Ribas, so devoted to the cause of liberty that he wore the little red cap of the French Revolution to their secret meetings. Don José was actually an uncle by marriage, having married the sister of Simón Bolívar’s mother. Doña María de la Concepción had deplored the connection, regarding her brother-in-law as an irresponsible crackpot.

There were the Montilla brothers, of a family almost as wealthy as the Bolívars. There were young Ybarras, Briceños, Pontes. Most of the great Venezuelan names were represented in these gatherings, chiefly by younger sons and obscure cousins. They were young and eager and brave; they were also impractical and reckless and slightly ridiculous. They risked their freedom and their fortunes to hold their frequent meetings, dramatically staged in the best traditions of dark conspiracy. And at these meetings they sat about and talked.

For two years Simón Bolívar, burning with impatience to be about the fulfillment of his vow, could find nothing better to do than to sit and talk with them.

How does one begin a revolution? Every man there had some brave plan for carrying it on to success. The new order that would be established when it was won engaged many tongues. It was the beginning, the actual starting point, which puzzled them. It puzzled Simón as it did the others. If only something would happen!...

It happened, of course. The spark that was to ignite the powder keg in the Spanish colonies was kindled far away, in old Spain. Napoleon Bonaparte kindled it, as a very minor by-product of the shower of fireworks with which he was dazzling the world.

Briefly, Napoleon marched into Spain, forced the abdication of King Carlos IV in favor of his son Fernando VII, and then induced Fernando to renounce the throne.

The son, who was none too bright, appears to have thought he was giving it back to his father. He was quite amazed when he awoke one morning to find Napoleon’s brother Joseph proclaimed king of Spain.

Amazement seems to have been the only emotion of which the royal dullard was capable, but the people of Madrid went farther. They rose in rebellion and established a Junta, or provisional government, refusing to recognize Joseph, and proclaiming their allegiance to Fernando as their lawful sovereign.

In the New World, the older aristocrats had no thought of severing their ties with the mother country. But they, too, bitterly resented the treatment which had been accorded Carlos and his son; they had no desire to be ruled by a French usurper. Following the example of their kind in Madrid, they organized a Junta to govern Venezuela in the name of Fernando VII.

It was here that Simón Bolívar’s political genius first showed itself. Silencing the protests of his friends, who were all for independence here and now, he persuaded them to work for the establishment of the Junta. Neither he nor they had any respect for the thick-witted Fernando, nor the slightest desire to see his throne restored to him. But it was the opportunity they had been praying for. Their revolution had begun!

So effectively did the young radicals work, so brilliantly and enthusiastically did they go about the job of organizing the Junta, that their bewildered elders gladly welcomed them into council. It was Francisco Salías, one of their number, who forced the Spanish captain general Emparán to listen to their demand that the Junta be formally recognized. Emparán, uncertain of his authority and frightened by a show of force, resigned and left the country. The Junta at once took command.

Venezuela was still a colony of Spain, acknowledging allegiance to the Central Junta now at Cádiz, which called itself a Regency acting for Fernando. But as far as government went, Venezuela had taken matters into her own hands. Her laws were to be made and administered by the Junta of Caracas, whose membership included many of those fiery young men who now called Simón Bolívar their leader.

It was a feeble enough little government, poor in revenue and none too stable. If it was to survive, it must have money and support from some source outside itself. Britain, then at war with Bonaparte, seemed a likely ally. The Junta decided to send a commission to London to ask for aid. Simón Bolívar was chosen to head the commission. He took with him Don Luis López Méndez, a close personal friend, and Don Andrés Bello, the brilliant young poet who had been his tutor after Rodríguez’ departure.

VIII

“When, in the Course of Human Events...”

In its main purpose the London mission must be called a failure. Britain, her hands full with Napoleon on the Continent, had little time to spare for the woes of an obscure Spanish colony. The Venezuelans were dismissed with graceful assurances of sympathy, but no material aid.

Against the advice of his friends, Bolívar now took a rash step. He hunted up General Miranda, living in retirement in London, and urged him to return to Venezuela with him.

The Junta at home had specifically warned him against doing this very thing. Years before, when Carlos sat securely upon his throne, this man Miranda had headed a revolt against his authority in the colonies. The fathers and older brothers in the Junta knew quite well that any movement Miranda might lead would never support an allegiance to Fernando. They preferred that he should remain safely in exile and not complicate their vexing situation still more.

Francisco de Miranda was a Venezuelan whose entire life had been devoted to war. As a boy he served with the Spanish Army in Florida and Cuba. When the American Revolution broke out he offered his sword to Lafayette, and was a soldier in the French division. Later, in Europe, he studied warfare in Russia and in Prussia, where Frederick the Great was revolutionizing military methods.

With the outbreak of the French Revolution he hurried to offer his services, and by a series of heroic acts leading to rapid promotion he emerged a general.

Ever since his North American experiences he had dreamed of a similar uprising in his own country. The new birth of freedom in France stimulated him to renewed efforts in that cause. He went to the United States and begged for help. No official recognition was given him, but a group of private citizens did lend him money and aid him in recruiting a force of two hundred men. In three small ships he sailed to liberate his native land. This was in 1806.

The little fleet was intercepted in the Caribbean by Spanish warships. Sixty-five American prisoners were taken, ten of them to be hanged at once and the others left to die in the dungeons at Cartagena. If we date the South American Revolution from this pitiful attempt, then the fact emerges that the first blood shed in the cause of South American freedom was that of citizens of our own country. A beautiful monument at Puerto Cabello bears witness that our southern neighbors have never forgotten this fact.

General Miranda escaped in his one remaining ship and returned to London, utterly discouraged.

This was the man to whom Bolívar turned when British help proved not to be forthcoming. General Miranda was an ardent patriot and, even more important, he was a trained, experienced soldier who had proved his worth on a hundred battlefields. If Venezuela were to hold even the limited liberty which she had just proclaimed, Simón knew well that she must fight for it. In such circumstances he felt that the cautious counselings of the older generation might well be ignored.

General Miranda accepted the invitation with enthusiasm. He offered his house in London to López Méndez and Bello, who were to remain and recruit such adventurous young Britishers as could be induced to join the patriot army. With Bolívar he returned to the land of his birth.

Miranda stepped ashore at La Guaira wearing the full uniform of a general of the Grand Army of France. He was then a man of nearly sixty; massive, erect, commanding; a splendid military figure. As he surveyed the motley crowd of townspeople who had assembled to welcome him, he turned frowning brows upon young Bolívar at his side.

“Where,” he demanded imperiously, “is the army which I am to command?”

The young man smiled. “There is as yet no army, my general,” he answered cheerfully. “But have no concern. We shall soon build one!”

That brief conversation tells all that is important about the difference between two great soldiers. Miranda was first and always the general, conceiving of warfare as a science governed by known and tested laws. You started with a well-drilled, disciplined army; you maneuvered them against a foe operating by the same book of rules. By outthinking and outplanning the opposing general, you won your battles. That was war as it was waged by Frederick the Great, by Napoleon, by Wellington. It was European war, and Francisco de Miranda had distinguished himself in it.

Simón Bolívar, then twenty-seven years of age, had had two years of training in the White Guard. His title of colonel conferred by the Junta meant very little, for his sword had never yet been drawn. He learned his warcraft the hard way, by trial and error, picking it up—or as some say, making it up—as he went along. He did pretty well at it.

His confidence that the Junta would overcome their objections to Miranda was justified. After some argument they granted him a commission as lieutenant general.

Time went by, and the Junta hemmed and hawed. They transformed themselves into a Congress on the North American model, and took some halting steps toward representative government. Enthusiasm for the cause of Fernando was dying down, and sentiment for complete independence was mounting. The Congress met, and debated, and nothing was settled.

Bolívar was not a member of the Congress. Instead, all of his energies went into organizing a “Society of Patriots,” composed now not only of his young friends but of many older men who were losing patience with the whole situation.

On July 3, 1811, he made before that society his first public speech. Since much of his fame rests upon his ability as an orator, and since this particular address stirred his countrymen to drastic action, that speech is worth quoting.

He declared:

What we want is an effective union to unite us in the glorious enterprise of our liberty. To unite merely to repose, to sleep in the arms of apathy, was a disgrace yesterday; today it is treason!

What does the national Congress say? That we ought to begin with a Confederation—as though we are not already confederated against a foreign tyranny! That we should wait for the results of the conflict in Spain. Why should it matter to us whether Spain sells her slaves to Bonaparte or keeps them herself, when we are resolved to be free?

Let us lay the cornerstone of liberty without fear! To waver is to fall!

I propose that a commission carry these sentiments to the Congress.

His proposition was approved, and a fiery Declaration of Independence was duly drafted and sent to the Congress. It stirred that somnolent body into action at last. By unanimous vote they adopted the declaration of Venezuela’s absolute independence of Spain. This was on July 5, 1811.

Thus was constituted the First Venezuelan Republic. It was to fail, with Spain regaining mastery. A Second Republic was to follow, to fail in its turn, but to rise again as a Third Republic. Those earnest patriots, proudly reenacting the drama of their brothers in the North who had sent their own declaration ringing in the ears of George of England, were setting their feet upon a longer, wearier road. The North American Revolution demanded but one declaration, established but one republic. There were other differences too, as the founding fathers of Venezuela were soon to learn.

IX

Wrath of Heaven

Holy Thursday in Caracas: March 26, 1812

At four in the afternoon, the hour of vespers, the streets were deserted. Entire families, Papa and Mamma and stairsteps of youngsters, all attired in their Sunday best, had filed solemnly into the parish churches. Old men who seldom left their chimney corners had hobbled forth; the bedridden had been carried to church in litters. The wine shops were shuttered; if any scalawags lurked therein, slighting their religious duties, they were keeping very, very quiet about it. So far as the eye could judge, the pious Caraqueños to a man were at prayer.

Simón Bolívar was attending the church of San Jacinto, not far from the barracks where he was stationed. He was not sorry, perhaps, to have this hour of prayer and meditation break the current of his troubled thoughts.

The revolution, so proudly proclaimed in the previous year, was not going too well. The Congress, after months of democratic wrangling, had adopted a constitution modeled after that of the United States. As a compliment to General Miranda, the new republic adopted the flag that he had designed for his first rebellion. Its three wide bars of yellow, blue, and red symbolize the golden shores of Venezuela separated by the blue sea from the bloody rule of Spain. It is still the national flag.

The country was to be known as “The United States of Venezuela.” On paper, at least, the United States of America now had almost a duplicate on the southern continent.

Unfortunately, the similarity was all on paper. The patriots were relatively few in number, and they were far from attaining that “consent of the governed” which the constitution presupposed. The great majority of Venezuelans did not want independence. They were willing to rebel against the French ruler, Joseph, but they considered themselves still bound to support Fernando’s cause as represented by the Junta at Cádiz.

The Spanish Junta, or the Regency, as it now called itself, had already taken steps to crush the Independent movement. The hastily formed Republican army had had several encounters with Spanish troops, small engagements but bloody ones. Neither side had won any decisive victory as yet.

Inside the church of San Jacinto, Don Simón bowed his head and besought a blessing upon the still-imperiled cause of freedom. While outside—but let the historian Larrazábal tell it, for he had the story from the lips of a man who was there.

The sky was extremely transparent and brilliant; a profound calm which increased the force of an intolerable heat.

A few drops of water fell, there not being a single cloud visible which would drop it.

At seven minutes past four a fearful noise, accompanied by a sudden trembling of the earth, announced to all a great catastrophe. The churches, the buildings, all crumbled into pieces, and fell with awful din, burying all in their ruins. To that intolerable noise succeeded the silence of death, broken only by the groans of the dying.

Earthquakes were by no means unknown along that Caribbean coast. But never, before or since, has an unhappy land known disaster on such a scale and at such an unfortunate time.

Not Caracas alone, but Barquisimeto, La Guaira, Mérida, all sizable towns, were converted into smoking ruins. Thousands died instantly, crushed under falling walls; others perished in the fires which broke out from overturned cooking braziers.

Still more terrifying, great fissures split the earth, engulfing those who fled. The village of San Felipe was swallowed into the earth. At Barquisimeto 1,800 soldiers were passing in review when the ground opened under their feet. Not one remained to tell the tale.

Simón Bolívar, bruised and cut, miraculously escaped serious injury. Without delay he set about the work of rescue.

It was hours later that Don José Domingo Díaz, who afterward wrote a most graphic account of the earthquake, came upon him. Simón’s uniform hung in ribbons, his face was smudged black, with his bare, bleeding hands he was tearing at a mass of stone under which an old woman lay imprisoned, moaning feebly.

Don José knew Bolívar well enough, but he was no friend to him, nor to the revolution. A fanatical Royalist, he had bitterly opposed the acts of the Congress and had sworn never to recognize a government set up by “traitors to our lord the king.” Nevertheless, finding the arch “traitor” engaged upon a work of mercy, he set to and helped to free the woman.

Their toil was in vain. Once the stones were removed, they dared not touch the twisted, broken body. Don Simón, his face working, bent over the poor old creature, and held her crucifix to her lips as she breathed her last. He straightened himself to find Dr. Díaz confronting him with a strange look of triumph.

“This is your handiwork, Colonel Bolívar,” he said levelly. “I trust that you find it good?”

The young man passed a weary hand over his forehead.

“Your pardon, Señor Doctor. I cannot have heard you aright. The handiwork, surely is that of Nature, not of any man.”

“So you believe, young sir, so you believe. But I charge you, reflect. Do you not divine a purpose behind this convulsion of Nature? Is it for nought, think you, that our Earth Mother rises in wrath to chasten her rebellious children? Is your conscience then so clear?”

“My conscience?” Símon stared at him. The tall, spare figure, the cold face with its mocking smile, seemed to sway before his bloodshot, watery eyes. Then his quick brain took in the implications of Don José’s words, and all fatigue fell from him. His slight figure straightened; his eyes blazed into the elder man’s.

“I understand you, Señor, and I will answer you. I bid you, mark well my words. Listen! If Nature herself opposes us, then will we wrestle with her also and compel her to obey us!”

The suggestion which Bolívar heard first from Don José’s lips took form simultaneously in a thousand brains, and ran like wildfire through the stricken towns. There could be no doubt about it. Almighty God, working through His handmaid, Nature, had punished the impious treason of those who called themselves patriots. Innocent citizens, like the poor old lady whom Bolívar had attempted to rescue, had paid with their lives for the sin of breathing the same air as those traitors. In thousands and tens of thousands they had paid, and the end was not yet.

Before the ruins were cold, two Royalist priests mounted a pile of debris and preached this gospel to the terror-stricken survivors. Look, they thundered, behold a sign which the Lord has sent! The military chapel of Los Remedios, completely destroyed save for one towering pillar. Mark well that pillar, for upon its capital was painted the royal arms of Spain! There it stood, the royal shield preserved by a miracle, as a sign of Heaven’s will, while all else was ruin!

Note also, they urged, the day upon which this tragedy occurred. Holy Thursday. Well they knew, all of them, that it was on Holy Thursday, two years before, that the king’s deputy Emparán had been deposed. The Lord had been patient with His erring children of Caracas. For two years He had held His hand, giving them the opportunity to repent and turn from their wickedness. By their own obstinacy they had brought about their doom.

The Congress did what it could to combat the wave of superstitious fear which these addresses started. There were priests among the patriots, too: devoted churchmen who believed they served their God best by serving also their fellow men. Their voices went unheard. Blind, unreasoning panic burned like a forest fire. The Royalists found it easy and profitable to fan the flames.

Hard upon the first earthquake came a second, in early April. This one, creating ruins among ruins, lasted a full eight hours. It wrought less destruction than the first only because less now existed to destroy. The suffering of the already stricken people was frightful. It is pleasant to record here that the Congress of the United States, learning of these disasters, immediately dispatched five vessels loaded with flour to be distributed to the unfortunate Venezuelans.

The fledgling republic knew no way to cope with its misfortunes except to abandon, for the time, its democratic practices and concentrate all power in the hands of one strong man. General Miranda became a virtual dictator, supreme in command of the army and of the nation as a whole.

It was a desperate remedy which could not save an even more desperate situation. Miranda, with his European ideas of army discipline, did not take kindly to suggestions from his younger officers, and a certain amount of friction arose in staff councils. Bolívar in particular annoyed his chief by offering ideas which, however excellent they may have been, were not backed up by actual campaign experience. Miranda detached him from the main forces and sent him to command the small garrison at Puerto Cabello, apparently to get rid of him.

In the late summer of 1812 Miranda was established in the town of La Victoria. Word came to him that Puerto Cabello had fallen, and that other scattered outposts had been taken. Rightly or wrongly, Miranda decided that the time had come to give up the struggle. He sent the Spanish general Monteverde a formal offer of surrender.

The historian Sherwell says that Miranda made this offer at a time when he had not been defeated in battle and still commanded a stronger force than his enemy. Indignation ran high among the young patriot officers, and Bolívar, arriving in La Guaira, was especially incensed when he learned that Miranda was in that port preparing to flee to Europe.

Bolívar had brought Miranda to Venezuela and had used his influence to have the Junta make him a general. Now the “rescuer” they had hailed had surrendered to the enemy and was making good his own escape, leaving the republic to perish.

It was too much. Bolívar and his friends themselves arrested Miranda, and when the Spaniards took La Guaira he fell into their hands.

Bolívar has been bitterly criticized for this act. At the time he and those associated with him believed themselves fully justified by the circumstances of the surrender. But certainly none of them dreamed that Miranda would be treated otherwise than as an honorable prisoner of war. They had no idea that Monteverde, one of the cruelest and most treacherous men who ever trod the earth of Spanish America, would treat the fallen hero with inhuman savagery. General Miranda was shipped off to Puerto Rico, then to Spain, and finally to Spanish Morocco, where he died in chains. His body was cast into the mud under La Carraca prison.

So ended the first revolution, and so ended, too, the career of General Miranda. Time has softened the judgment of his countrymen; no longer is his surrender called “treachery,” but only one of those tragic mistakes of which even the greatest are capable. In the beautiful Pantheon of Caracas, near the tomb of the Liberator, a marble sarcophagus waits, empty, its cover held open by the claws of a majestic bronze eagle. It bears the name of Francisco de Miranda, “Precursor of Liberty.”

X

Under a New Sky

The brave new flag of the United States of Venezuela is hauled down, her constitution is publicly burned, her army disbanded. It is the end of the First Republic. The bloody adventurer Monteverde rules in the name of Fernando VII. One of his first acts is to send to Cádiz, with irons on their feet, the leaders of the Congress. Here is the letter which accompanied them: “I beg to present to your Highness these eight Monsters, origin and first root of all the Evils and Changes in America, who have horrorized the whole world; let them be ashamed and confounded before your Majesty, and may they suffer the penalty for their Crimes.”

The Spanish historian Torrente, who reports this, adds with evident satisfaction: “Venezuela’s Congresses, her Independence, her Laws, disappeared like a Shadow, leaving no least impression of its ephemeral Existence.”

The fortunes of war had not enabled Simón Bolívar to play a conspicuous part in Miranda’s ill-fated campaigns. He was so little known to Monteverde that the Spanish general did not refuse the passport which a friend requested for him. He sailed for the Dutch island of Curaçao, and from there made his way to Cartagena, in the neighboring province of New Granada.

The Scene of Bolívar’s Activities

The territory then known as New Granada was made up of the two present-day countries Colombia and Ecuador. The Spanish governed it from Quito, although there was a subcapital at Santa Fé de Bogotá.

New Granada was probably the most progressive and Europeanized of the Spanish colonies. Education was more widespread than in either Venezuela or Peru. Visiting foreigners, landing at the port of Cartagena, brought news of the outside world. Smuggling flourished at Cartagena too, so that in spite of Spanish laws its citizens made the acquaintance of French books as well as of French wines and Dutch rum. In the French seaport of Marseille there was a whole row of sea captains’ houses built from the profits of the Cartagena smuggling trade.

New Granada had had her early revolutionary attempts, paralleling those of Venezuela. These began in earnest in 1810 under the leadership of Dr. Camilo Torres. Dr. Torres was a scholar of great intellectual gifts, and a devoted patriot. He disliked the shedding of blood and tried hard to bring about the salvation of his country by peaceful means. He was quite willing to co-operate with the Regency at Cádiz, but when their unreasonable attitude made such co-operation impossible he realized that war was inevitable.

Antonio Nariño, who had once been imprisoned for smuggling a printing press into the colony, was the first military head of the Granadans. At the time of Bolívar’s arrival he had just been defeated in battle and again sent to Spain a prisoner. The army was now headed by General Labatut, a Frenchman who had served under Miranda in Venezuela. Dr. Torres was president of the Congress, and a man named Torices had been chosen as chief executive.

The Congress of New Granada claimed authority over the entire area, but as a matter of fact Quito and Bogotá were in the hands of the Spanish, so that actually only the cities of Cartagena and Tunja were under their control. However, they were not disheartened, feeling that a good beginning had been made and that it was only a matter of time until they should be able to reclaim the entire land.

Among their dearly bought and perilously held new liberties, the New Granadans valued none more highly than the freedom of the press. Cartagena cheerfully supported a number of newspapers out of all proportion to its size.

“Newspapers” is hardly the name, perhaps, for the single sheets and small pamphlets, irregularly issued, containing little general news. They rather resembled an editorial page, its space largely given over to letters from readers. If a letter was of sufficient consequence in the editor’s eyes, an entire edition might quite well be devoted to it.

In a time and a country where communication was difficult, the Granadan press was of great value. Simón Bolívar’s first act after having offered his services to the republic and receiving a colonel’s commission, was to address an open letter to his new comrades. It was published and widely circulated.

It is an interesting document, startlingly modern beneath the stilted, old-fashioned wording. He began by analyzing the fall of the Venezuelan republic, tracing it to public indifference to national defense and to the wrangling of politicians. Then, assuming that the New Granadans would avoid these pitfalls, he went on to outline a masterly plan of military strategy by which their new independence could be firmly established.

Caracas, Venezuela, in the hands of the Spaniards, was an important military base from which to strike at New Granada. Bolívar’s plan was to retake Caracas with a Granadan army, thus delivering a telling blow in the interests of both provinces. He outlined the plan very persuasively in the latter part of his manifesto.

The Congress was impressed, but hesitant. Something certainly must be done, and soon. Most of their country was still controlled by Spain; the capital, Santa Fé de Bogotá, had set up an independent government, but it was at odds with that of Tunja, where the Congress assembled.

The plan of this eloquent young man who had come to them out of nowhere seemed hopeful, but how did they know that he had the ability to carry it out? It was all very perplexing, and in true congressional manner the gentlemen settled down to debate it.

Simón Bolívar, always practical, decided to give them proof of the ability they questioned. He had already been commissioned a colonel in the Granadan Army. With not too much regard for the instructions of his superior officer, who was providentially absent, he attacked the town of Tenerife, where a strong Spanish garrison controlled navigation on the Magdalena River.

The surprise attack, made with only 400 men, was successful. Without pause he moved on up the river, taking one fortified town after another. When he rested at Ocaña he was able to notify the Congress that the reaches of the Magdalena were free. He had won five victories in five days.

The doubts of Congress were set at rest. They immediately granted his request to be allowed to move toward Cúcuta, on the Venezuelan border. When that stronghold, too, fell before his impetuous assault, all opposition to his scheme dissolved. Congress voted him an honorary citizen of New Granada and sent him a commission as brigadier general. And they gave him what he valued far more, their consent to advance into Venezuela. He crossed the border that night.

As a colonel at Tenerife, Bolívar had had 400 men under him. Now, a general, he commanded 800. One is constantly amazed at the smallness of the patriotic forces. Years later, at the battle of Junín, Bolívar commanded 9,000 men, the largest Republican unit to take part in a single engagement. The Royalist forces, although usually outnumbering the patriots, were small also by European standards. At no time did both sides combined make up the numbers of one modern division. Yet by the actions of these opposing handfuls of men the fate of half a continent was decided.

What the New Granadan contingent lacked in quantity they more than made up in quality. They were the cream of the country’s youth, ardent young men from the universities, soldiers by conviction, the bearers of honored names. Not one of them was ever to look upon his homeland again.

The campaign upon which Bolívar embarked from the Granadan border ended in Caracas ninety days later. He had marched five hundred miles across a desolate mountain trail marked only by hostile towns. He had fought innumerable desperate battles by the way, replenishing his scanty stock of munitions by stores wrested from the enemy.

In all, he had destroyed five armies sent out to oppose him. Over the cities and towns he left behind, the flag of the Venezuelan republic floated again, as the Liberator pressed on to the city of his birth.

Monteverde, the Spanish tyrant, did not remain to oppose him. Instead, he withdrew his forces to the seaport town of Puerto Cabello, so that Caracas was free to welcome her deliverer.

XI

Swing Low, Sweet Chariot!

It must have been a pretty scene. At the city gate an arch of flowers had been erected, and here were massed some ten thousand people. As Bolívar approached, riding at the head of his troops, salvos of artillery and the joyous pealing of church bells could not drown the shouts of “Long live the savior of Venezuela! Long live our Liberator!”

The throng parted to reveal the city’s twelve loveliest girls, robed in white and crowned with flowers, who pulled by silken ropes a gilded Roman chariot. Chanting an ode especially composed for the occasion, they drew their hero through the flower-garlanded streets, while roses rained down upon the procession from every balcony.

No doubt Bolívar thoroughly enjoyed every minute of it. These extravagant displays of public acclaim were to become commonplaces of his career, but he never failed to be touched by them. With unfailing courtesy he listened to long, heavy speeches by self-important politicos, and only on one occasion do we hear of his patience wearing thin.

That was long after, in a small Colombian village. The mayor had ridden out to meet Bolívar, who was sleepless, mud-splashed, and hungry after an all-night march. His honor the mayor had prepared a long complimentary address, with gestures. For half an hour General Bolívar listened with weary politeness, but the breaking point came at last. “When Caesar crossed the Rubicon—” the mayor droned. “When Caesar crossed the Rubicon he had already lunched,” the Liberator snapped, and rode on into the town.

But that was an exceptional incident. Usually, he found these community ovations very pleasant. At the grand ball with which the Caraqueños climaxed their welcome, he danced with the beauties who had drawn his chariot, and gallantly kissed the blistered palm which one pouting señorita displayed as her souvenir.

In spite of these charming distractions, he turned up bright and early at the city hall the following morning. The withdrawal of the Spanish administration had left everything in confusion; with swift, sure strokes Bolívar brought order out of chaos. Many Royalists who followed Monteverde had abandoned stores and warehouses. Bolívar arranged to have these opened and operated, with a strict accounting kept for the absent owners. He reorganized the city government, appointing temporary officers, and arranged for the uninterrupted collection of customs and taxes. Within twenty-four hours he had the disorganized community functioning again; not too smoothly, it is true, but in such a manner that the citizens could go about their ordinary business.

He had again the comfort of sleeping in his own house. The Casa Bolívar was full of children now, some of whom had never yet seen their illustrious uncle. María Antonia was there, with her five, and under her wing she had taken also the four little orphans left by her brother Juan Vicente.

In the early days of the First Republic, just before the earthquake, the Congress had sought a sober, levelheaded man of business to send to the United States in hopes of floating a loan there. Don Carlos Palacios had been approached, but he was then in failing health, and actually died while the question was under discussion. Young Juan Vicente, his uncle’s right-hand man, accepted the mission. It was not successful, for the merchants of Boston were frightened off when the earthquake stories began to come in. The ship upon which the elder Bolívar brother attempted to return was wrecked off the Dry Tortugas.

The greathearted aunt exhibited the youngsters to her brother with the same pride that she felt for her own. Simón, who had vowed never to marry after his wife’s death, declared that they should be his children. Their mother, eager to remarry and glad to be rid of them, cheerfully agreed to let Simón and María Antonia make whatever arrangements they wished. Simón adopted them all by due process of law. Of the two elder ones nothing is known. Felicia, the youngest, grew into a lovely girl who married Colonel Laurencio Silva, one of Bolívar’s staff officers. The boy, Fernando, was nearest his uncle’s heart. He was sent to the United States for his education, and at his old school, the University of Virginia, a Bolívar Room commemorates his sojourn. Fernando eventually became one of the many private secretaries on Bolívar’s personal staff.

María Antonia, having by this time successfully eliminated the disappointing Don Pablo from her life, had her hands full trying to replace both Uncle Carlos and Juan Vicente as the family financier. The earthquake and Monteverde’s army had destroyed much of the city property in Caracas and La Guaira, but she was doing what she could to get things into shape again. “Now that the war was over...” she said hopefully, all would be well.

The war was far from being over. Caracas, by Bolívar’s proclamation, was Republican again. But the Spaniards still held the ports, so that they could easily receive reinforcements by way of the sea. And to the southwest, in those vast grassy llanos where the young Simón Bolívar had learned horsemanship, a new enemy was menacing the life of the Caracas republic.

The ex-convict who called himself Boves was a large-scale gangster. He began by making the discovery that, with the country engaged in war, the policing of the remote back country had grown slack. With a few fellow thugs, heavily armed, it was child’s play to ride up to a rich hacienda and demand its surrender from the women and old men he found there. Rich food, rare wines, gold and jewels were waiting to be plucked like fruit from trees. Their tough prairie ponies carried them far beyond pursuit, and with so many able-bodied men in the army, pursuers were few.

In no time at all the Boves gang had grown to the size of a regiment. He was joined by runaway slaves, by cowboys who saw no sense in working when there was fun to be had, by all the village toughs and riffraff that such leaders do attract.

His forces grew so large that Boves succumbed to delusions of grandeur. With so many men under his command, he reasoned, he ought to he a general. So he proclaimed himself a general. And since the aristocrats whose property he had just looted happened to be Independents, he announced his “army” as supporters of the king.

Being an army instead of just a gang had no drawbacks, and all sorts of advantages. Looting went on as before, but there was no need for caution now in the matter of murder. Boves had always enjoyed killing, with such frills in the way of preliminary torture as his inventive mind could devise. Now, acting in the name of the king, he could give full rein to his hobby. And besides, there was the delightfully novel experience of being commended for it by the Spanish authorities who had once clapped him into jail for a very minor bit of manslaughter.

The man was an inhuman monster, and to this day the backwoods mothers frighten their crying babies into silence by the mention of his name. The Royalists received the co-operation of his army eagerly, and it was an army now. As he advanced toward the coastal cities, looting and burning and killing, he was joined by recruits from every direction.

Boves harassed the patriots from the south; the regular Spanish troops were a constant menace from the coast. The patriot army, never large, was sent scurrying now in this direction, now in that. They suffered some crushing defeats and won some glorious victories.

Once, when word came that the hordes of Boves were advancing upon the capital, Don José Ribas went out to try to turn them back at a little village called La Victoria. To augment his small forces he called upon the schools of Caracas, and a crowd of boys, the oldest fourteen and the youngest ten, went out with him. They held off the savage lancers until General Campo-Elias arrived to complete the victory. Little Juan Tomás, aged eleven, dying in his brother’s arms, whispered proudly, “Tell Ribas I never took a backward step.”

Wars are not won by touching episodes like that. Nor are they lost, necessarily, by military defeats alone. The Venezuelan patriots had within their own ranks an enemy which eventually proved more powerful than the Spanish muskets and Boves’ lances.

This enemy was the spirit of defeatism. Economic depression gripped the land; the only trade they had ever had had been with Spain, and that was now cut off. The Spanish blockade kept foreign craft from their harbors. Boves was laying waste the countryside; growing crops were trampled into the ground, storehouses were pillaged or wantonly burned. Food was scarce, even for those with money to buy. Smallpox and typhoid, never very well under control, ravaged city and village and army camp.

“We were better off in the old days.” Even some fairly ardent Republicans were beginning to murmur, and we have to keep remembering that the majority of the people had not wanted the revolution in the first place. When it seemed to be succeeding they became doubtful converts, but now they were reminding everyone, “We told you it would never work!”

The “poison of dissension,” which Bolívar had named as the prime cause of the first failure, was circulating again. Royalist agents, magnifying the honest doubts of honest men, made of Caracas one vast whispering gallery. “Remember the lesson of the earthquake!” “When Boves comes he will murder us all in our beds!” “The only thing to do is to appease Spain!” And always, again and again, muttered by the old women coming home from church, gravely whispered in the countinghouses, shouted in the wineshops: “We were better off in the good old days!”

Boves was sweeping in from the south with 8,000 savage horsemen. Ceballos, successor to Monteverde, had 4,000 well-armed veterans at Puerto Cabello, and new shiploads were being landed every week. Another Spanish army of 3,000 was operating in the east. Bolívar and his heroic officers were dashing about, trying to be everywhere at once, fighting desperately, winning individual battles and slowly, inevitably losing the war.

Toward the last it was not so slow. After they were forced to evacuate Caracas the end was in plain sight. The Second Venezuelan Republic was tottering to its fall. Bolívar did not stay to watch it. Instead, he returned to New Granada to render an account of the mission with which they had entrusted him. The Congress there, you will remember, had given him 800 men to free his country and their own.

XII

The Revolution Is Dead

Bolívar went at once to Tunja and presented himself before the Granadan Congress. Of the 800 young men who had followed him, the best and bravest of the country’s youth, not one remained to stand at his side. He stood up alone, like a prisoner at the bar of justice, and frankly told his story, offering no excuses.

It is to the everlasting credit of the Granadans that they listened with generous understanding. Not a voice was raised in reproach when he finished. Instead, Don Camilo Torres, president of the Congress, beckoned him to a seat beside him. “General,” he told him, “your country is not dead while your sword still lives. With that sword you will save her yet! We will help because we believe in you. As a soldier you have been unfortunate, but as a man you are a hero.”

It was now the year 1814, and the situation in Europe was vastly altered. Napoleon Bonaparte had gone down to final defeat, and Fernando VII was back on the Spanish throne.

Napoleon, European to his fingertips, had never attached a great deal of importance to the American colonies. He let the French island of Haiti slip through his fingers, and when he needed ready cash he cheerfully sold the vast Louisiana tract to the United States for the bargain figure of $11,000,000.

With his puppet brother on the Spanish throne, he made little effort to control the South American holdings. The Regency which attempted to govern them during the four years of Fernando’s imprisonment was a creation of that Junta which had no standing in old Spain. Monteverde and Boves, when they butchered their prisoners of war as traitors to the king, did it in the name of Fernando and not of Joseph Bonaparte.

Fernando, on the other hand, was considerably more colony-minded. His first act on regaining the throne was to plan a real campaign to end the insurrection in Spanish America. England had been Spain’s ally in the war against Napoleon, so that Fernando had the benefit of advice from the Duke of Wellington in outfitting the expeditionary forces. The duke recommended Field Marshal Pablo Morillo, who had served on his own staff. Fifteen thousand Spanish regulars, part of the forces which had defeated Bonaparte, were available, together with seventy-six ships and all the latest-model guns they needed.

The expedition landed on the Venezuelan coast early in May, 1815. They found Caracas in the possession of the army of Boves, under a new commander.

Promotion in the upper ranks of the “Infernal Legion” proving a bit slow, one Tomás Morales had taken matters into his own hands. At the battle of Urica he had managed to mistake his chief for an enemy officer, and had run him through with his lance. By this simple bit of strategy Morales became commander of the Legion.

He was a worthy successor to Boves, being, if anything, a little more resourceful at devising tortures for his victims. There is a tale of a captured village at which Morales commanded all the women to attend his victory ball. As he concluded a dance with a lady, he would promise her a memento of the occasion. Whereupon a soldier would bring in and lay at her feet the severed head of her husband, or brother, or sweetheart.

It is with this bloody bandit that Marshal Morillo, the polished gentleman, the friend of Wellington, joined forces. If he felt any distaste, there is no record of it. War makes strange bedfellows, and the subjugation of the provinces, by fair means or otherwise, was the one important issue.

As Bolívar had foreseen in his Cartagena letter, Morillo immediately decided to strike at New Granada, with Caracas as a base. New Granada must prepare herself at once to withstand the shock of a major invasion.

Resistance in Venezuela, except for some scattered guerrilla warfare, was at an end. A large number of Venezuelan officers had followed Bolívar to New Granada, and stood ready to help in the fight there. New Granada had officers of her own, great soldiers like Santander and Castillo. Additional men for the ranks could be recruited at short notice. What was lacking was equipment: guns, ammunition, uniforms, horses, river boats, food. Some of these things must be bought abroad; all of them cost money. And the treasury was empty.

It was years before Bolívar’s ideal of a paid professional army could be realized. At this stage of the struggle, ordinary soldiers expected only their maintenance. Officers were supposed to receive salaries, but those who possessed private means did not claim them. Bolívar himself spent his own money lavishly for the provisioning of his troops, and so did many another patriot officer. Unlike the Boves gang, the Independents scrupulously paid for such supplies as it was necessary to requisition along their line of march.

Word came that Morillo was approaching by sea; Morales was leading his bloody hosts down from the mountains. Fever and smallpox racked the ill-clad, ill-fed, poorly housed forces of freedom. Congress was helpless and dismayed. Leaving command to the Granadan general Castillo, Bolívar hurried to Jamaica to make another desperate appeal to the British.

Disaster struck more swiftly than he had anticipated. Cartagena, defended through a harrowing siege, was taken. The Spanish Army sailed up the Magdalena and demanded surrender of the capital city, Bogotá. They promised considerate treatment, and the surrender was made.

Morillo and Morales marched in, disbanded the Congress, which had retreated there from Tunja, seized 600 prominent citizens, and beheaded them in the public plaza. Among them was President Torres, that “illustrious Granadiño” who had been so generous a friend to Bolívar.

In Venezuela and in New Granada, now, the revolution was dead. The red-and-yellow flag of old Spain fluttered again from the public buildings. In the dungeons of Cartagena elderly scholars were chained to the walls like dogs, subsisting on an occasional bone tossed to them by brutal jailers. Printing presses were towed out to sea in small boats and sunk. A baby whose thrifty mother had made him a little smock from the Republican flag was snatched from her arms and spitted upon a bayonet. His Majesty King Fernando sent a letter of commendation to his faithful servant Tomás Morales, with whom he was well pleased. It was to be hoped, he added, that these rebels had now learned their lesson.

XIII

The Jamaica Letter

Bolívar spent six unhappy months in Jamaica. News of fresh disaster came with every wretched boatload who managed to follow him from the ill-fated Colombian shore. The British governor of Jamaica was friendly, but the best he had to offer was an occasional invitation to dinner. Great Britain was not disposed to intervene against Spain, her European ally. The hoped-for loan was not forthcoming.

Probably at no time in his life did Bolívar’s future look so hopelessly black as it did then. He had failed again in a mission upon which the Granadan Congress had sent him, and he could not go back and ask their pardon this time, for all those greathearted men were dead or in prison. The cause which he and they had loved seemed utterly lost.

He himself was an exile from two countries, Venezuela and New Granada. The Spanish had placed a price of $2,000 upon his head, and even in this friendly British colony an attempt was made to collect it by assassination.

The attempt failed because Bolívar had lent his room to a friend for the night. The assassin, a Venezuelan whom Bolívar had befriended, stabbed in the dark and killed the wrong man.

The exile lived in a series of cheap lodginghouses, crowded with other refugees. None of them had any money. Bolívar’s family estates were in the hands of the Spanish, and María Antonia, who had struggled to the last to extract some revenue from them, was herself a fugitive now on the British island of St. Thomas. He had no place to go, no money to stay. His company was an embarrassment to his British friends and, as in the case of the unfortunate Señor Amestoy who had occupied his hammock, a real danger to his fellow countrymen. If ever a man appeared to be thoroughly down and out, it was Simón Bolívar in Kingston in that summer of 1815.

He had been down before, and was to be so again. But as for being out—that happened to he a word that was not in his vocabulary. He sat down in the midst of his troubles and calmly wrote a letter to an English friend living in Jamaica, a Mr. Maxwell Hyslop. It might well have been a request for the loan of a few dollars to pay his landlady or to rescue his shirts from the laundress, but it was not.

Instead, in the same dispassionate tone of his Cartagena letter, he continued his analysis of the failure of South America so far to attain her independence. And then, stating his profound conviction that “since justice decides the disputes of men, success will crown our efforts,” he goes on to predict the political organization of the continent when victory shall eventually be won.

“We have risen suddenly,” he writes:

and without previous experience or practice in public affairs, to assume the responsibilities of organized states. We have had no opportunity to develop the talents and public virtues of our brethren to the North [the United States], and since we have not yet attained those qualities, we cannot adopt their system. We cannot be, for the time being, a true republic. We need the care of paternal governments, by which to heal the wounds of despotism and war. A monarchy we do not want, and a perfect republic we are not yet fitted for. Let us then seek a means between the two extremes; let us leave the ideal for the future and concern ourselves with what is practicable for us here and now.

This letter is frequently quoted as proving that Bolívar was, after all, no true democrat. It proves no such thing. He was a realist, and he knew, better than most statesmen, exactly what his people were like. The mass of them were incredibly poor, they had never been allowed to make an important decision, they could not read or write. Only a rank sentimentalist could believe that such a population was fitted to take a responsible part in government.

The educated classes, a small fraction of the total population, were scarcely better qualified to govern, if for different reasons. Spanish reprisals had brutally exterminated many of the scholars, young and old, who had made up the brains of the revolutionary movement. Men like Camilo Torres in New Granada and Father Madariaga in Caracas, once lost, could not easily be replaced. Their type was outnumbered in the patriot ranks now by men of lesser caliber, ranging all the way from impractical dreamers to self-interested businessmen. They wanted democracy and were willing to fight for it. What they would do with it when they got it remained to be seen.

Bolívar did not make a detailed comparison between the position of his countrymen and that of the North Americans facing a similar situation in 1776. This might be a good place for us to do so.

The Spanish colonials were denied all participation in government. The British colonists in North America, on the other hand, were allowed from the beginning a certain degree of self-government. They had their town meetings and their House of Burgesses.

Spain forbade her colonies to trade with each other or with any foreign country. The British colonists were encouraged to develop trade and home industries.

The North American colonists did not object to taxation, which was never oppressive. The Stamp Acts and the tax on tea which brought about the Boston Tea Party were admittedly reasonable taxes, levied to help pay for the French and Indian Wars by which the colonies themselves had benefited. It was “taxation without representation,” not merely the taxation itself, which aroused their indignation. The South Americans were far more heavily taxed to pay for the upkeep of the corrupt Spanish court, and the question of “representation” was not even considered in Madrid.

In the United States the land itself was such that it was possible to build roads and establish communications among the thirteen colonies. Boston and Philadelphia were in relatively close touch with each other, whereas it was not only physically difficult but legally forbidden for the inhabitants of Caracas to visit Quito or Bogotá.

Our “founding fathers” came from all parts of the colonies, but they knew and trusted each other before the struggle began. When it was over there was a general knowledge of what man was especially fitted for what task. We know that they had their family squabbles, even so!

Furthermore, the North American patriots were all white Europeans, and they set up a government best suited to white men. There were African slaves and native Indians in the colonies, but their numbers were so small that they were not a factor. In South America, on the other hand, Indians and their mixed brethren, called “men of color,” were in the majority. Any enduring government had to take them into account.

All of these things were clear to Bolívar when he wrote his Jamaica letter. He was far from viewing them as handicaps in the long run. He believed in an “American” race which should be a fusion of all the different blood strains now existing on the continent, with color lines wiped out. He believed, too, in a system of universal education and of training for public service. But he knew quite well that these goals are not arrived at in a minute, or in a generation, and in the meantime the country had to find a government which suited present conditions.

XIV

Dawn of Hope

Although he could get no official British aid in Jamaica, Bolívar did succeed in interesting several private citizens. Money was collected by subscription, and a young Jewish shipowner named Luis Brión offered the use of his little fleet. From the black republic of Haiti came word that the president, Pétion, had been impressed by the Jamaica letter, which Mr. Hyslop had caused to be published in the local gazette. Inspired by a kindly letter from Pétion, Bolívar went to Haiti.

He found many old friends there. The siege of Cartagena had just ended; Granadan patriots, fleeing for their lives, were making their way to Haiti in small open boats. Comrades whom Bolívar had last seen in Caracas were there, too.

The Haitians, who had only recently thrown off the French yoke, were warmly sympathetic. Already they were sheltering and feeding hundreds of destitute refugees; every day brought new boatloads, and none was turned away. By the president’s order, a daily ration of bread and meat equal to that given the Haitian Army was issued to the fugitives.

On a night in March, 1816, the palace of the president in Port-au-Prince blazes with light. His Excellency, President Alexandre Pétion, is giving a farewell banquet to General Bolívar, Admiral Brión, and their aides, who are sailing with the tide. The new expedition to free South America, financed and equipped through the generosity of residents of Jamaica and Haiti, is under way.

An odd assortment of faces surrounds that banquet table. At its head sits M. Pétion himself, a grave, majestic Negro whose brilliant mind and soldierly genius had once gained him the commendation of the great Napoleon. In the place of honor is Simón Bolívar, slender, intense, his thin face showing too plainly the long nights of harrowing anxiety he has known, but with the gay sparkle of his eyes undimmed.

Robert Southerland, the bearded English merchant who has labored day and night at the unromantic but essential business of floating loans, is on the president’s other hand. Beside him young Brión, a little abashed by the new splendor of his epaulets, steals occasional glances toward a distant mirror. Mariano Montilla, late come from the siege of Cartagena, schools his face to indifference as a servant sets a magnificent cut of broiled fish before him. After a three months’ diet of burro meat, field grass, and more unmentionable things, civilized food is still a miracle for which to thank God.

There are white faces and black at the table, and all the shades between. Not all of them are male. Ladies of color, French-speaking and beautifully dressed in Paris clothes, are gracious hostesses to the pale women of the Cartagena garrison who have followed their men into exile. Carlos Soublette, a friend with whom Bolívar is most joyously reunited, has brought his mother and his beautiful red-haired sister Isabel. Afterward, when the feast is ended and the stately hall is cleared for dancing, there will be no lack of partners.

The night of revelry was quickly sped. The candles were burning low and the tropic stars outside were paling when Simón Bolívar led the fair Isabel to a chair at her mother’s side. Another partner was quick to claim her. Instead of going back to the dance floor, Simón made his way to a small balcony where a lone figure stood looking out to sea.

“Your Excellency—” the young man began.

Pétion turned about. “It is time, then? I have been watching your ships in the harbor there. Seven little ships, so small, so small! And the force you have been able to raise here—two hundred and fifty men, against the thousands who will oppose you. Oh, my boy, I can only pray for the success of this desperate undertaking!”

“Your prayers will be answered, sir,” Bolívar replied confidently. “Two hundred and fifty men, yes, but those men are experienced officers and veterans. And, thanks to the generosity of our kind friends here, we carry arms to equip some four thousand. Men will not be lacking, when our purpose is known!

“And now, sir....” He held out his hand. “It is good-by. I have no words to express the gratitude which fills my heart. If only there were some way in which I could hope to repay your kindness!”

The older man grasped the extended hand. “There is a way, my son, but I will not urge it upon you. You sail in the name of freedom. Have you reflected that there are men in your land who have never dared hope for that blessing? Yet the love of liberty works as strongly in the breast of the black man as in that of the white. If—”

“You need say no more!” Bolívar interrupted him. “We Americans know too well the bitterness of slavery, for we have endured nothing less from our Spanish masters. Do not ask my promise as a reward, but allow me to offer it as a duty and a privilege. Your Excellency, I give you that solemn promise now, upon my word as a gentleman and a patriot. My first act upon reaching my native land shall be to proclaim the abolition of slavery!”

Upon the third of May, 1816, the little fleet anchored off the island of Margarita, Venezuelan territory. Bolívar immediately issued a proclamation declaring the independence of Venezuela, and further decreeing the freedom of all slaves. “Henceforth,” he said, “there shall be but one class of men in Venezuela. All shall be citizens.”

In the United States at that time slavery had not yet begun to be an issue. Washington, bequeathing freedom to his own slaves in his will, had expressed the hope that eventually the institution would be brought to an end. Jefferson and Franklin hated it. The Congress had gone so far as to limit it by forbidding further importation of slaves.

It was commonly asserted, however, that slave labor was a necessity to the South; no one of importance had ventured to suggest its immediate abolition. Later, many eloquent voices were to be raised against it; a long and bloody war was to be fought out before the question was finally settled. Abraham Lincoln’s first Emancipation Proclamation is dated September 22, 1862. Forty-six years lay between that proclamation and Bolívar’s on the Isle of Margarita.

Numberless writers have called Bolívar “the Washington of South America.” The biographer Sherwell suggests that with equal aptness he might be called the Abraham Lincoln of his country. Both he and Lincoln gave freedom to slaves; both knew the bitterness of a war in which brother fights against brother. The titles by which the two are best known, “Liberator” and “Emancipator,” have an identical meaning. And perhaps the truest resemblance of all, both men held steadfastly to a high purpose through storms of slander and insult and misguided opposition from those they gave their lives to serve.

The coastal towns of Venezuela were too strongly held by the Royalists to offer any hope of successful assault by the new expedition which set out from Jamaica. Instead, Bolívar decided to make for Angostura, far in the interior, and establish his headquarters there.

He sailed up the Orinoco, surprised the small garrison, and took the town without too much difficulty. It was months before the enemy in Caracas even learned of this maneuver, for the intervening mountains made land communication with the capital almost impossible. Bolívar devoted the precious time thus gained to recruiting, and to testing and strengthening his army for the desperate days which lay ahead.

XV

Fun in Camp

Angostura, later renamed Ciudad Bolívar (Bolívar City), was proclaimed capital of the Third Venezuelan Republic.

It was a town of 5,000 inhabitants, located 250 miles inland from the mouth of the Orinoco. Like all Spanish towns, it was built around a central plaza, with an imposing cathedral, the governor’s palace, barracks, and jail.

Most of the houses were flimsy shacks of bamboo sticks plastered with mud, but there were a few fairly substantial homes of whitewashed stone and brick, with tiled roofs and iron balconies. Dutch and English traders occupied these better-class residences, for Angostura was too far from Caracas to be popular with the Creole landowners whose mines and plantations bordered the town.

The coming of the patriot forces wakened the dull little river port to unaccustomed social life. Throughout the difficulties and dangers of Bolívar’s campaigns, there runs this thread of gaiety, cropping up under the most unexpected circumstances.

In part it was a matter of policy. The need to provide fighting forces with recreation in their leisure hours is well recognized. In our day we meet it with Y.M.C.A. huts, with dramatics and athletic contests, with “entertainment” tours by stars of stage and screen. We say that a reasonable amount of wholesome relaxation builds morale. The simple Venezuelans said that a soldier fights better for having a bit of fun.

Bolívar understood this military maxim, however stated, as well as any general and better than most. He must have, because he liked to have fun, too. His enemies have seized upon that likable human trait to paint him as a “monster of dissipation.” The truth, borne out by those who knew him best, is far otherwise.

He was an extremely moderate drinker, preferring wine to spirits, and seldom taking more than two glasses at a meal. Like all young men of his background, he gambled rather more than we should approve nowadays.

Long ago in Madrid he had pledged undying fidelity to María Teresa. “For time and eternity,” he had told her, “you are mine and I am yours.” In the years after her death he kept that vow, and never married. However, he admired pretty girls, and he was much too gallant to refuse the chance of a flirtation when it was offered to him. It was frequently offered. But no woman of his acquaintance ever had a bitter word to say against him when the pretty comedy was played out.

He was passionately fond of dancing. In fact, his detractors allege that his army bands were chosen more for their skill in dance music than for their ability to play regimental marches. If it was at all possible he celebrated every victory with a ball; some of his liveliest parties were organized to comfort his men in defeat.

Dances were every-night affairs during that lull in Angostura. Some of the refugee ladies had accompanied their menfolk from the start; others arrived as Brión brought reinforcements up the river. Bolívar’s widowed sister Juana came with her daughter Benigna, a charming girl whose beauty wrought havoc among the susceptible young officers.

They seem more than a little pitiable now, those gay evenings of dance and song, with the fugitive women so pretty in their tattered silks and red-heeled slippers. Many, indeed most, of the gallant young officers who kissed their hands were going out to hardship and suffering and untimely death. All too soon the heavy crape of mourning veils was to replace the lace mantillas and the garlands of flowers. Even while they laughed and danced and coquetted, heartbreak waited just ahead for those smiling women. It’s nice to know that they had the dancing while they could.

The social scene at Angostura was considerably enlivened by the arrival of British volunteers recruited in London by López Méndez.

The close of the Napoleonic Wars had left plenty of soldiers at loose ends, willing and eager to try their fortunes in the New World. There were ardent lovers of liberty among them; there were professional soldiers who knew no other way to make a living; there were wild Irishmen who loved a fight for its own sake; there were calculating profiteers who counted on heavy bonuses.

Like General Miranda, these men knew warfare on the European plan only, what they called “civilized” war. Some of them took one appalled look at the conditions under which the American struggle was proceeding, and demanded their passage home. A Colonel Hippesley stayed long enough to gather material for a biography of Bolívar which is a masterpiece of spiteful vituperation. Another Britisher, returning to London, brought a lawsuit against López Méndez.

These men, however, were the exception. Most of the foreigners, whatever their disappointment, took it like soldiers, and settled down to making the best of this strange new life.

There were well-known names among them. Belford Wilson was the son of a distinguished member of Parliament. Francis Burdette O’Connor was a famous Irish patriot leader. General John D’Evereaux, who brought a thousand Irishmen with him, was a naturalized citizen of the United States and a protégé of Martha Washington. Baron Johannes von Uslar had commanded a battalion of Hanoverians against Napoleon at Waterloo.

At its peak the so-called “British Legion” numbered some 6,000 men. The name is misleading, for they were Germans, Frenchmen, Italians, and Poles too. All the armies of Europe, disbanded after Waterloo, furnished recruits. From the first days at Angostura to the final battle of Ayacucho some of their number took part in every important engagement, fighting always with a splendid courage which South Americans have never ceased to honor.

Hardship and peril, honor and glory were still ahead of them as they swarmed into Angostura. They came full of eager confidence, splendid in their brand-new uniforms. Those uniforms!

There were no private soldiers in the first contingents. All were to be officers, and as such they provided their own uniforms. López Méndez, having no instructions to the contrary, had permitted each man to design his own as well as to pay for it. The London tailors had done a fearful and wonderful job. Listen to Colonel Hippesley describe what he wore:

A dark green jacket with scarlet collar, lapels and cuffs, figured gold lace edging cuffs and collar; an ornamental Austrian knot on the arm, a gold lace girdle. [Whatever that may be!] Dark green trousers with gold lace down the sides, crimson silk sash. Wellington boots of Cordovan leather. Headgear, a shako with plumes. Cloak, blue camlet lined with red baize.

A fine practical outfit for the steamy river jungles around Angostura, which lies about eight degrees north of the equator! The average temperature is ninety degrees, and humidity is always high.

Once active campaigning began, the fine feathers did not long survive. Bolívar himself had a nice taste in uniforms for state occasions. But in the field he habitually wore a plain blue jacket and trousers, with a leather cap and Indian sandals. Necessity soon forced the Britishers to follow his example.

One mad Irishman, Colonel Rooke, clung to his gold-laced scarlet jacket through thick and thin. On an evening in New Granada he came to dinner at headquarters with the red coat pinned together over his bare chest. “No shirt, Rooke?” Bolívar inquired. And, to his servant, “Hurry, boy, and bring one of my shirts for the colonel.” The Negro grinned broadly. “Which one, Your Excellency?” he asked. “The one that is in the wash, or the one that is on your back? Your Excellency has no others.”

Bolívar esteemed his English and Continental aides; he loved his Irish. Rooke, big, red-headed, incurably profane and a mighty practical joker, never failed to extract a laugh from the most desperate situation. Equally beloved was Daniel Florence O’Leary, who also joined at Angostura.

O’Leary was no veteran, being a bare seventeen years old. He was related to Burke, the great Irish leader, and he came out with a flaming desire to fight for freedom in a strange land, since there was no chance at that time to strike a blow for Ireland. With a boy’s passionate hero worship he attached himself to Bolívar and served him with unswerving loyalty to the very end. He acted at various times as secretary, as aide-de-camp, as diplomatic envoy. Bolívar had no secrets from him; he knew the Liberator as few men knew him.

In later years O’Leary painstakingly collected Bolívar’s letters and public documents, using them, together with his personal experiences, to write an invaluable biography. He married a Colombian girl, and the family which he founded is still an influential one.

If dancing engaged Bolívar’s nights, war and politics fully filled his days. He called for the election of a Congress, and in due time a handful of “representatives” presented themselves. By whose votes they were chosen, or indeed whether any voting had been involved, it is best not to inquire. They were local men, some of them claiming to represent districts far away under Spanish control. But such as it was, it was a Congress, and it settled down solemnly to consider the constitution which Bolívar promptly submitted.

This document represented Bolívar’s conception of the practical form of government his Jamaica letter had called for. It resembled that of the United States, except that it provided for a life-term president, and a senate which should he hereditary, like the English House of Lords.

Congress, after months of debate, rejected these features and adopted a constitution modeled more closely upon our own. It was a constitution for all Venezuela, although the Third Republic actually had as yet no power to enforce its decrees outside of Angostura. It was functioning somewhat in the manner of those European “governments in exile” with which we are becoming so familiar, except that it had a foothold upon its own soil. In Caracas, the true capital, the Spaniards had set up a military dictatorship.

Throughout the revolution, no one of the provinces involved was ever at one time completely Spanish-governed or completely Republican. The situation in Venezuela at this time is a fair example. Earlier, New Granada had had a Spanish governor in Quito and a Republican Congress in Tunja, each claiming control over the entire province. In actual practice, each government controlled only so much as it was capable of dominating by force of arms, regardless of its claims.

These more or less official governments located themselves in important cities. In the villages and the country districts there was plain anarchy. Any self-made “general” such as Boves could and did levy supplies and commandeer labor and soldiers. Some of these caudillos, as the petty chieftains were called, were devoted patriots and honest men. Many were rascals. None of them made any pretense at civil administration. The Church carried on as best it could, marrying and baptizing and burying, teaching and nursing and counseling patience. It was a wretched, uncertain, hand-to-mouth existence for non-combatants, but it was war, and what could anyone do about it?

The new constitution had a fine, solid ring to it in Angostura, if nowhere else. Under its provisions Bolívar was elected president. He accepted, warning the Congress, however, that he would have no time for executive duties while the war continued.

Twelve days after his election, on February 27, 1819, he left the vice-president, Francisco Zea, in charge. With his Foreign Legion, with all the native troops he had been able to raise, he set out to join Páez in the west.

XVI

Páez the Centaur

The patriot camp at Angostura had for some time buzzed with rumors of a leader far up the Orinoco, in the wilds of the western plains. None of them had seen him. Like the murderous Boves, he headed his own army, although in the Republican cause. He operated against the Spanish when and where he saw fit, responsible to no one. Again like Boves, he recruited his forces from the llaneros, hard-riding, death-defying cowboys. The resemblance to Boves ends there.

José Antonio Páez would be recognized by present-day movie-goers as a familiar type. He was the “good bad man” of our Western films, the guerrilla leader with the heart of gold. It would be unfair to compare him to the real Pancho Villa; he was amazingly like the romanticized Villa the movies have given us.

Bom of poor whites in a mud-hut llano village, Páez never saw a city or a book or a knife and fork until long after he had achieved military distinction. He loved horses better than anything else in life. His men, complimenting his inimitable skill in the saddle, said that he was “half horse” himself. Later, when he encountered Bolívar’s Britishers and was told by some of them the Greek legend of the centaurs, half horse, half man, he pronounced it the finest story he had ever heard. And very likely a true story, too, he added seriously, for it was well known that mankind in the ancient days bred a nobler race of beings than now walked the earth.

Páez could be cruel on occasion, but in the main he was a simple, lighthearted, friendly soul, loyal and fantastically brave. There were no airs about him in those early days. He dressed like his men: knee-length cotton breeches, blanket poncho with a hole for the head, wide straw hat, and homemade sandals. He ate with them, squatting around the kettle, or on the march, gnawing the strips of dried beef carried under the saddle to be salted by the horse’s sweat. They called him tío (uncle), and they were ready at the drop of a hat to follow him straight into the jaws of death.

They were the same sort of men who had followed Boves and the unspeakable Morales. Quite likely some of them were the same individuals, for Morales was constantly vexed by desertions. The llaneros liked to ride and they liked to fight. Causes were nothing to them; the leader was everything. They shed their blood as cheerily and as bravely in a good cause as in a bad one, and it was sheer luck for the revolution that Páez happened to be on the right side.

This was the man whom Bolívar rode out to meet at the river village of San Juan de Payara. The meeting was a curious one.

Bolívar and a few officers had ridden ahead of the main body of troops, arriving in midmorning at the ranch house where Páez was quartered. Although a messenger had been sent ahead, the doors were closed. There was no sign of human life about the place except a huge Negro loitering in the shade of the garden wall.

He came forward as Bolívar approached, but instead of raising his eyes to the white man, he gave all his attention to his horse. Paying no attention to the Liberator’s impatient inquiries for his master, he coolly ran his hands over the animal’s back and legs, picked up a hoof and examined it, peered into its mouth.

Finally he looked up with a satisfied nod, a cavernous smile splitting his black face.

“You are welcome, Señor General. My master awaits your coming with impatience. Be pleased to dismount.”

Even as he spoke the house door opened, and General Páez burst out. He, too, was smiling broadly. With an impetuous rush he came forward and caught the slight figure of the Liberator in his arms. “This is the happiest day of my life!” he exclaimed extravagantly. Then to the Negro, who was jabbering at him in some unintelligible dialect, he gave a dismissing nod. “It is well, Pedro. Yes, I see. The horse is well fed, well curried, without saddle-sores. You may go!”

He turned to Bolívar, who was still gasping from the rib-crushing embrace. “Your pardon, my general, that I have kept you waiting. It was necessary, see you, that I should satisfy myself. But now I am convinced that you are the leader under whom I wish to serve.”

Half laughing, half provoked, Bolívar answered him. “I came, sir, to offer you a commission in the Venezuelan Army. Do I understand that you hesitate to accept it?”

“I do not hesitate, my general. Not now! For a commander who takes care of his horses will take care of his men, and such a one I am proud to follow. My general, lead on!”

That night, a great military review was held. Bolívar’s 5,000 troops, a credit to their Prussian drillmaster, went through their paces. They were well armed and well clothed, for London agents had sent out a miscellaneous stock of surplus army goods. French, Russian, German, and British uniforms, indiscriminately mingling in the same regiment, made a brave show. They were already a little shabby from the long march up the river, but that did not matter in the twilight.

Then it was the turn of Páez’ men. No manual of arms dictated their evolutions. Casting aside their ponchos, naked except for ragged cotton drawers, brandishing the twelve-foot lances which were nothing but small trees stripped and sharpened to a point, they raced their half-tamed horses up and down the dusty field. They were joined by several hundred Cunaviche Indians, war-bonneted and carrying bows and arrows. Someone drove a herd of steers among them, and the affair developed into an impromptu rodeo.

Páez looked on indulgently, and then roared at them for silence. All movement ceased, every head turned toward him.

“Salute!” he ordered. Obediently a mighty “Viva!” rent the evening air. “Viva Páez! Long life to our uncle!”

Their general held up his hand. “Hear me, my children. From now on, you are soldiers of the republic. These men are your comrades. This is your leader, and mine. Life to the republic! Life to the Liberator!”

The men from the cities and the sons of the plains joined their voices for the shout. Páez seized Bolívar in another bearlike hug. “With your men and mine, General,” he declared, “we are invincible! And now may Heaven help the Spanish pigs, for their hour has struck!”

“This is the happiest day of my life...a commander who takes care of his horses will take care of his men.”

XVII

Council at Setenta

On the night of May 23, 1819, in Setenta beside the Arauca River, Bolívar summoned his officers into council.

Setenta, once a flourishing river town, had been reduced by years of civil war to a miserable heap of ruins. A famous painting by the German artist, Erwin Ochme, now hanging in the Federal Palace at Caracas, shows us the house where the council met. One wall is gone, moonlight shines through the jagged hole in the thatched roof; one chair, a rough table, and a heap of packing cases are the only furniture.

Colonel Rooke is there, in his scarlet coat; dark, melancholy Anzoátagui; O’Leary, pen poised over paper to record the proceedings; two gaunt, stiff Britishers; one of Páez’ lieutenants, his careless llanero dress in sharp contrast to the formal uniforms of the rest of the staff. Páez himself is away to the north, harassing the Spaniards with a right good will.

A little silence falls as Bolívar rises from his chair and prepares to address them. On his right stands young Colonel Lara, who has ridden in that day with a letter from General Santander.

Everyone knows the contents of that letter, and everyone wonders what is to be done about it. For Santander, a New Granadan general of great ability, announces that he has established himself just over the border, in Granadan territory, and reports that enthusiasm for liberty is by no means dead in his native land. In spite of the fact that Spain has regained her hold over most of the province, the desperate New Granadans are continuing the struggle. Santander has raised an army of 2,000 men, armed and equipped at the cost of heroic sacrifice by citizens who have little left to give.

Bolívar asks Lara to read this letter again. He reminds them that in spite of scattered successes they are making little headway here in Venezuela. Morillo has an army of 17,000 veterans; the patriots, even with the welcome addition of Páez’ braves, now number only a scant 7,000. Santander’s 2,000 men across the border oppose 7,000 Spaniards.

Then, with sublime simplicity, he unfolds his plan.

“Why,” he asks them, “do we not give up for the present this unequal struggle in Venezuela? The New Granadans are our brothers, fellow Americans; their need is great. You all know that it is my dearest wish that New Granada and Venezuela should eventually form one state under the glorious name of Colombia. I firmly believe that this union will come about. Let us look upon that union as accomplished; what follows? The best chance of military success at the moment lies in the Granadan section of our common country. Very well, then. Let us go and give battle there. At the side of brave Santander!”

The men exchanged puzzled glances. One of the English officers spoke. “I say, your geography is still a bit of a mystery to me, sir. But surely to give battle in New Granada would mean that we must cross the Andes Mountains?”

Bolívar inclined his head. “That is so, Colonel. Santander is on the Casanare Plains; he can join us as we reach the foothills. We must strike straight for Bogotá, the capital. Once that is in our hands, we shall be in position to meet whatever force Morillo may send against us.”

“But, Simón!” It was Carlos Soublette, the beloved comrade. “To go to Bogotá from here, that is not possible! By sea, yes. Were we in possession of our own coast, we might well hope to land a force at Cartagena and fight our way up the river to Bogotá. But to go from this point—there are roads and bridges, it is true, but they are in Spanish hands and well defended. Only an eagle could reach Bogotá from this place where we find ourselves now.”

“Also, my general,” the solemn-faced Anzoátagui reminded him, “the rains have begun. Here on the plains, in the rainy season the rivers become seas. We should never even reach the foothills.”

“And if we did, what then?” It was the llanero officer Iribarren. “Our horses could never survive the mountain passes. And as for the men—well, I speak only what I know. My men are children of the plains. They hate and fear the mountains, where it is well known that evil spirits dwell. They will not go into those mountains, my general.”

For an hour the discussion continued. Bolívar met every objection squarely, not attempting to deny the dangers and difficulties. He was not proposing, he told them, to follow the ordinary overland route, such as it was. As Soublette had pointed out, Spanish garrisons along the way made that impossible. His idea was to take another, rougher route, one followed at rare intervals by pack trains. It was not a good road. Very likely they would have to build their own bridges across the mountain chasms.

It was a desperate plan, he admitted. Yet was not their situation still more desperate? Three years since he had landed in Venezuela from Jamaica, and still the struggle dragged on! Time was working for the Royalists, who could draw inexhaustible reinforcements from Spain, while the patriot numbers dwindled. And all the time the country lay prostrate: trade, agriculture, all the normal human activities crushed beneath the heel of civil war.

Such a state could not continue forever. Someone would have to give up, and it would not be the Spanish. His plan, wild though it seemed, did hold out a prospect of success which might turn the tide. Had they any other to offer?

They had not. And one of them, the red-headed Irishman Rooke, was the first to be won over. ‘‘Why not?” With a whoop he tossed his cocked hat into the air and caught it deftly. “After all, boys, what have we got to lose? General, lead the way. We’ll follow you all the way to Cape Horn, if that’s where you’ll be after taking us!”

Soublette sprang to his feet. “Gentlemen, Rooke is right! Why do we sit here debating, as though there were many plans to choose from? If this one satisfies you, Simón, then it satisfies us. Lead on!”

The sudden flame of enthusiasm ran through the younger officers first. They were on their feet, talking excitedly, laughing, shaking hands with each other and with their commander. The older men, inclined to hang back, were finally swept into agreement. When Bolívar called for a vote there was not a dissenting voice. For good or ill, the die was cast.

The expedition assembled at the near-by town of Mantecal. With quick decision Bolívar gave his orders. It was important that General Morillo, who had established winter quarters in the town of Calabozo, should be kept in the dark. The approach of the rainy season had slowed down clashes between his men and the patriots; Bolívar decided that if Páez remained behind, making frequent sorties upon Calabozo, the Spaniards would not suspect that the main force had stolen away.

Páez was summoned and given his instructions. He carried them out in such a manner as to constitute an epic still pridefully sung by his countrymen. General Morillo, resting on his arms after the summer’s campaign, found himself constantly roused to fight off the llaneros, whom he called “a swarm of angry hornets.” He had no idea that the “swarm” had reduced itself by more than half, and that over the Andean passes was toiling such an expedition as the world had not seen since Hannibal led his Carthaginians across the Alps and down upon Rome.

XVIII

“Though Nature Oppose Us”

On May 26, 1819, from the town of Mantecal, Bolívar’s column started the march into New Granada. Government documents tell us that it consisted of 1,300 foot soldiers, 800 cavalry, “women and oxen uncounted.” Official reports do not even mention the children.

Those women and children who always accompanied the patriot armies need perhaps a word of explanation. They were the families of private soldiers. These men, recruited from country villages, had no idea when they could return to their homes, nor what would happen to those homes when the tides of war swept over them. Morales was an important Spanish general now; it was not pleasant to think of one’s little family undefended in his path. Better, far better for Mamá and los niños to tag along with the marching columns where, though they must face incredible hardships, they were out of the reach of atrocities.

There was no hard-and-fast line between the “protected ones” and the regular soldiers. A strong boy of ten who knew how to handle a machete might march beside his father; his name would be entered on the infantry rolls.

Both the Spanish and the Indian traditions were against the participation of women in battle, but a few of them fought just the same. Those who did not were of service as a sort of primitive Red Cross.

The rains, already overdue, swept down upon the army on their first day out, the hard tropical rain which bruises the cheek it beats upon, which slackens to a steady drizzle only to burst into new torrents, but which never quite ceases, day or night, from May to November.

In no time at all the low-lying plains were turned into an immense shallow lake, waist-deep on the muddy trails. Not that there were any longer any trails. Here and there grassy hummocks raised themselves above the flood; it was a matter of progressing from one to the other of these in as straight a line as possible.

These higher spots provided the only possible resting places. They could be called dry land only by comparison. The grass grew sparsely out of heavy sticky mud which clung to the foot. The wet ground and the ever-falling rain made it impossible to light a fire. The strips of dried beef may have been no worse for being eaten soaking wet, but the corn-meal tortillas crumbled away in the hand as the water struck them.

For sleeping you wrapped yourself in your blanket and stretched out in the mud, counting yourself fortunate if you owned a saddle for a pillow. Half the cavalry detachment, being Indians, rode bareback, so that the luxury of a pillow was not a common one.

These were the minor discomforts of the march, not too distressing at first. But as they penetrated deeper into the llanos, the route became a series of rivers to cross. The first loss of life occurred in one of these swollen torrents, where an incautious soldier stepped unknowingly from the flooded bank and was swirled downstream before anyone could save him.

The rivers held other perils. The deadly caribe fish, with their razor-sharp teeth, swarming to attack a man or a horse with equal ferocity, stripping flesh from bone with incredible speed. The loglike alligator, supine on the muddy bank, waiting for a victim to come within range. And always and always new rivers to face, as the rain continued to fall and turn harmless little creeks into deep, raging streams.

There were no bridges, and the expedition carried no boats. It was easier to swim the horses and cattle, holding on to their tails. Supplies were ferried across in hide “coracles,” huge leather bags loosely gathered by thongs, propelled ahead of a swimming man.

Keeping ammunition dry was the most pressing problem. Muskets and swords would rust in the all-pervading damp; there was no help for that. There was no help, either, when shoes and blankets and clothing rotted into mildewed shreds. Little to be done when feet and legs swelled and grew tender from long immersion, when leeches and all sorts of tropical ticks fastened and clung to shrinking flesh. There were giant mosquitoes and bloodsucking bats to make the nights horrible, too.

Three weeks of this; weeks in which Simón Bolívar scarcely slept. He was everywhere, encouraging, rallying, lending a hand where it was needed. A hundred times, having crossed safely on his magnificent gray horse (“Gray horses are the best swimmers,” the plainsman Páez had warned him), he was back in the swollen stream, pulling some luckless straggler from the reach of snapping alligator jaws; encouraging a frightened mule which had never learned to swim and did not propose to begin now. At night he produced his best stories to set the sodden camp roaring. He sang and he made them sing.

The irrepressible Rooke supported him tirelessly. Never, he swore, had he known so fine a climate as this one. Think of the poor Arabs in the Sahara, he urged them, plodding along under a burning sun, going mad for want of a drop of water. Naturally the good Lord does not love the Arabs, poor heathen, to deny them His most precious boon. And by the same token, how much, how very much He must love us, to bless us so prodigally with this delightful moisture!

On the far horizon a faint gray line raised itself into humps, a little higher every day. On the fourteenth of June they reached the village of Tame at the foot of the mountains.

The plainsmen and the lowland Indians gazed upward in uneasy astonishment. They had never seen the Andes before, hut they had heard of them. And what they had heard was not good. “The Old Ones” lived among those towering peaks, they knew that. Who “The Old Ones” were, what they would do to mortals, was not a matter for discussion. In spite of the terrors of the homeward journey, there were desertions from the Tame camp.

The hardier spirits enjoyed the three days’ rest there. They were out of the rainy belt now, they could feel the sunshine on their bare backs. Part of Santander’s army was waiting for them. The others, under Santander himself, had gone ahead to tackle a Spanish garrison which held the pass at Paya. The Granadan soldiers had already gathered food supplies from the countryside; they welcomed the shivering Venezuelans to good hot cooked meals around the fire.

Word came that Santander had cleared their path by wiping out the Spanish outpost. On the third day the main expedition resumed its march, joining him at Paya.

The crossing of the plains had been bad. But, for the plainsmen at least, it had been made bearable by the element of familiarity. This journey into the mountains was a different matter altogether. The known discomforts paled before new agonies only to be accounted for by the fury of fearful gods disturbed in their sacred places. Superstitious terrors added themselves to physical sufferings already great beyond bearing. Death and madness rode with the little cavalcade and daily took their toll.

There was the cold. The lowland people knew the shivering dank chill of their rainy season, but this stark mountain cold which struck like knives through their thin rags was something new. It came in gusts, borne on winds against which a man could hardly stand. It fell upon them in visible form, hard, round, stinging bullets which Santander’s highlanders called “sleet.” Or it floated down like soft, lovely feathers, hiding a sleeping man so quickly that his comrades never missed him, but went on and left him there.

Sleeping men were the bane of the commander’s life. There were so many reasons for a soldier to fall out and snatch a nap by the roadside. The soroche, the mountain sickness, although it begins with head pains and nausea, inclines to trail off into a drowsiness which passes into peaceful death. A man’s companions who wish to save him must beat him, pinch him, prick him with the bayonet —anything to keep him awake and on his feet.

Men who were spared by soroche, who were not numbed to insensibility by cold, had still good reason to lie down and refuse to get up again. They were tired. The thin mountain air tried their bursting lungs; their legs ached from the climb and their backs from the loads they carried. Hunger is exhausting, too, and they were soon hungry. Pack mules, loaded with provisions, toppled over precipices or fell through the makeshift bridges contrived of plaited vines with which deep gorges had to be spanned. Grain bags managed to get themselves jammed against sharp rocks and burst their rotted fabric. The last of the cattle had been slaughtered at Tame, so there was no meat. There was no fire, either, after they passed the timber line. Even their late enemy, water, had deserted them. Burning with fever, they quenched their thirst with handfuls of snow.

On the sixth night, having climbed 13,000 feet, they rested on the Páramo de Pisba. This is a bleak, rocky plain, without any shelter at all from the icy winds. There was no food, no fire, no medicine for the sick, no bandages for the wounded. There was one lone priest to minister to the dying. The good father was overworked that night, for they died by scores, within reach and almost in sight of the promised land.

The morning sun showed them something which they had begun to believe did not exist. The rocky goat track they had been following led, not upward, but downward.

They had done what only one among them, Simón Bolívar, had believed it was possible for men to do. Avoiding the easier routes where the Spaniards waited, they had blazed their own trail across the mighty Andes.

Sun shines on the little silver streams of the Sogamoso Valley. Its grass is green and its flowers are bright and all manner of fruits and grains grow abundantly there. The visions of paradise which had tortured the dreams of the delirious can have painted no fairer picture than the one into which the scarecrow army stumbled.

Not a horse or a mule was left among them. With Santander’s force, they had been 3,200 strong men when they began to climb. They were a bare 1,200 now, 1,200 living skeletons sparsely covered by fluttering rags. For all that remained, it was hard to tell what had been a London uniform and what an Indian blanket. Even Rooke’s red jacket, faded and frayed, had gone to wrap a Cunaviche baby born on the march.

The villagers of Socha hurried out with food and drink. They would have done that in any case, for they were a kindly folk. But when they learned that these were Republicans, come to free them from the accursed Spaniards, that there in their midst strode El Libertador himself, hero of Tenerife and friend of the martyred Camilo Torres, their delight was boundless. Santander, the native Granadan, they knew too, and welcomed him as one of their own.

They threw open their homes, and that night they gave a banquet and ball to the generalissimo and his staff. Bolívar borrowed the mayor’s Sunday suit and danced with the mayor’s daughter, and afterward wrote a brief letter to his vice-president in Angostura. It merely reported that he had reached Socha in New Granada safely, and proposed to move at once upon Tunja, where the Spanish general Barreiro was established.

XIX

Viva La Patria!

Bolívar allowed his scarecrow legions only three days’ rest at Socha. For himself and his staff there was no rest at all. They personally scoured the countryside, bringing in some eight hundred recruits and a thousand horses. On July 7, 1819, they were on the march again.

Barreiro, the Spanish commander, was not greatly disturbed by the reports his scouts brought in. He sent out a small detachment to deal with these rash invaders, and they cut it to pieces. A stronger party met the same fate a few days later. This roused General Barreiro, so he put himself at the head of his formidable army and marched out to settle the matter once for all.

The two armies met at Pantano de Vargas, a marsh between Socha and Tunja. It was a battle in the old style, fought without benefit of entrenched positions, artillery barrages, or headquarters direction. Bolívar was there in the front line, on his gray horse, giving his orders with his own lips. So, to be fair, was General Barreiro.

The fighting was hand to hand and toe to toe, the weapons, rifle and bayonet and pistol and naked sword. By all reasonable calculations an easy victory should have gone to the Spanish, veterans who had fought under Wellington, standing like a wall in solid rank on rank.

The patriots won it, at terrific cost, and only after performing deeds of such desperate daring that they do not sound quite believable when they are set down on the printed page.

The recorded details of such a battle as this, where every single man had his chance at heroic action, must indeed be taken with a grain of salt. The survivor who boasts, “With my own sword I slew twenty Spaniards!” perhaps slew only five. He cannot be contradicted, for his neighbors had their hands full polishing off their own quotas. But the mere fact that he is a survivor, from a melee where there was no chance to hide and the enemy was an outnumbering force, is in itself a certificate of valor.

The heroism of commanding officers is rather easier to establish, and the battle of Pantano de Vargas brought new laurels for Anzoátagui, for Santander, for Carvajal, and for Colonel Rondon. It was to Rondon, a cavalry officer, that Bolívar gave only one sublimely simple order: “Colonel, save your country!”

The British Legion too, fighting for the first time under the Liberator’s eyes, gave a glorious account of itself. O’Leary was wounded, and Rooke fell to the rocky hillside, bleeding in a dozen places.

Victory came with nightfall and a torrential rainstorm which enabled the remnants of the foe to scurry away to safety.

Into Bolívar’s hut, a crude shelter of mud and palm, they carried the merry-hearted Irishman. Rooke was conscious. He lay quiet and unflinching while the British surgeon sawed off his shattered arm. His pet joke had always been to pretend to be a very quarrelsome fellow; on the bitterest páramo night he had thrown the campfire into wild hilarity by challenging a brother officer to a duel.

Now he put on his most belligerent expression.

“Mind what you’re doing there, Doc! That’s no common arm you’re handling, I’d have you know. Sure and it’s the finest arm in the Western Hemisphere, that one is!”

“Oh, I don’t know about that.” With tears in his eyes, Dr. Foley took up the game. “I’ve seen better arms in my time. Lots of them.”

“You lie! You never saw a better arm. Look, gentlemen! Where’ll you ever find an arm like that?” His breath was coming in gasps now; the end was not far off. But he laughed as he cried, “Viva la Patria! Long live my country!”

One of the officers standing by forced himself to laugh, too. “What country do you mean, Rooke? England or Ireland? You have the blood of both.”

“Not those.” The dying man tried to shake his head. His voice was only a whisper now, and his comrades bent close to catch the words. “I mean—” here came the ghost of his old chuckle, “I mean the country that’s giving me a grave.”

Late that night Bolívar sat down to write a letter to a blue-eyed colleen in Angostura. Less than six months ago young Mistress Rooke, with a trunkload of London finery, had come out to join her husband in this brave new land. The handsome, high-spirited Irish couple had been the life of the nightly dancing parties. In the summertime that was, and now it was winter, and dancing days were done for Jim and Molly Rooke.

Students of military tactics know all about the battle of Boyacá, which followed hard upon the heels of Pantano de Vargas. It is a classic illustration of Bolívar’s military genius, and besides that it was an important battle in its own right, for it was a decisive one.

Victory went to the patriots. They captured Barreiro himself, and some sixteen hundred men, and a beautiful stock of nice new shiny guns which they sorely needed. The fifty Spaniards who escaped never stopped running until they got to Bogotá. Their account of the battle so frightened the viceroy there that he departed down the river in great haste, not even waiting to remove half a million dollars from the royal treasury.

So the day that Bolívar’s men marched into the capital of New Granada was not merely a “Day of National Rejoicing and Homage to our Deliverers,” as the rose-wreathed triumphal arches proclaimed. It was also Pay Day, and that was good, too.

XX

Gran Colombia Is Born

The conquest of New Granada put heart into the patriot cause. The land was a rich one and, though her most illustrious leaders had been brutally executed by the Spaniards, though many towns lay in ruins, she had been spared the incessant surge of battle up and down the countryside which had laid Venezuela waste. Marching men had not trampled down the grain; fruit ripened undisturbed; horses and mules and cattle grazed placidly in lush pastures. While the Spaniards held the land all these resources were theirs. Now they reverted to their rightful owners, who eagerly offered them in the cause of freedom.

Shortly after the entry into Bogotá, Bolívar organized a provisional government. The popular assembly which he called named him president, with the further title of Liberator. At his suggestion the vice-president chosen was General Santander.

Francisco de Paula Santander was a native Granadan, one of that group of ardent young officers who had welcomed Bolívar at Cartagena six years before. He was a lawyer by profession, highly educated and able.

The revolution had begun with a wealth of such young men, men of Bolívar’s own background and breeding. Now, alas, they were becoming scarce. They spent their lives with reckless devotion, and there was none to replace them. Education was at a standstill in the Spanish provinces; a generation was growing up whose only school was the camp and the battlefield. The generals of Bolívar’s later days were men promoted from the ranks, often with no qualification but their reckless courage.

Bolívar valued Santander especially, therefore, because he combined military genius with a gift for statesmanship. He had given much thought to the political organization of the new republics when peace should be assured. He had arrived at conclusions which differed from the Liberator’s in many important particulars. For the moment, since peace was still far in the future, those differences were of no account. Later they were to affect profoundly the lives of both men and of their countries.

Leaving Santander in charge at Bogotá, Bolívar returned to Angostura. The journey this time was an easy one. Riding with only a servant and a few officers, he could follow the main-traveled routes now cleared of Spaniards. Fresh horses waited in the villages, and Indian canoes to take him down the swift streams. It was an uneventful journey, a restful interlude whose peace was rudely shattered at Barinas, where Páez met him.

Páez had ridden a hundred miles upriver to welcome his chief back to Venezuela, and he did it in style. The fires of battle had left not a single habitable house in the village, so he had a new house built. This was not as ambitious an enterprise as it might seem; half a dozen Indians had accomplished the job in a single day.

The “house” was a thatched roof of plantain leaves raised high above the ground on roughhewn posts. Since there were no walls, it was not necessary to waste time on the construction of doors and windows. The floor was trodden mud spread with sweet river grasses. Furnishings were equally simple. Solid wooden doors from the ruined barracks laid across trestles made the table. The chairs were the sun-bleached skulls of long-dead oxen.

Such architecture, such furnishing, made up the common llano dwelling most familiar to General Páez. He had been born in one, and throughout his boyhood had known no other. He found it entirely satisfactory. Although in his later years he became a dweller in palaces, he never regarded them as anything but symbols of glory. It was fitting that a great man should have a great house, he agreed. But only so that the populace might see how great he was. Not, by any manner of means, that one could sleep better in a bed than in a hammock, or repose more comfortably in an armchair than upon a cozy ox skull!

The huge blackened pot was brought in from the cooking trench and set upon the table. With a lavish hand Páez ladled out the contents, the thick stew of chicken and green corn and bananas which his people call sancocho. With it went cornmeal tortillas fried crisp and dripping in hot lard, and fried plantains and fried fish.

If Simón Bolívar, whose mother had imported her cook from Paris, found anything lacking in the cowboy-general’s banquet, he did not say so. With the fine courtesy which never failed him, he ate the heavy, greasy food and drank the native beer and complimented his host. Páez beamed in simple pleasure, but when the meal ended his round face sobered. Bolívar had asked whether all went well in Angostura.

“My general,” Páez began, “I am no talebearer, you know that. But there are things going on there which you should hear. It is for this reason that I have come to meet you. In Angostura—no, it does not go well, my general. And how indeed could one expect it, where affairs are left in the hands of politicians? Politicians—bah!” He spat upon the mud floor to show his contempt.

Bolívar smiled. “I know well, amigo, that you have little regard for politicians. But tell me, what are they up to now?”

Páez was eager to tell. The Congress had fallen into one of those senseless wrangles which were the curse of early lawmaking bodies. Zea, the vice-president, had issued some arbitrary order to General Arismendi, far away in Margarita fighting the Spaniards. Arismendi, instead of sensibly ignoring it, had sent back a message of defiance, and another general was called from his campaign to go and arrest the culprit. He brought him back a prisoner, but Arismendi’s friends in the Congress had started a movement to overthrow Zea. The result was that Arismendi was elected vice-president while he was still in jail, leaving his cell for the presidential palace. Other generals, hearing of the row, lightheartedly left their commands and hurried back to Angostura to take sides in it.

Bolívar heard the story to the end, and with calm common sense realized that the affair was by no means so serious as it seemed to the simple-hearted llanero general.

“I think,” Páez offered helpfully, “that the best thing to do is to have a number of persons shot. A good shooting clears the air wonderfully, my general, or so I have always found.”

Bolívar nodded solemnly. “Perhaps you have some suggestions to offer, José? Whom shall we shoot first, the generals or the politicians?”

“Oh, the politicians, certainly! Quite a large number of those, I should think. Twenty or thirty, at least.”

“And then twenty or thirty generals to follow? I am afraid we shall have to make some promotions first, old friend. There are scarcely so many generals available at the moment.”

“But you would not shoot twenty or thirty generals!” Páez turned a scandalized face upon his leader. “Naturally I referred to politicians. Thirty—or perhaps forty. Yes, forty would undoubtedly be better.”

“Very well, forty politicians. But how many generals, then?”

The brow of Páez wrinkled. “Must there be generals? Generals are very important people, sir. We need them to win the war. It seems a wicked waste to go about shooting them.”

“Ah, but we must be fair, José. It would never do to have it said that we showed partiality toward the army. It is plain that you value generals far above politicians, so perhaps we could establish some sort of ratio. If we shoot one general to every five politicians, how would that be?”

Páez worked out the sum laboriously on his fingers. “Eight generals—just heaven, no! Besides, sir, it is unreasonable to rate politicians so highly. One to ten: that is more like it.”

“As you will,” Don Simón agreed gravely. “Then for the forty civilians we will sacrifice four generals. Name them, my friend.”

O’Leary the Irishman, seated at Bolívar’s right, had listened with wide-eyed horror. He attempted to speak now, but his chief laid a restraining hand upon his arm. In silence the handful of officers at table waited while Páez made his calculations.

“Arismendi—certainly we cannot spare him,” he muttered. “Nor Urdeneta; no, it is unthinkable. He has been at my side on too many campaigns, and I would as lief ride a colt of his breaking as my own. Montilla perhaps. He is nothing but a Granadan, when all’s said and done. Still, he has a knack of handling those highheaded countrymen of his. Bermudez? I never liked the man. Yes, he could go. And that conceited young jackanapes from the east who calls himself Mariño. Bermudez and Mariño— there are two for you, sir. I can think of no others who can be spared.”

“Good. Then we must shoot only twenty politicians, to keep it at ten to one. Name them for me now.”

Páez waved his hand. “What matter? A politician is a politician, and all are equally worthless. It is necessary only to round up the first who present themselves. Although I do think, my general, that you are showing yourself very niggardly in fixing such a number. To shoot only twenty politicians—what is it? A mere drop in the bucket. Forty would be far better.”

From the two or three other men present, Bolívar’s aides and Páez’s, a little murmur broke out. The Liberator decided that the comedy had gone far enough.

“There will he no shooting, Páez. The gentlemen of whom you speak, soldiers and statesmen alike, are good patriots all. It is regrettable that they have allowed themselves to fall into childish disputes, when so much work remains to be done. There are matters of state to engage the best thinking of the Congress; and as for the military men, we have still a war to be won. I do not think that this silly quarrel will persist when I have called that fact to their attention.”

Events justified his statement. Arismendi met him upon his entry into Angostura a few days later and voluntarily resigned the office which he had assumed. Zea was reinstated. Instead of scolding the warring generals, Bolívar praised them warmly for their valor, and sent them back to their armies to earn new glory. They earned it, too. There was never any fault to find with the Republican generals when fighting was in question. Only when they tried to dabble in politics were they likely to cause trouble.

As for the Congress, Bolívar quickly recalled them to their duties. At their first session, he reported upon the progress of the war in New Granada where, except for a strip along the coast, the Spanish power had been completely broken. He described the battles of Pantano de Vargas and Boyacá, naming for special commendation those men whose courage had made victory possible. He asked the Congress to enact a law assuring pensions to the families of the fallen. When someone objected that funds were low, he reminded them that his own salary for the year 1819 was unpaid, and formally assigned this money to the pension fund.

Then, calmly and confidently, he presented his newest plan. It was not new, for it had been close to his heart for years, but only now did the opportunity arise to put it into execution.

He wanted, he told them, a single republic uniting the old Spanish provinces of Venezuela, New Granada, and Quito. It was to be called Colombia.

The project, he admitted frankly, might seem to them an unattainable dream at this moment. In Venezuela the Spanish still held the old capital, Caracas, the seacoast, and the larger part of the territory. Quito, on the Pacific coast to the south of New Granada, had made only a feeble attempt at revolution, ruthlessly suppressed.

Yet, he reminded them proudly, New Granada was free. She lay between Venezuela and Quito and afforded a splendid springboard for action against the Spanish on either hand. By declaring the three provinces one common country, it would be possible to move against the king’s forces wherever necessity dictated or opportunity offered.

These were practical considerations. There were other and more idealistic ones, which he presented with all the natural eloquence which was his to command. It was his old dream of a united America, with sectional lines erased; a dream which was the motivating force of Simón Bolívar’s whole career. It was a dream which Santander, passionately attached to his own New Granada, did not share. Nor did Páez, whose world was the plains of Venezuela.

In the Congress at Angostura, however, no voice was raised in objection. With enthusiasm they passed the “Fundamental Law of Colombia,” creating the three-ply republic and naming Simón Bolívar its president.

Three vice-presidents were elected also: Zea for the republic as a whole, Roscio for Venezuela, and Santander for New Granada. Since the citizens of Quito were not yet aware of their new estate, a resolution was passed stating that their vice-president would be chosen “when the liberating arms shall enter that capital.”

It was arranged that a new Congress should be called for May of the following year, to meet at Cúcuta on the Venezuela-Granada border. It was to be composed of representatives of the two countries.

Having passed this final act, the gentlemen “dissolved their assembly and dispersed to their homes.” Bolívar hurried back to Bogotá to arrange for the election of representatives from the Granadan side of the border.

XXI

Peace Before Battle

While all this was going on, King Fernando in Madrid was having his troubles. The self-appointed Regency which had attempted to govern in his name during the Bonaparte occupancy had put notions into the heads of the Spanish people. They had had a brief experience of trying to run the country, and while they had not done too well at it, they were unwilling to resign themselves to absolute monarchy again. Revolution broke out, and the king was forced to grant them a constitution limiting his own powers. It provided for a national assembly on the order of the English Parliament.

Having been forced to compromise with rebels at home, the unlucky king decided that he might as well swallow his pride and negotiate with the rebels in the colonies, too. He sent out orders to General Morillo to find out whether they would be willing to come back into the fold under the new constitution, which would allow them representation in the new Spanish assembly.

Morillo, who had asked for and been promised a reinforcing army of 24,000 men, was not at all pleased with these orders which came instead. However, he obeyed, writing a letter to Bolívar in which he addressed him as “Your Excellency, President of the Republic of Colombia.” Ordinarily the haughty don was in the habit of referring to his antagonist as “that bandit.” The fact that he now for the first time felt constrained to treat with him as an equal showed better than anything else the real strength which the revolution was developing.

The meeting between the two commanders was a knightly scene right out of the pages of Sir Walter Scott. Each brought only a few officers to the place of conference, the village of Santa Ana. O’Leary, who had been sent to escort the Spanish general to Bolívar, made the presentations. With stately courtesy they greeted each other and sat down to “an ample collation.”

Whatever conceptions of Bolívar as an irresponsible bandit Morillo may have entertained before, they were completely changed in the course of the meal. He found his companion a man better bred than himself, as well versed in the niceties of formal etiquette, and considerably more conversant with the state of affairs in Europe and America both.

Quietly and politely this amazing rebel began sticking pins in the bright balloon of the king’s gracious proposal. It offered no advantages whatever to a free people who had good reason to distrust Spain’s promises.

Furthermore, they had no reason to compromise in a war which they were triumphantly winning. Three provinces, strongly united, joined together in a righteous cause, were invincible on their own ground. Their resources, which Bolívar enumerated at length, were boundless. Their spirit was unbreakable.

The people of Spain, on the other hand, were losing heart for the struggle. With exquisite courtesy he brought up the rebellion at Cádiz, which had prevented the sailing of new units for Morillo’s army. Did it not show, he asked, that the Spanish people were growing sick of seeing their young men shipped off to certain death in the distant colonies?

The two men shook hands warmly at parting. Morillo had come to this meeting instructed to offer the rebels a grudging concession which should ensure their surrender. When he left he had agreed to enforce upon his officers more humane treatment of prisoners of war, and to observe a six months’ armistice.

He carried away also a healthy respect for the rebel strength, and a new doubt of the Spanish chances so compelling that very soon afterward he resigned and returned to Spain. La Torre, who replaced him, was a less able man, so that the meeting may safely be accounted a diplomatic victory for Bolívar.

The six months’ armistice gave the patriots a welcome opportunity to strengthen themselves for the struggle which still lay ahead. It was broken, before it had run its course, by an independent uprising in the city of Maracaibo. Bolívar had nothing to do with it, but since La Torre declared the rebellion a breach of the armistice, there was nothing to do but prepare for resumption of the war.

The time had come at last to strike a final blow for the liberation of Venezuela. Bolívar summoned his legions, and from every direction they came hurrying to his call. He himself, with a strong force, rode over the border from New Granada. Páez came thundering from the lowlands, his “Bravos de Apure” and the British Legion at his back. Urdeneta came from Maracaibo, Mariño and Zaraza from the east.

La Torre was at Valencia, the gateway to Caracas. Five thousand men, almost the entire Spanish Army in Venezuela, were with him.

Learning that the patriots were advancing toward Caracas, he marched out to turn them back. The battlefield of his selection was the rugged plain of Carabobo, the same spot where in 1814 Bolívar had won one of those hollow victories which failed to save the Second Republic.

XXII

Carabobo

The battle of Carabobo was the greatest, in point of numbers, yet fought in this war. Bolívar had 6,000 men, commanded by seven of his ablest generals. Seven generals and a generalissimo may seem a little excessive for a force which after all was only about the size of a European brigade, but the patriot armies were always singularly rich in high-ranking officers.

There were good reasons for that, several of them. For one thing, small detachments were constantly operating in different parts of the country, and must be commanded by men empowered to make independent decisions. Again, since Bolívar forbade the looting which his opponents looked upon as a legitimate fruit of victory, and since the patriot treasury seldom allowed any monetary awards, promotion was about the only means of recognizing outstanding deeds of valor.

There was one further consideration. It was absolutely necessary to give the revolution dignity and importance in the eyes of the outside world. The Spanish worked constantly to convince England and the United States that the whole thing was a petty native rebellion, about on a par with the Indian uprisings which the North Americans were frequently called upon to quell.

If this view could be made to prevail, there was little chance that the powerful foreign nations would take the revolution seriously. Bolívar fought the enemy on this ground as skillfully as he did on the field of battle. He sent full accounts of every victory to López Méndez in London, and that gentleman saw to it that they got full publicity in the local press.

The Colombians, then, had eight generals at Carabobo, and the Spanish, with an opposing force of about the same number, had two. La Torre, commander in chief, had under him those seasoned veterans of the Spanish Army who had won their spurs against Napoleon. They included an artillery division and the famous infantry battalion, “Valency.”

Morales, with his cutthroat band of horsemen, formed a separate command. One writer says that they did not arrive until the action was over, and took an active part only in the retreat. Whether this is true or not, they did not distinguish themselves. General Morales was far more at home raiding undefended villages than upon a regulation battlefield.

The fighting was hot and heavy, but it did not last long. The patriots, for the first time equal in numbers to their foe, were also for the first time well fed, well armed, and fighting upon terrain favorable to them. That is not to say that victory was easy. The Spanish fought with skill and courage. Inside of an hour, however, they were in full retreat, taking the road to the coast.

Three successive commanders of the British Legion gave their lives in that crowded hour, and a fourth, eighteen-year-old Lieutenant Minchin, stepped into the breach. In less than thirty minutes the British lost 17 officers and 119 men. They charged out of the ravine in which they had been trapped and scattered the Spaniards up the hillside. Páez with his lancers came to complete the rout.

All over the saucerlike plain of Carabobo, Bolívar’s men were fighting courageous actions of the same sort. It is hard to choose one outstanding hero from among so many, but the officer to whom Bolívar gave the warmest praise after the engagement was over was General Páez.

That night, at an uproarious celebration around the campfire, Páez the Centaur sat silent and apart. He had been publicly thanked by Bolívar, and named commander in chief of the armies of Venezuela. He had responded modestly when all the officers had insisted on drinking his health. And then he had slipped away into the shadows.

A young captain approached him, where he sat wrapped in his blanket, staring into the night.

“You are sad, my general? You mourn the loss of Cedeño, perhaps? Or of the Englishman Ferrier? They were your good friends, I know.”

Páez lifted his head. “Good friends, yes. My life will be the barer for their going. But it is the fortune of war, my boy. They would not have us repine.”

“No, my general.” The young man hesitated, lingered. “Do you not feel well, sir? Is there anything I can get for you? A glass of wine, perhaps, to drive away the evening’s chill? Or shall I have El Negro Primero prepare your bed?”

The general looked up at him, his face twisting like a child’s about to cry. “Then you have not heard, lad? They killed him today. Pedro Camejo will never spread my blankets again.”

“Killed the Foremost Negro? Oh, sir, this is bad news indeed. No, I did not know. I saw him a dozen times in the course of battle—why, he rode past me, shouting, ‘Nothing gets in front of me today but the neck of my horse!’ Are you sure that he is dead, my general?”

“Quite sure.” Páez tried to smile. “I have the best of evidence. He told me so himself. Look you, lad, this is what happened.

“I saw him come galloping toward me, his back to the enemy. I was astounded. ‘Pedro, you coward!’ I roared at him. Heaven forgive me that I thought ill of him in that moment. ‘What do you mean by running away? The fight is not over yet!’ He opened his shirt, boy, and the blood gushed out. ‘It is over for me, my general, but I had to tell you good-by. General, I’m dead.’ And he was, Captain. He toppled off his horse and lay there, dead in the dust. My old Pedro, and I called him coward!” He hid his face in his blanket.

The young officer stood helplessly by. Like everyone else, he knew how dearly Páez loved the giant ex-slave whom he had once sent to examine Bolívar’s horse. El Negro Primero, Negro Number 1, had served his master with fidelity. He had been valet and groom and chef and nurse and court jester, although none of these duties ever interfered with his fighting when there was fighting to he done.

The general looked up presently, and wiped his eyes. He scowled fiercely at the boy. “Well, what are you standing there for?” he barked. “Why don’t you go back to the others?”

“I—if you wish, sir. But I hate to leave you sitting here alone. If you would come with me—”

“I will come.” Páez got to his feet. His face lightened. “The Liberator—I must tell him. He valued Pedro, too. Do you remember how he used to roar at Pedro’s preposterous stories? This will be one last story for him, and a fine one. ‘I’m dead, General!’ Ah, but the Liberator will relish that!”

XXIII

New Laurels

As Boyacá had meant the liberation of New Granada, so the victory at Carabobo was a deathblow to Spanish ascendancy in Venezuela. Again Bolívar entered his native city in triumph, to the sound of cheers and pealing bells. Government offices were removed from Angostura and established at Caracas, the proper capital.

The Liberator lost no time in hurrying to Rosario de Cúcuta, where the Congress of Gran Colombia was in session. He had hoped that they would adopt the constitution that he first presented at Angostura for the Venezuelan Republic, the constitution which embodied the ideas of a life-term president and a hereditary senate.

To the day of his death Simón Bolívar believed that such a constitution was the ideal one for his people. He was never able to get it adopted by the only method he was willing to use, that of reasonable argument.

The gentlemen of the Congress had their own ideas about a constitution, eventually adopting one very similar to that of Angostura. But they unanimously re-elected Bolívar “President Liberator,” with full powers to carry on the war as he saw fit. He was free now to embark upon the project which had seemed so visionary when he first broached it at Angostura: the liberation of Quito and its inclusion in the new republic.

The province of Quito, now the republic of Ecuador, was perhaps the most pugnaciously Royalist of all the Spanish colonies. Along the coast, particularly in the port city of Guayaquil, some gallant attempts at revolution had been made. But in the capital itself, and particularly in the rock-girt mountain city of Pasto, the inhabitants were fanatical in their devotion to the crown. They taught their dogs to snarl at the word “Republican”; and one historian tells us that to this very day the citizens of Pasto open their formal banquets with a toast to the king of Spain.

Bolívar had begun to prepare the way in Ecuador even while he was fighting the Venezuelan campaign. He had sent Sucre, one of the most brilliant of his younger officers, south by sea to Guayaquil. Sucre succeeded in taking the port at about the same time that Carabobo was being fought. Bolívar left Cúcuta, intending to join him there, but a Spanish fleet arriving in the meantime made the sea journey impossible. There was nothing for it but an overland march to Quito.

If anything, this expedition surpassed in hardships the epic journey of 1819. There was the same freezing cold, the same mountain sickness to contend with, the same need to find a path where there was none. Again the bridges of plaited reeds must be swung across dark chasms; again peaks must be scaled by handholds formed of bayonets thrust into crevices in the rock. Three thousand men set out from Bogotá on December 13, 1821. Four months later, two thousand of them closed their gaping ranks against the Royalist force waiting at Bomboná.

The enemy was strongly ensconced upon the steep slopes of a volcanic mountain. It was necessary for the desperate patriots to storm those heights from the gorge below, a gorge almost filled by a swift mountain river. The position guarded the town of Pasto, that furiously Royalist city which was the last in all Colombia to resign itself to a republican form of government.

At great cost, and by blazing deeds of valor, the heights were taken by the patriots. Colonel García, the Spanish commander, was forced to surrender, and the way into Pasto was cleared.

The battle of Bomboná produced one refreshing incident. After the surrender, when Bolívar was planning to enter the city, Colonel García received word that the stubborn townspeople, far from acknowledging defeat, were arming themselves with axes and household knives to resist to the death. They had no hope of success, but to subdue them Bolívar would be obliged to turn his guns on civilians, many of them hysterical women.

García, a soldier himself and a good one, knew without being told that Bolívar would find such a job a sickening one. So he proposed that he be allowed to send an escort of Spanish soldiers with the Liberator. Bolívar accepted the chivalrous offer, and the plan was carried out.

The Spanish prisoners of war, released and given back their weapons, marched in perfect formation at the head of the entering troops. The bewildered Pastusos (natives of Pasto) stood gaping, pickaxes idle in their hands, until Bolívar was safely inside the palace. The minute of danger had passed, and the mob sheepishly broke up. Not one Spanish soldier attempted to escape or balked at surrendering his arms again.

While Bolívar was advancing toward Quito by marching south, Sucre was working his way toward the same point from the coast. He too had his grueling march over the Andes; he too encountered strong opposition and vanquished it. He reached Quito first, taking it after a fantastic battle fought above the clouds on the slopes of a smoking volcano. He at once sent off a messenger to carry the good news to Bolívar in Pasto. Three weeks later he and all Quito welcomed the Liberator.

Antonio José de Sucre was the Sir Galahad of Bolívar’s Round Table. Chivalrous, modest, generous, and loyal, he was the very perfect gentle knight “sans peur et sans reproche.” Bolívar loved him, calling him “the son which Heaven has denied me.”

Sucre had labored self-effacingly for many years, but this day at Quito was his first public triumph. Far greater glory was to come to him. He was to become grand marshal of Peru, liberator of Ecuador, president of Bolivia. And eight years later, on a lonely mountain trail, he was to be foully murdered by those sullen Pastusos who still called themselves the loyal subjects of Fernando VII.

XXIV

Two Strong Men Meet

Far away to the south, in the countries which are now Argentina and Chile, another revolution had been going on since 1812. The colonists there had the same reasons to hate and fear their Spanish oppressors that the Northerners had; they were equally rich in brave and able leaders. Of these José de San Martín was the most illustrious.

San Martín, like Bolívar, was an aristocrat by birth. His father had been lieutenant governor of Buenos Aires. Like the Venezuelan, San Martín too was called “Liberator” by a grateful people. The story of the successful struggle by which he had freed Argentina and Chile is too long to recount here, but it is a thrilling one.

San Martín was an older man than Bolívar, more austere, more formal. His military genius and his courage rank him among the great leaders of the world.

Which of the two South American heroes was actually the greater is a matter upon which we of the United States find it better to express no opinion. It is a ticklish subject below the equator. What we can say, comfortably and with justice, is that they were two immortals whose names deserve to stand forever beside that of our own George Washington.

Each liberator knew of and admired the other, but during the early years each had his hands too full at home to devote much attention to affairs at a distance. Communication between the northern and southern parts of the continent was almost impossible at best, except by sea. San Martín carried on in his sphere and Bolívar in his, working toward the common purpose of driving the Spaniard from America, but not working in any sort of union.

Now at last their paths were converging. Like Bolívar, San Martín held that the freeing of his own land was not enough; that there was no safety side by side with Spanish-held colonies. After accomplishing the emancipation of Argentina and Chile he moved northward to Peru, of which country he proclaimed himself “Protector.” Bolívar, having succeeded in Ecuador, now turned his face toward that colony, too.

The Peruvians, with deliverance offering on either frontier, were provokingly lukewarm to the whole business.

Lima was the real center of Spanish government for all America; the most important officials lived there, and the city itself lived on their patronage. It was a prosperous city, for the Spanish grandees scattered with a lavish hand the gold wrung from the peons in the near-by mines. Lima under the Spaniards resembled Rome under Nero more than it did any other city of its day.

Like ancient Rome, it had its undercurrents of dissatisfaction. If the rich were richer in Lima than elsewhere, the poor were poorer. And the Creoles, the American-born aristocrats, smarted under Spanish insolence as their brothers had done in Caracas and Bogotá. There was fertile soil there for the seeds of independence, but they were slow in sprouting.

San Martín had had enough success in Peru to feel that revolution was possible there, but enough discouragement too to make him anticipate a wretchedly long-drawn struggle. He willingly accepted Bolívar’s invitation to meet him at Guayaquil and decide what was best to be done.

When the “Macedonia,” a warship of the Chilean Navy, anchored off Guayaquil, Bolívar went in person to welcome the Protector of Peru. The meeting was a warmly cordial one, and the two men rode into the city between lines of cheering townspeople.

A wealthy merchant had turned over his mansion for San Martín’s use, and that night an elaborate banquet was held. San Martín, silent, reserved, excused himself when the dancing began. He was tired from the long sea voyage, and preferred to go early to bed. He would meet General Bolívar in the morning for their conference.

On the following day, therefore, Bolívar called at the house. Finding San Martín waiting for him in the library alone, he dismissed his aides at the doorway. That door was closed upon the two men, and remained so for the hour and a half that the interview lasted.

Within forty hours after landing at Guayaquil, General San Martín sailed south again. He went straight to Peru and resigned his protectorate, then to Chile and Argentina to give up all the titles and offices his countrymen had bestowed upon him. He took ship for France, where he lived in quiet retirement for twenty-eight years. He died in Boulogne in 1850.

What happened at that interview in the library? To this day no man knows for certain. Neither Liberator ever made any official report giving the full details. What we know must be based upon letters written later, upon the gossip and guesses of men who were close to Bolívar and to San Martín. The picture that we get from these clues is accepted by modern scholars as fairly accurate, and it is something like this:

Two important points were discussed. First, how could the war with Spain in both sections of the hemisphere be brought to a speedy and successful close; second, what was to be the “New Order,” the governmental plan for a free South America when the war was won?

Both men had already freed their own countries and those neighboring provinces which had supported them. The only real Spanish resistance remaining was in Peru, a foreign country to both. To whose leadership was Peru to owe her freedom? It would be necessary for one of them to subordinate himself to the other. Which was it to be?

It would not be Bolívar. This he made clear at the start. It might have been San Martín, for in a later statement he said that he offered to serve under Bolívar, but that his offer was refused. We do not know the conditions which he attached to his offer, or Bolívar’s reasons for refusal. But it is fair to assume that the Liberator was influenced greatly by San Martín’s position on the second subject of their discussion.

Bolívar was a fanatical Republican; he could conceive of no “New Order” for the Western world which did not comprise that form of government. San Martín, on the other hand, was a monarchist. He wanted the American nations to be free of Europe, but he conceived of them as free kingdoms, not republics. He had already proposed to the Chilean Congress that a prince of some European royal house, French or Austrian, should be invited to rule over them.

This was the real point upon which the two men, equally sincere, equally patriotic, disagreed and could never hope to agree. It was a point, also, which had a bearing upon the choice of commander in chief. If Bolívar subordinated himself to San Martín and final victory was won in his name, it would be San Martín who would set up the new government, and he would press for a king. Even if San Martín served under Bolívar, his views would have to be considered in the end. His views were not likely to change. He would still insist upon importing a royal ruler.

Under such conditions Bolívar foresaw endless difficulties and dissensions. He feared royalism in the New World above all evils, but he knew that many influential revolutionists favored it. Brazil, practically next door, had a king; Agostin Iturbide in Mexico was about to proclaim himself emperor.

With such thoughts, spoken or unspoken, Bolívar conducted the fateful interview. He must have brought all his tact and diplomatic skill to bear, for the two men parted on friendly terms. Indeed, at the state banquet that night they toasted each other with glowing words, and San Martín embraced Bolívar warmly when they parted on the quay.

There is no reason to think that San Martín was bullied into giving up his leadership. He headed a strong military force and could scarcely have been intimidated. The historian Ybarra, whose ancestor was Bolívar’s aide, suggests a very simple reason for his action. General San Martín, he says, was weary. He had spent his life in fighting, first with the Spanish against Napoleon, and then strenuous years in the service of his own country. He was nearly fifty years old, and suffered from asthma. Ybarra quotes him as saying, “I gave my youth to Spain and my middle age to my country. Now I wish to dispose as I please of my old age.”

Perhaps he was wise. He lived out the long evening of his life very tranquilly in France, honored and loved by all who knew him. No one has ever suggested that there was anything of the quitter’s attitude about his renunciation. Whatever he may have thought of Bolívar’s political ideas, he must have had full confidence in his high principles and in his ability. The great soldier and great gentleman who was José de San Martín loved the cause of liberty far too well to leave it in any hands except those which he knew would hold it safe.

XXV

“To Conquer, of Course!”

The Peruvian story is a confused one, and hard to follow. There was a certain Spanish gentleman in Lima named Torre Tagle who managed to install himself in a beautiful palace which is still one of the show places of the city. When the Republicans were in power Señor Torre Tagle seems to have been president, but when the Spaniards came back he had no objection to ruling as governor in the king’s name. Maybe he just liked living in the palace.

The Republicans and the Spaniards were in and out of power in Lima, until it was hard to tell on Monday just what the government would be by Saturday night. There was a Congress, but its sole activity seems to have been to send frequent messages to Bolívar in Quito begging him to come and restore order.

Many perplexing problems kept him in Quito for a year after his meeting with San Martín. The Royalists of Pasto revolted again and yet again, and had to be severely dealt with. The Quito government had to be organized, with all the petty details of civil administration. Then for an expedition into Peru Bolívar wanted to have formal permission from the Colombian Congress, and it was slow in coming.

While he waited in Quito, one piece of good news reached him from home. General Páez had sworn a personal vendetta against the cruel Morales, who after the defeat at Carabobo had retired to the lake town of Maracaibo. (Páez’ grievance against Morales was that he was said to mistreat horses!) The fact that the patriots had achieved military supremacy in Venezuela, and that theirs was now the legal government, did not mean that all fighting had ceased. It broke out again and again, in isolated regions, like a forest fire which never quite ceases to smolder.

Páez and Morales were both cavalrymen, and their clashes had been many and fierce. This time, however, Páez did not rely upon his horsemen entirely. He called in the navy.

Maracaibo, an important oil town now, stands upon the site of the Indian stilt village which caused the early explorers to name the country “Little Venice.” The lake upon which it is built has an outlet to the sea. Páez therefore reinforced his command with a fleet of small boats, most of them manned by Yankee seamen from New England. Their own ships were idle in near-by ports, and apparently they welcomed the chance of a good scrap to vary the monotony.

Caught between Páez on the land and the armed boats, Morales was quickly reduced to submission. He surrendered the town and departed for Havana, first collecting five thousand pesos from Páez “for expenses.”

It does not seem a very suitable end for such a scoundrel, and one cannot help regretting that he was not at least compelled to finance it himself. But at least he was gone for good, and the air of Venezuela was the sweeter for his going.

Bolívar finally received permission to take the Colombian Army into Peru on August 7, 1823. Why Congress hesitated so long is not clear, for Sucre, with an insufficient force, had been there all the time, doing his best to unite the various factions against the Spaniards.

It seemed a hopeless task. A Spanish viceroy still claimed authority, backed by the regular army. The more conservative of the citizens supported him. Another faction, influenced by San Martín’s monarchical ideas, wanted freedom from Spain but wanted also to find themselves a king. They had elected Torre Tagle president, and it was whispered that should a suitable European prince not prove available, he himself would not be unwilling to don the royal purple.

This group, while admitting that they must have support from some neighboring country to drive out the Spaniards, were inclined to look toward Chile rather than Colombia. For military strength they relied upon a garrison of Chileans which San Martín had left at Callao, the chief Peruvian seaport.

The third faction, which had also elected a president, rallied around Sucre and begged him to summon Bolívar with an army of sufficient size to end the dissension and give Peru the same standing as a free republic which he had given to Venezuela, New Granada, and Quito.

Sucre worked feverishly, trying to win over the Torre Tagle group by diplomatic means. He knew that the Liberator, while always joyously ready to fight Spaniards, hated to turn his guns upon the men of his own continent. His efforts had some success, especially when it became known that San Martín had departed for France, leaving the Peruvians a doubtful prospect of further help from the south.

Bolívar arrived by sea and was met at Callao by Sucre. He marched into Lima and so impressed Torre Tagle by his firmness and decision that the wily president decided to throw in his lot with him. The second “president” conveniently decided that a European trip would benefit his health, and so some sort of union was attained. There remained then only the Spanish to deal with.

The prospect seemed bright enough, but that was only on the surface. The Peruvian Army was lazy, ill disciplined, badly led. Their general, Santa Cruz, refused to co-operate with Sucre.

Most of the money in the country was in the hands of Spanish sympathizers, as were the stocks of food and horses needed for the army. These people showed great ingenuity in evading Bolívar’s emissaries who sought to collect taxes and buy supplies. Don So-and-so was ill and could not be disturbed; Señor This-and-that was resting at his country house; Señora Someone-else had just sailed for Paris and her overseer could sell no horses without her permission.

Neither were the humbler citizens any more inclined to offer their services as soldiers. They too had excuses; they too were ill or busy or away from home.

All these difficulties only inspired Bolívar to energetic action. He organized public meetings at which all his eloquence came into play to shame and stir the sluggish patriots. He sent to Jamaica for secondhand British uniforms of scarlet and gold to tempt the color-loving half-breeds into the ranks. Army bands played fiery marches in the plaza every night. He set his well-born young officers to persuade the upper classes that it was fashionable to be patriotic. By every possible means he “sold” the idea of a liberating war to a people who were too indolent to seek liberation for themselves.

Never, except in Peru, was it necessary for Bolívar to stage what amounted to an advertising campaign as a prelude to war. Despising the necessity, he yet went about it with all the patience and skill of a modern public-relations counsel.

When success seemed in sight, when money came rolling into the treasury and enlistments mounted and the fair ladies of Lima took up the embroidering of regimental flags as the very smartest fad, Simón Bolívar paid for his superhuman efforts by a sudden and violent illness.

They took him to the seacoast town of Pativilca, where the air was thought to suit him better. For a week he lay unconscious, hovering between life and death. His physicians believed that it would be death, and the word got back to Lima. Whereupon the house of cards which he had so painstakingly erected there promptly fell apart.

General Santa Cruz, defying Sucre, led his men into the mountains on a foolhardy expedition against the Spaniards which failed miserably and cost him several thousand men. The Chilean troops at Callao suddenly remembered that this was not their war anyway, and besides, they hadn’t been paid lately. They sent a message to the Spanish to come and take over.

Back in Lima, Torre Tagle remembered something too—that he was a Spanish marquis. He ran up the flag of Spain and proclaimed himself governor in the king’s name. Three hundred officials of the government joined with him.

To Bolívar, convalescing in his hammock at Pativilca, a good friend rode posthaste with the appalling news. He tried to break it gently, but Bolívar, although too feeble to sit erect, demanded to know the whole truth.

When Colonel Mosquera had finished, a silence fell. The Liberator lay motionless, his eyes on the far horizon. He was scarcely more than a shadow of his old self. The illness had wasted him to a skeleton; his slender hands were like claws, and the outline of his teeth showed through his sunken cheeks.

With aching pity the friend watched him awhile, and then he spoke.

“You asked for the truth, my general, and I have given it to you. There it is. What do you intend to do now?”

“Do?” The word was only a whisper, the eyes which the sick man turned upon him were fever-bright. “Why do you ask that? There is only one thing to do. I intend to conquer, of course!”

XXVI

Junín and Ayacucho

One week later Bolívar wrote to Sucre, “I am ready for anything. The time has come to liberate these people in spite of themselves. We must be firm and end this war, regardless of popular clamor. Come to me and let us consult how it may best be done.”

Sucre with his little force joined him, and the next five months were spent in a period of preparation.

There was no question now of winning support by diplomatic means. Able-bodied men were sternly conscripted; so were horses and supplies. The people of Trujillo, where the army was based, were not so wealthy as those of the capital, but they were required to give until it hurt. No excuses were accepted. Foundries were built for the manufacture of arms; there were forges and shot towers. When enough money was not forthcoming Bolívar demanded that the clergy bring out the gold and silver vessels from the churches.

The conscripts would scarcely have passed the efficiency tests for modern armies. There was no age limit; a man was assumed to be physically fit if he was able to walk and carry a rifle.

Bolívar himself rode far into the mountain fastnesses where no white man had ever been, bringing back Indian braves and horses and cattle. He used no arguments and offered no bribes; he fixed them with his burning eyes and said, “You must!”

The Indians, who knew no Spanish, followed him in superstitious awe. Where they thought they were going, what they conceived to be the cause in which they gave their lives, we shall never know. They fought with savage bravery, and when it was over those who survived melted back into their native mountains and were seen no more.

The tradespeople of Trujillo yielded up their money and their sons at the same compelling command, “You must!”

The army camp hummed with activity. Sucre and his veterans labored tirelessly, drilling raw recruits into some semblance of soldierly efficiency. The British officers, scattered among the different battalions, were of inestimable value here. The gold-and-glory seekers among the Britishers had long since fallen by the wayside; those who remained were the pride of the patriot armies.

On August 2, 1824, all was ready. At Cerro de Pasco, the mountain town where the great copper mines are now, Bolívar reviewed his troops. They were 9,000 in number.

Bolívar himself was commander in chief. Next in authority to him came Sucre. Then the three divisions: the Vanguard, under the young Granadan Córdova; the Center, commanded by La Mar, who had once fought on the Spanish side; and the Rearguard under Lara from Venezuela. The Englishman William Miller commanded the Peruvian cavalry, while that of Colombia was led by the valiant “man of color,” Carvajal.

In words like these Bolívar addressed them: “Soldiers, you are about to complete the greatest task ever assigned by Heaven to man: you are about to free a world from slavery! Peru and all America look to you to bring them peace. Soldiers, you are the hope of the world!”

The Spanish general Canterac (who was actually a Frenchman) had been joined now by the viceroy La Serna, a stiff-necked hidalgo who had vowed by his patron saint to put down this presumptuous rising against his lord the king. He agreed with Canterac that before giving battle it would be wise to learn the strength of the enemy. Accordingly three spies, disguised as cattle herders, were sent into Bolívar’s camp.

A few days later the three men were back at the Royalist headquarters. They had been detected almost at once, they reported, but they had not been harmed. Yes, they had seen the rebel general, a small, thin man with fearful eyes that burned into a man’s soul. He had bade his chief of staff send a letter to the viceroy. Here it was: “His Excellency, the Liberator, releases these spies so that they may give correct information to the Spanish general. His Excellency has no objection to freely permit any officer of the royal army to examine our own, to the fullest extent. Thus may we avoid, in future, the sending of these unhappy wretches who by the laws of war deserve to be victims.”

Canterac began the battle of Junín with what he considered a very clever stroke. Holding back his infantry, he sent his cavalry charging suddenly into the patriot ranks, hoping to throw them into confusion.

The Republican horsemen, however, were ready for him, and they charged almost in the same minute. It was like a collision of locomotives when the two mounted bodies met head on. The battle, short and sharp, was one of the strangest ever fought, for not a shot was fired on either side. It was a mad surging melee of swords and lances, of flying hoofs, of Spanish oaths and Indian war whoops.

Before an hour had passed, Canterac was summoning his infantry from the rear to cover the retreat of his shattered cavalry. He escaped into the mountains, and later wrote to his superior: “My army being superior in numbers and its officers valiant without exception, it was natural to expect a victory and I had counted upon it.”

The patriot victory was not complete, for the Spanish Army retreated without surrendering. But it stiffened the wilting Peruvian morale as nothing else could have done. Lima, hearing the news, reversed itself and turned patriot once more. They urged Bolívar to come in person and set everything to rights, and he went. Thus it happened that he was not present at Ayacucho, the final great battle of the war which he had waged with unflagging persistency for fourteen years. The glory of Ayacucho went to Sucre, the well-beloved “son” of the Liberator.

It was fought on December 8, 1824, on a mountain plain surrounded by snow-capped peaks.

Except for Bolívar’s absence, the line-up on the patriot side was the same as at Junín: Sucre in supreme command, and under him Córdova, La Mar, Lara, Miller, and Carvajal. There were no better military brains in all the New World; the battle was a beautiful example of superb generalship superbly carried out.

Canterac, on the other side, was a worthy opponent, being probably the most capable general the Spanish had yet found. La Serna, the viceroy, brought all the prestige of his rank as personal representative of King Fernando.

Some picturesque legends cluster around the conflict. Reckless, handsome young Córdova was an officer of infantry and as such entitled to ride a horse while his men advanced on foot. When the charge was about to sound he dismounted and killed his horse with his sword. “There!” he cried. “Now I have no chance to escape, nor do I want one!” And later, when he gave the order to go forward, he discarded ordinary military language for the immortal words, “Arms—as you please! Step—that of conquerors!”

There is another story, and rather a touching one. That night, when the battle was won and the Spanish had surrendered, the English general Miller went to the hut where the captured viceroy was held under guard.

La Serna was an old man, and he had given a lifetime to the service of his king. Now, dusty and dejected, his white hair clotted with blood from his wound, he sat on the mud floor and wondered why kindly Death had not taken him on this afternoon’s field.

The Englishman stood stiffly, too much the soldier to find easy words of sympathy, too warmhearted to go away without saying anything. He solved the problem as only an Englishman could. “I think, sir,” he said, “you would be the better for a nice cup of tea. I will have one sent to you at once.”

XXVII

Roses All the Way

Ayacucho was the last major battle of the War for Independence. The inland portion of Peru known as Upper Peru was still held by the Spanish, and a Spanish garrison had Callao, which the Chileans had surrendered to them. Sucre was dispatched to Upper Peru for “mopping up” operations there, accomplishing the task in short order. That left Callao the final outpost of Spain on the South American continent. It held out for eleven months, so that it was not until January 23, 1826, that the last Spanish flag was hauled down.

The first Venezuelan Declaration of Independence had been issued on July 5, 1811. If we disregard the earlier attempts and count the struggle as beginning then, the war had lasted for fifteen years. Again and again the patriot cause had known such crushing and widespread defeat that it seemed simple madness to try again.

Many sincere persons had said, and believed, that Simón Bolívar was a madman. Now that success had justified him, those same persons were the first to hail him as the supreme genius of all time. We have no reason to suppose that they were not equally sincere in their revised views. There his accomplishment stood, solid and undeniable. Against overpowering odds, against all the expectations of reason and common sense, he had achieved the seemingly impossible. Spanish America, which had groaned for three hundred years under the tyrant’s yoke, was free. And she owed that freedom to Simón Bolívar.

It is impossible adequately to describe the fever pitch to which public enthusiasm rose after Ayacucho. In Lima particularly, that apathetic city which had so often and so easily relapsed into royalism, admiration for Bolívar took the wildest forms.

For days the church bells pealed in his honor; special services of thanksgiving were held in the cathedral. Whenever he stepped outside his door it was into flower-carpeted streets, lined by cheering throngs who waited for hours to catch a glimpse of him. When he expressed dislike for the formal Torre Tagle palace which was his official residence, a country home, the Villa Magdalena, was converted into a veritable fairy palace for his use. Patrician families stripped their salons of their richest tapestries to hang on its walls; gifts of gold plate were thrust upon him.

The Congress, not to be outdone, voted every day some new honor to the hero. An equestrian statue must be erected in the plaza; portraits of him must be painted to hang in every government office throughout the land. They appropriated one million dollars to be distributed among his soldiers, and another million to him for his personal use. This latter gift he refused to accept, and it was applied instead to charitable works.

Peru, which had not greatly hoped for liberty and which was the last province to achieve it, was now in a perfect delirium of delight. From all over the country people were demanding to see the Liberator with their own eyes. Sucre was anxious to have him come to Upper Peru, and his journey there was a triumphal progress such as this hemisphere had never seen, and is not likely ever to see again.

At Arequipa they gave him a horse whose trappings were made of the red gold mined in their own hills. At Cuzco, ancient capital of the Incas, a thousand ladies presented a wreath of solid gold set with pearls and diamonds.

From Cuzco he had already received another gift which impressed him far more than the golden wreath. Sucre had sent him from that city the ancient banner which Pizarro had carried three centuries before, when he took Cuzco from the Incas. The banner hangs in the museum at Caracas today.

At La Paz another jeweled wreath awaited him; at the silver city of Potosí the Indians had organized such an elaborate program of tribal dances and sports that it was necessary to remain for several weeks to see them all. Children dressed as angels were pulled along ropes suspended overhead, showering him with flowers.

He joined Sucre in Chuquisaca, the capital of Upper Peru. The name of the country was changed to Bolivia in his honor, and that of the capital city to Sucre.

The Bolivians fairly outdid their neighbors in the lavishness of their gifts. Both Bolívar and Sucre were presented with solid silver caskets containing swords hand-wrought by expert Indian workmen. Hilts and scabbards were of solid gold, set with diamonds. There were uniforms too, with golden buttons, and cocked hats rich with gold lace and white plumes.

All in all, during the journey, Bolívar accumulated eight jeweled swords, twenty-six gold medals, five golden wreaths, a quantity of gold and silver plate, and two hundred pounds of handmade personal jewelry varying from an emerald-set sword knot to a filigree gold toothpick.

Peru is one of the richest gold-producing countries in the world, and the peoples of the Incas were expert goldsmiths long before the Spaniards came. Before the conquest the Incans had never adopted any standard of money values, esteeming gold only because it was easily worked into any desired shape. Dishes and even cooking utensils were commonly made of the precious metal. Pizarro found the walls of the Temple of the Sun lined with thick gold sheets.

It was natural, therefore, that the grateful people should offer Bolívar their gold as freely as they brought him their fruits and flowers. He accepted the gifts graciously, and in later years he gave them away with the same unthinking generosity with which they had been offered.

The time was to come when the price of just one of those jeweled wreaths would have meant the difference between comfort and misery to him, but he never thought of that. He gave the sword of Chuquisaca to Páez, and the wreath from the thousand maidens to Sucre, who made use of it as a betrothal gift. A few of the trinkets are still cherished as heirlooms in South American families; some have found their way into museums. No one knows what has become of the rest. Simón Bolívar possessed not one of them when he came to die. Nor did he ever receive one penny of the tremendous money value they must have represented.

Only on the surface was the journey to Bolivia a spectacular progress of triumph. Quietly, in the mornings, when the speechmaking was over and the music had died, Bolívar was at work.

He would order his horse in the gray dawn and, attended only by the faithful O’Leary, he would ride out into the countryside to see how the people fared. A road was needed here; how could the villagers hope to drive their pigs to market over these great stones? A knock at a doorway, and a wondering small farmer comes forth to be questioned. What tax does he pay? When was it last collected, and by whom? “Make a note of that, O’Leary. The rascals reported no taxes had come in from this district in the past year. We must look into this.”

Patiently, with infinite care, he would look into it. Local officials must be summoned, admonished, consulted with. All the petty, wearisome details that make up honest and efficient administration had to be pounded home. Means had to be found to build roads, irrigate barren tracts, establish schools, reform courts of justice. It was all very dull, very exhausting, and very important. Bolívar never shirked any of it.

In the Bolivian capital the same work waited to be done on a national scale. It waited, too, back in Lima. He worked quickly and efficiently in Bolivia, helping the new Congress to confirm the severance of their country from Peru and to establish itself as an independent republic under the new name.

They were anxious to have Bolívar as their president, but he refused the office, knowing that he was needed in Lima. Sucre was accordingly elected in his stead. Bolívar was given the honorary title of “Father of the Republic.” Leaving Sucre to carry out all the plans he had outlined, the Liberator hurried back to Peru.

XXVIII

The Crown Is Offered

His horse came stepping delicately, fetlock-deep in shattered roses. His white uniform, rich with gold lace, gleamed in the hot Andean sun. Bareheaded, slight, and boyish-looking in the heavy Spanish saddle, he waved his plumed hat to the cheering crowd. The brilliant dark eyes missed nothing. The flashing smile was for all, wondering Indian children and ragged soldiers and lovely Spanish ladies leaning from near-by balconies.

Close-packed in the narrow street, the throng surged forward with a mighty shout. “El Libertador! Viva el Libertador! Long live the Liberator of Peru!”

At the palace gate he turned his rearing charger with superb horsemanship.

“People of Lima!” His voice was rich and full, and they fell silent to hear his words.

“I bring you good tidings! I am but now come from the Constitutional Assembly. The last vestige of Spanish dominance has been abolished. Your country of Peru is now a free and independent republic, owing no allegiance to any foreign power. Your future is in your own hands. You are free!”

Roses flashed through the air; the answering shouts were like thunder in his ears. For a moment he lingered, smiling, bowing, waving the plumed hat. Then he rode through the palace gate, and the iron door clanged behind him.

It was cool in the shady enclosed courtyard, with its little plashing fountain. Don Simón Bolívar tossed the reins to an old Negro and slid down from the saddle. Somewhat wearily, for the day had not been an easy one, he crossed to his private chamber on the far side of the patio.

He had thrown himself into an armchair, and a servant was just removing his high polished boots, when a young Irishman entered. Don Simón smiled warmly at him.

“Ah, my O’Leary! You should have come with me. What a day! Truly, I thought these Peruvian patriots would never have done wrangling. But all is concluded. The constitution has been adopted, at last. Peru is now a republic, fit to take her place as a sister nation of my own beloved Venezuela.”

The Irish eyes kindled. “Splendid, my general! The fifth Spanish province to raise the flag of freedom! Venezuela, New Granada, Quito, Bolivia, Peru, and yourself the Liberator of all of them. Ah, ’tis a glorious sight, those fine free flags! My general...” he hesitated. “You are weary, and I would not trouble you. But visitors have arrived in your absence who beg to speak with you as speedily as possible.”

“Visitors?” A slight frown crossed Bolívar’s face. “Can they not wait until tomorrow? Who are they, O’Leary?”

“One is General Gúzman, your Excellency. He comes from Caracas, with an urgent message from Páez, your deputy there. The other—and this I think will please you—is Monsieur Mercier.”

Don Simón straightened. “Mercier? Surely that is the French gentleman of whom the great Lafayette wrote me? The man by whom he is sending the mementos of George Washington? Oh, this is good news, O’Leary. I will see Monsieur Mercier at once.”

“Yes, my general. And General Gúzman—”

The Liberator waved a negligent hand. “Gúzman can wait. He has had refreshments, I trust? Then offer him another bottle of wine. He will not mind waiting while our cellar holds out. And bring the French gentleman to me immediately. No, wait. In half an hour. I cannot receive him in this rumpled uniform. I must dress as carefully as though I were going to court, for indeed the decoration I am about to receive is far more precious than that which it is within the power of any sovereign to bestow.”

It was a resplendent figure indeed which awaited the gray stooped Frenchman half an hour later. The fresh white uniform with its scarlet and gold facings was but a background for the jeweled decorations commemorating the gratitude of many cities. Against the shining black of hip-high Wellington boots shone the slender golden sword presented by the citizens of Quito. On the wall behind the Liberator’s high carved armchair fluttered the ancient banner of Pizarro, Spanish conqueror of Peru, taken from the old walled citadel of Cuzco when the liberating army marched in.

The Frenchman in his travel-worn citizen’s clothes hesitated a moment before all this magnificence. But as O’Leary made the presentation Bolívar rose, and stepping forward he greeted the visitor cordially in the French fashion, with a kiss on either cheek.

“This is indeed a fortunate occasion, Monsieur,” he said in fluent French. “Since the Marquis de Lafayette deigned to write me by his own hand, commending my poor efforts in the cause of freedom, I have eagerly awaited this opportunity of expressing my gratitude. I beg that when you return to Paris you will endeavor to convey to him what is in my heart.”

“Assuredly I shall do so, your Excellency.” The little Frenchman accepted the handsome armchair which O’Leary drew forward for him. “The marquis will be happy to know that I have found your Excellency in good health and spirits.”

Don Simón bowed. “But tell me of your noble master, Monsieur. He has returned to France? I trust that his North American visit was not too severe a tax upon his strength. We hear that the citizens of the United States made of it a veritable triumphal progress. They know the meaning of gratitude, those Northern Americans. It is a matter of fifty years since Lafayette first offered his sword in their service, yet they do not forget.”

“The North Americans were most kind,” M. Mercier answered. “The marquis journeyed extensively about the land, and was everywhere received with open arms. He was most moved, I think, by his reception at Mount Vernon, where he laid a wreath upon the tomb of General Washington and shed a tear for the memory of his beloved comrade in arms. The family of Mr. Custis, General Washington’s stepson, look upon the marquis as a well-loved father.”

At the mention of Mount Vernon Bolívar’s eyes brightened.

“I hope that I also may one day be permitted to lay my tribute at that shrine. The example of Washington has been a beacon light all through our long struggle, guiding our footsteps. When, upon the icy páramo of Pisba, I looked back and saw the bloody footprints of my ragged soldiers in the snow, I recalled the story of General Washington at Valley Forge and took heart. My bitterest regret is that I was never privileged to look in life upon that noble leader.”

“It is indeed to be regretted, Excellency,” the Frenchman said gently. “But since Fate has decreed otherwise, I bring you a measure of consolation. It now gives me infinite pleasure to offer the gift which was entrusted to my illustrious master by the heirs of General Washington, for transmission to you.”

He took a small velvet case from his pocket. Lifting the lid, he extracted a gold medal. The aide-de-camp, O’Leary, who had been standing respectfully behind the general’s chair, leaned forward with eager interest.

“This,” M. Mercier explained, “is a medal presented to General Washington by the American nation. It commemorates his services in the cause of liberty. Mr. Custis felt that in view of the warm enthusiasm your efforts in that same cause have awakened in the North, it might well stand as an expression of his countrymen’s sentiments toward you. And this”—he lifted out a smaller gold locket—“you will perhaps cherish as a more personal souvenir. It contains a lock of the great Washington’s own hair, together with a miniature portrait.”

Bolívar examined the handsome medal with interest, and laid it back in the case. Then, with hands that trembled a little, he accepted the small locket.

It opened at the touch of his finger on the spring. One side held a lock of brown hair touched with gray. From the other looked out the sternly noble face of the first American president.

“This—I had not expected this.” Don Simón’s rich voice faltered. “General Lafayette wrote that he was sending me certain keepsakes, but I did not dream of anything so precious, so truly sacred. I—you must give me time to compose myself, Monsieur. At the moment I have no words to express my feelings.”

“Your emotions do you honor, excellent sir,” the visitor answered. “Will you note the inscription on the outside of the locket? Mr. Custis had it engraved expressly for you.”

The general closed the locket and turned it over. The finely chased lines in flourishing script swam before his eyes. With an apologetic laugh he beckoned to the hovering O’Leary.

“My Daniel, I find my sight is somewhat clouded. In any event, your Latin is better than mine, for do you not claim to have studied for the priesthood? Render these lines into Spanish for me, if you will.”

The young Irishman’s handsome head bent low over the jewel. “Auctoris Libertatis...” he read slowly. His lips moved; his fine black brows drew together.

“I have it!” he cried triumphantly. “Listen, my general. Thus it runs: ‘This portrait of the Liberator of America in the North is presented by his adopted son to him who achieved similar glory in the South.’ A fine compliment, my general, but one well merited.”

“And such is my own sentiment,” the Frenchman observed. “I am happy to have been the means of conveying it to His Excellency.”

“The happiness with which I receive it is beyond any words of mine to express,” Simón Bolívar said earnestly. “I shall write a letter for you to take back to the Marquis de Lafayette, Monsieur, but written words are poor things. I beg of you, tell him yourself how deeply his kindness and that of Mr. Custis moved me. Tell him, with all your eloquence, that never while I live shall I cease trying to merit this signal honor.”

O’Leary, detailed to show M. Mercier to his chamber, returned to find Don Simón musing over the velvet case. He touched his chief on the arm.

“Gúzman, my general,” he reminded him. “You have not forgotten how touchy he is? He will assuredly take offense if he is longer kept waiting.”

Bolívar shrugged. “When I found Gúzman a corporal and made him a general, I did not improve his manners. Indeed I think his gain in rank has scarcely outrun his gain in self-sufficiency. However! I will see him. Send him in.”

The man whom O’Leary now ushered into the room was very different from the last visitor. Swarthy, heavy-shouldered, his uniform stained with soup and wine, he slouched through the door and saluted.

Don Simón, with the fine courtesy which never failed him, greeted him cordially and apologized for the delay. With a grunt Gúzman sank into the chair O’Leary pulled forward.

“I understand that you are newly come from Caracas,” the Liberator said. “I trust that all goes well there?”

“As well as could be expected,” Gúzman answered grumpily. “We are constantly harassed by ridiculous orders from Bogotá. ‘The constitution requires that you do thus and so without delay,’ they write to General Páez. Never do they stop to think that he is dealing with human beings, not with cattle. The constitution, they say, allows of no excuses, no exceptions. How is General Páez to make our people understand such a thing? It is a trying task, that one.”

“But one to which I am sure our good Páez devotes himself with all his powers,” Bolívar answered patiently. “Do I understand that you bring me a message from him?”

“Yes, Your Excellency. I have here a letter—” He fumbled in the pocket of his tunic and brought forth a folded document.

As the Liberator read it the fine lines across his forehead deepened. He looked up to ask abruptly, “You know the contents of this letter, Gúzman?”

“Excellency, yes. With permission, I would say that General Páez has expressed the sentiments of all of us. This republican business, with its tiresome constitution—” He dropped his thin pretense of gentility and spoke like the peasant he was. “A republic! What is it? A fancy French idea! What our people need over them is a king. A good strong king, who will rule with a royal hand. That they can understand. But a republic—bah!”

“Our people had a king, Gúzman,” Bolívar reminded him quietly. “A Spanish one. And no one fought more fiercely than yourself to shake off the grip of his ‘royal hand.’”

Gúzman shrugged his thick shoulders impatiently. “That! We are Americans; why should we submit to a Spanish king? But an American king, that is what we need! An emperor, even, for an emperor is finer than a king. See, General Páez has written in his letter, ‘Emperor of the Andes.’ Where can one find so splendid a title? The great Bonaparte himself had not a better!”

Daniel O’Leary spoke up, his Irish eyes gleaming with mischief.

“There would be titles for the emperor’s followers too, eh, General? Chosen for battles won, in the European manner. Let me see, now. General Páez should undoubtedly be Duke of Queseras del Medio—a beautiful title, to be sure. And you, Milord Gúzman, have you yet chosen one for yourself? It would be difficult to choose among your many exploits.”

The irony passed unnoticed by the beetle-browed general. He smiled wolfishly. “There are one or two little engagements which might perhaps be commemorated, Colonel O’Leary. But I should not presume to ask for myself a dukedom. I should be quite content to be called a marquis. Providing, of course, that a suitable estate accompanied the grant of title.”

The Liberator, who had resumed his perusal of the letter, dashed it violently on to the table.

“Enough of this foolishness!” he exclaimed. Then, with an effort, he regained his customary composure.

“General Gúzman, you are weary from your long journey. I pray that you will repose yourself until the hour of dinner, when you will be my guest. In the meantime, I shall prepare a suitable reply to this letter. Go, my friend.”

When O’Leary returned from showing the visitor out he found the Liberator slumped in an attitude of dejection. The aide quietly drew up a chair opposite him. For a long time neither spoke. Then Bolívar broke the silence.

‘These people!” he said bitterly. “I have frozen and burned, I have marched and starved, I have offered my life and fortune to give them liberty. Now it is theirs, and what do they ask? A king, an emperor! Why, it is as though they held out their hands and begged again for the shackles I have stricken from them!”

O’Leary shook his head. “My general, you know your countrymen better than that. They are bewildered with their new state, that is all. Freedom is a strange element in which they scarcely know how to comport themselves. All their hopes are in you, and they are terrified lest your guiding hand be withdrawn. With you as their king they would feel safe.”

“You do them too much honor, Daniel. It is not safety they crave, but the silly mummery of royalty. A court, with all its gilded trappings. Titles, estates—oh, the thought of their folly sickens me!”

“My general, let me speak.” The young Irishman leaned forward earnestly. “This is not the first time that this matter has been broached. Even here in Peru, various influential persons have asked me, why does not the Liberator proclaim himself king? Your sister, Doña María Antonia, has written you that the same question is being asked in Caracas.”

“I know that. If this folly originated with Páez, I should think nothing of it. His grace the duke—ah, yes, it would please him well!”

“General Páez is as simplehearted as a child; he means no harm. No doubt a dukedom would make him happy, as a toy delights a child. But he is not like Gúzman, who unquestionably is greedy for a patent of nobility and the wealth that goes with it. Páez is not speaking for men like Gúzman, my general. He is only echoing the cry which rises from the hearts of the people themselves, who have no such dreams.”

“Yes, the people! My people, who reject the freedom I have won for them!”

“My general, if you will but listen to me! They do not reject their freedom. Rather, they seek to assure its continuance in the only way they know: by making sure that you, who gave it to them, will remain in control of their destinies.”

Don Simón’s sad eyes lightened. He laid an affectionate hand on the young man’s arm.

“Your words are comforting, my Daniel. If only I could accept them!”

“You must accept them, my general, for they are true words. And you must not be angry with me if I urge you to consider this plea. After all, Caesar made himself emperor, and—”

“—and Napoleon, and Iturbide of Mexico did likewise!” Bolívar interrupted. “Páez mentions those names in his letter, supplied, no doubt, by his British secretary. It is a very persuasive letter, urging me to follow in those illustrious footsteps.”

O’Leary hesitated. “You would not consider it, my general? There are advantages to the plan.”

“Perhaps. It would be far simpler to rule from an autocratic throne than to attempt to administer a liberal constitution. But the very idea is hateful to me, O’Leary! For what have we fought, and struggled, and sacrificed all these years, if we are but to replace one tyrant by another? Ah, I know what you would say. You think that I would be a ‘good tyrant,’ perhaps? O’Leary, no such thing exists, for tyranny is never good! As a temporary expedient, when the common good demanded it, I have not hesitated to take to myself the powers of a dictator. At no time have I relished such an assumption of power, and I have ever been quick, when the danger has passed, to return it to the people. You know this to be true, my Daniel.”

O’Leary sighed. “It will be difficult to make such exalted ideas clear to General Gúzman, who wishes to be a marquis. And still more difficult with the honest men, like Páez, who ask only to follow their trusted leader.”

“Difficult, yes, but surely not impossible. Hark you, O’Leary. Not an hour has passed since, in this very room, I received the priceless relics of George Washington. Was not he the trusted leader of his people? And did he not, when liberty was won, set their feet on the path of democratic government? I have heard that men urged a crown upon him also. Did he accept it? You know well that he did not, and that his countrymen have come to honor his memory for that refusal.”

He reached out to touch the velvet box lying on the table. O’Leary was silent, and Bolívar seemed to have forgotten him, to be merely thinking aloud.

“In my boyhood,” he went on, “I had two great heroes, George Washington and Napoleon Bonaparte. Then, on my visit to Paris as a student, I learned that Bonaparte was about to crown himself emperor. My cousin urged me to attend the brilliant ceremonies, but I shut myself away in my lodgings, sick at heart. My idol had proven himself to have feet of clay. All his subsequent career of vainglorious self-seeking but confirmed my youthful judgment. And Páez urges that I should take that man for my exemplar!”

“Yet Bonaparte was a great soldier,” O’Leary ventured.

“A great soldier, yes!” Don Simón’s eyes flashed. “So, also, was General Washington. But he, my friend, was in addition a great patriot, as Bonaparte was not! The Frenchman put personal glory above all else, but George Washington chose the nobler course. You know your history books, Daniel. What was the noble Washington’s answer to the plea that he should set up the trappings of a throne in America?”

O’Leary smiled. “You marshal your arguments well, my general. Washington refused on the grounds that America was a new and better country than Europe, and deserved a new and better form of government.”

“And that is my own contention!” Bolívar said firmly. “No, O’Leary, my mind is made up. So long as my people need me I will never desert them. But no more than Washington will I fasten the burden of a throne upon them. They are free, and they must remain so. We want no emperors in this brave new land of America. Ours is a nobler destiny!”

XXIX

Free Flags Flying

And now, in Lima, the tide of Bolívar’s glory is in full flood. The vow which he swore upon Mount Aventine has been fulfilled, he has not permitted his arm to rest nor his soul to repose, and he has broken the chains which bound his people. Venezuela, New Granada, and Quito fly the free flag of Gran Colombia; the new banners of Peru and Bolivia float beside them. He is “Presidente Libertador” of Colombia and Peru, “Father and Founder” of Bolivia.

There have been more resounding titles in Spanish America, of course; the viceroy La Serna had one. But Bolívar’s titles were neither conferred by the king nor snatched by force. They were given him freely by duly elected Congresses of free men. For that reason, and that one alone, they were precious to him.

As in the past one disaster had crowded close upon the heels of another, now it seemed that the only news which came in was good news closely followed by better. The gift of the Washington locket, followed by the long and friendly correspondence with Lafayette, was only one example.

Laudatory letters came from rulers all over the world; even the emperor of Russia sent a gift of magnificent sables. Bernadotte, king of Sweden, wrote a flattering letter; the English poet Byron named his boat the “Bolívar” to express his admiration. Emissaries of European governments, official and otherwise, began to arrive at Lima. Society there took on an international color and a brilliance which made the former pomp of the Spanish period seem very commonplace.

At about this time Bolívar was delighted to receive a letter from his old tutor, Simón Rodríguez. The eccentric scholar, after years of wandering about Europe, had turned up in Bogotá.

His former pupil sent for him at once, entertaining him in his own house. Rodríguez was very old now. His once brilliant mind, never very well balanced, was definitely failing. He insisted, however, that he must help to initiate the new system of public schools. Bolívar sent him to Sucre in Bolivia, with instructions to give him a free hand. The results were both laughable and pitiful.

The old gentleman was still an enthusiastic disciple of Rousseau, who advocated among other things a return to the simplicities of nature. In an effort to impress these teachings upon the little Bolivians, Dr. Rodríguez removed his clothing before addressing his classes and counseled his students to do likewise.

When the youngsters reported this novel educational method at home, the horrified mothers descended in a body upon the presidential palace. Sucre, after vain efforts to prevail upon the old man to modify his views, was obliged to dismiss him with a pension. In a way the incident was a boon to education in Bolivia, because when school reopened under a more conventional master the mothers attended also, and absorbed their own A B C’s while making sure that their little ones were preserved from corruption.

This period at Lima, which preceded the final victory at Ayacucho and lasted nearly two years, was undoubtedly the most pleasant and peaceful of the Liberator’s life. After the long strain of campaigning in mountain and jungle and camp, he could live again as a civilized man lives. For the first time in fifteen years he could he sure of a daily bath, of a comfortable bed, of fresh linen and decent cooking. He could listen to good music, he could enjoy the conversation of cultured and witty minds, he could dance and be gay.

No man had a keener appreciation of the good things of life than Simón Bolívar. There was no reason why he should have been without them for fifteen years, or for fifteen minutes. Or only one reason: that he loved freedom more.

Out of the accounts of this idyllic aftermath following upon the grim days of war, the biographer Lemley has plucked a bud of wistful romance which never came to flower.

The heroine was the sister-in-law of an American naval commander whose gunboat paid a courtesy visit to Peru. A “Miss Hart”—we have no other name. She was gentle and sweet, and in coloring not unlike the long-dead Doña María Teresa to whose memory Simón Bolívar had vowed eternal fidelity. Miss Hart was engaged to a young merchant in her native Boston. With her sister and brother-in-law she was a guest at Villa Magdalena, and the Liberator “distinguished her with marked attentions.” After a few days the gunboat sailed away, never to return.

That is the end of the story, or almost the end. For on her return to Boston Miss Hart broke her engagement without explanation. She withdrew from society and lived a retired spinster life for many years. When she died they opened a locket which she wore always next her heart, and found there a miniature portrait of Simón Bolívar.

The visit of the American gunboat was an indication of awakening interest on the part of North America. It was followed by the most important event of this period, the formal recognition of Colombian independence by the United States in 1822.

As early as 1819 Henry Clay had proposed in the House of Representatives that Colombia be recognized as a free country, “worthy for many reasons to stand side by side with the most illustrious peoples of the world.” Daniel Webster, who seldom agreed with Clay, seconded him warmly in this.

No action was taken on the proposal, but it is undoubtedly true that a great deal of sympathetic interest did exist in the northern republic. Martin Van Buren had spoken admiringly of Bolívar, while counseling for reasons of prudence that the United States refrain from taking any part in the struggle below the equator.

Thus it was that, aside from some private sources, the South American republics received no practical help from the United States. They did get both men and money from Britain, however.

The British aid did not come officially from the British government. But money and volunteers were forthcoming far more generously from Britain than from the United States, and for a very good reason. The people there were kept much better informed than were the people of the United States. López Méndez remained in London throughout the war, ceaselessly devoting his very great talents to winning friends for his cause.

The occasional envoys who were sent to North America were neither so capable nor so persistent. Bolívar himself felt a closer kinship to the British, and his ideal constitution, with its lifetime president and hereditary senate corresponding to the House of Lords, shows the strong English influence on his thinking.

Nevertheless, by the vote of our Congress we became the first great power to recognize the new republics. And out of that recognition, with its resultant exchange of diplomatic representatives, grew something which was important to both North and South America at the time, which has grown more important with the years, and which in our own day is proving a force which may shape the world for all of us.

In the simplest possible terms, Bolívar was able to convince President Monroe that the South American republics were strong enough to stand on their own feet and maintain a stable government. It was on the basis of that conviction that the American president laid down his famous Monroe Doctrine.

There were many and varied reasons for this history-making declaration. The strongest of them concerned the new republics only indirectly, as possible pawns in the never-ending game of European power politics. It is not pretended that Monroe’s chief consideration was any other than the welfare of the United States. But if he had believed the South Americans to be a weak and cowardly lot who would easily surrender their new liberty to any European aggressor, he would hardly have pledged himself to protect them.

Before taking his historic step President Monroe consulted with Jefferson and with Madison, finding them in complete accord. And then of course there was Henry Clay, who never lost an opportunity to put in a word for the South Americans. For ten years, in Congress and out of it, Clay had agitated for a warmer attitude toward the men who were fighting to realize ideals so truly our own. His speeches had been translated into Spanish, and by Bolívar’s orders were frequently read to the Colombian troops.

The effect of the Doctrine in its own day was to dash the aspirations of the unholy Holy Alliance, which consisted of Austria, Russia, and Prussia. Singly and together they were turning covetous eyes upon the rich territory so lately the property of Spain.

Monroe was quick to see in this attitude a threat to democracy in the Western Hemisphere. Backed by the warm approval of Britain, he met it squarely with his historic declaration. The danger passed. The Holy Alliance turned its attention elsewhere, eventually falling to pieces, as such alliances do. Except for France’s attempt in Mexico with the ill-fated Maximilian, no European powers have—at this writing!—“extended their system to any portion of this hemisphere.”

What the future may hold no man can say. But from 1823 until this present moment the Monroe Doctrine has stood like a wall between American independence and European aggression. That it was built so well and stands so firmly is a tribute to the genius, not alone of James Monroe, but also of Simón Bolívar.

XXX

The Gentleman from Kentucky

The study at Villa Magdalena, near Lima, was quiet except for the scratch of Bolívar’s pen. From the open windows behind him the sweet scent of an orchard in bloom drifted in on puffs of sun-warmed breeze. Sunlight pierced to the far corners of the wide low room, picking out gold threads in the tapestry hangings, gilding the red leather and dark carved wood of the high-backed Spanish chairs.

Don Simón signed the last letter and looked up as O’Leary clicked his heels in the doorway. “Yes, Daniel?”

“Don Pedro Gual has just arrived from Bogotá, my general. He bids me tell you to prepare for a happy surprise. He brings an unexpected guest with him.”

“A guest?” Bolívar’s fine eyebrows arched. “I do not know that the time is auspicious for entertaining guests, Daniel. Gual’s stay here will be a hurried one at best, for he must not miss the opening of the Congress at Panamá on June twenty-second. I sent for him especially to talk over the agenda of the Congress, and I had hoped to devote every moment to that purpose. This guest—”

With the familiarity of long friendship the aide-de-camp interrupted him.

“The guest will not interfere, my general. He is Mr. Richard Clough Anderson, envoy plenipotentiary from the United States. In all probability he will be their delegate to the Congress of Panamá.”

“So? President Adams has decided, then, to accept our invitation? Well, although at first I opposed it, we may find that we were wise in soliciting the presence of our powerful neighbor. The gentlemen are already at the villa, Daniel? Then let us not keep them waiting. Quick, lad, show them in.”

Few of the ardent young men who had shared Bolívar’s youthful dream of freedom now remained to see its fruition. Don Pedro Gual was one of the few. He had been a member of that fiery “Society of Patriots” which pressed for the first Declaration of Independence in 1811; he had served also as General Miranda’s secretary.

When the earthquake of 1812 dispersed the revolutionists for the time, Gual escaped to the United States and settled down in the city of Washington. He was admitted to the bar there, and had begun the practice of law when Bolívar summoned him to the renewal of the struggle in 1816. A profound scholar, he had aided greatly in the drafting of laws for the new governments. At the present time he was the Colombian minister for foreign affairs.

The two men ushered in by O’Leary were in civilian clothes. Dr. Gual, short and stout, was rosy-faced and bustling. His companion was a lean, lantern-jawed Kentuckian, his skin showing the unhealthy yellowish tint which often afflicts white men new to the tropics.

“Simón, friend of my heart!” Don Pedro advanced with open arms. The Liberator returned the embrace as warmly, and then waited courteously while Gual presented his guest.

“This is indeed a pleasure, Señor Anderson,” he said. “I have long regretted that the press of affairs, keeping me here in Lima, has prevented my greeting in person the representative of the United States of North America. I trust that you find Bogotá a residence to your liking?”

“Bogotá is a very pleasant city, and its people are most kind,” the Kentuckian answered in careful, accurate Spanish. “I am honored to greet Your Excellency.”

“Unfortunately, Señor Anderson has not found our climate as kind as our people,” Dr. Gual explained. “He suffers from an affliction of the digestive organs brought about, no doubt, by the change of food and water.”

“That is a matter for regret.” Bolívar’s keen eyes noted the lines of pain etched on the face before him. “I earnestly hope that the malady may soon pass. But tell me, sir, is it true that you are to accompany Don Pedro to the All-American Congress as a delegate from your country? That is good hearing!”

“And so it was to me, Your Excellency. My good friend Don Pedro will tell you of my deep interest in the Congress, which we have discussed many times. I knew that he planned to come to Lima for a final conference with Your Excellency before embarking for Panamá. Therefore, when a confidential letter informed me that my commission as delegate would soon arrive, he was kind enough to invite me to accompany him. I shall not of course intrude upon your confidential discussions, but—”

“There is nothing to be discussed between us which need be concealed from you, Señor,” Bolívar replied. “I am only too happy to know that we may have the advantage of your opinions upon matters which, after all, concern your country as much as ours.

“And now, gentlemen, if you are ready, let us lose no time. O’Leary, you have the notes which I dictated last night?”

“They are here, my general.” The Irishman laid a sheaf of papers upon the flat desk behind which Bolívar sat. He drew up chairs for the two visitors and one for himself, and pulled the inkwell toward him.

“You both know well the purposes which prompted me to call the Congress,” the Liberator began. “It has been evident to me from the beginning that America has freed herself from Europe to no avail if she is to allow herself to fall into those errors which have made of the continent of Europe a bloody battleground for centuries. Jealousy, covetousness, the lust for power have led the greater states to oppress the weaker, and have set those great states in turn at each other’s throats. These evils should not and shall not be permitted to root themselves in the soil of our clean new Western world.”

The Kentuckian nodded. “Mr. Clay has frequently expressed the same sentiments, sir. He is heartily in sympathy with your plan for avoiding the growth of those evils by fostering a spirit of concord and good will among all the nations of the hemisphere. This conference of your calling, Mr. Clay feels, with its frank and open discussion of many problems, is an inspired first step toward that end.”

“I am deeply grateful for Mr. Clay’s commendation. As you know, I addressed my call to every nation of the Western world. Pedro, the burden of the correspondence has fallen upon you. Exactly what has been the response to this date?”

“It has been most gratifying,” Dr. Gual answered. “Only one refusal has reached us, that of Argentina. Chile, while I fear sharing her sister republic’s attitude of distrust, has nevertheless promised to lay the matter before her Congress. It is to be hoped that they will take favorable action. The Brazilian Empire of Dom Pedro has agreed to participate. Acceptances have been received also from Mexico and Guatemala. Peru and Bolivia will send their own delegates, independently of Colombia. The prospect is most heartening for a thoroughly satisfactory meeting. But, Simón, you promised me an outline of the most important points to be covered.”

“And here it is.” Bolívar picked up a paper in O’Leary’s copperplate handwriting. “Naturally I do not seek to impress my will upon a free assembly. But it seems to me essential that the Congress should effect a treaty of union, alliance, and confederation between the American nations. Such a treaty, to my thinking, would be useless unless it embodied in some form the following provisions.” He began to read from the paper before him.

“None of the signatory nations shall declare war or order reprisals against an aggressor nation without having first taken the case to the General Assembly, whose decision shall be binding.

“The General Assembly shall act as adviser in major conflicts, as a means of liaison in common dangers, as a faithful interpreter of public treaties if difficulties shall arise, and as arbitrator, conciliator, and judge in disputes and differences.

“Any member of the alliance not conforming to the decisions of the arbitrator shall be expelled.”

“Well put, Simón,” Dr. Gual beamed. “We have discussed these points many times, but I had despaired of reducing them to a few simple words as you have done. It should not be difficult for the dullest envoy to grasp their meaning.”

“Your pardon, Don Pedro,” the Kentuckian interrupted. “Perhaps I am that dullest envoy, for although I find the words simple enough, the idea they convey is stupefying. Do I understand that the nations are to renounce their right to make war for the settlement of grievances? Surely they will never consent to that?”

“Why not?” Dr. Gual took up the challenge. “The savage knows no law but that of combat. The civilized man renounces his right to personal vengeance and submits his case to a court of justice. Why should nations follow the example of savages rather than of civilized men? In a controversy between states, as between individuals, there is always a question of right and wrong. An impartial tribunal, unblinded by passion or prejudice, can be trusted to decide that question fairly as between man and man. This is the principle upon which our courts of justice are founded. What is to prevent the extension of that principle to quarrels between nation and nation?”

“But it has never been done!” Anderson protested. “War is the tribunal which decides the questions of nations. There has never been any other. No nation would accept any other!”

“Are you so sure, Señor Anderson?” It was Bolívar’s quiet voice. “Think well. The proposal is not that the disputants submit their quarrel to the judgment of one man, as in civil life is the custom with petty offenders.

“This is rather a matter of trial by jury. A jury of one’s peers, since an Assembly of all the allied nations would sit upon the case. Your country, Señor Anderson, is heir to the Anglo-Saxon tradition whose greatest gift to the world was the right of trial by jury. Is it preposterous to believe that your countrymen could be brought to approve the extension of that right to nations?”

Anderson considered the matter. “In our country,” he said thoughtfully, “we are proud of the fact that the poor man can obtain from the courts the same evenhanded justice that is meted out to the rich and powerful. Under this plan of yours, would it be the case that a small and poverty-stricken country, ill prepared for war, might hope to stand on an equal footing with its rich and powerful neighbor?”

“Upon an absolutely equal footing,” Bolívar answered firmly. “The justice of the cause would be the only consideration. A nation which preferred to direct its wealth and energy toward the arts of peace rather than of war would incur no danger by so doing. Possession of weapons would avail its antagonist no more before the Assembly than they avail the individual in any honest court of law. For all practical purposes, the General Assembly of the allied nations would constitute a court. A court of the Western world.”

“A World Court! But Your Excellency, this is—it is sensational! Why, it would outlaw war!”

“Such is my hope.” Bolívar’s voice shook with earnestness. “Look you, Señor. I am a soldier. All the years of my manhood have been given to war. Yet never have I regarded it as anything but the most sorrowful necessity.

“Now, happily, that necessity no longer exists. We have cast out our tyrants. We are free men here. Differences amongst us will certainly arise, since we are men, not angels. But neither are we beasts. Why should we not unite ourselves into this brotherhood of free nations, agreeing to compose our differences by reason instead of by force?”

“Unite ourselves, sir?” There was a note of doubt in the Kentuckian’s voice. “I do not know how far my country would be prepared to go—”

“I am proposing no such thing as the European system of alliances,” Bolívar explained patiently. “Those states unite for war. Ours must be a union for peace. Neither am I suggesting that any American nation should sacrifice a single sovereign right. Within its own borders each state would be supreme. But through such a union as I propose it would be possible for all to work together harmoniously. Not only should we work to eliminate the specter of war, but we should be able to solve those vexing problems which hamper the welfare of us all.”

“I am not sure that I take your meaning there, sir,” Anderson said. “Could you give me a specific example?”

“Willingly.” Bolívar’s smile was somewhat grim. “There is the matter of piracy. The freebooters who harass our coast would find their position difficult if the harbor of New Orleans were closed to them.”

Anderson flushed. “I assure Your Excellency that my government is as concerned to suppress piracy as is your own.”

“I have no doubt of that,” Bolívar answered quickly. “The task is a difficult one under present conditions. But with your government and the Caribbean countries acting in full knowledge and accord, we could soon drive these scoundrels from our waters. This is merely one example, Señor. I could give you many others. Trade between our two continents is certain to increase; it is vital that it should be carried on in an honorable and amicable manner. Throughout all history a vast proportion of the discords leading to war have had their roots in commercial quarrels. We should rid ourselves of that danger.”

“And do not forget to tell Señor Anderson, Simón, that there is a constructive side to your plans,” Dr. Gual put in. “I think the Panamá Canal project will be of interest to him.”

Bolívar laughed. “That project, unfortunately, is a dream which must wait upon the future. But since Pedro has mentioned it, Señor Anderson, I will not deny that it is a dream very dear to my heart. A cutting across the Isthmus of Panamá, does that not inflame your imagination?”

“It does indeed, sir. The matter has been discussed in my own country, where its advantages would be immeasurable. If our shipmasters could be spared that long perilous journey around the Horn, our Pacific trade would greatly benefit. But I had understood that engineers pronounce the idea an impracticable one.”

“So I have been told also, but I am not convinced. I have here—” He shuffled the papers on his desk. “Ah, yes, here it is. This is a brief sketch of a survey of the Isthmus made by two engineers, Maurice Falmarc and John A. Lloyd, who concluded from their preliminary observations that such a canal could be constructed. In the near future I propose to ask the Colombian Congress to commission these gentlemen to make a thorough survey, and to provide us with plans and estimates. The undertaking would be a costly one, and should properly be handled by all the American nations which would benefit by it. I hope—but Señor Anderson, what is it? You are ill?”

The visitor had fallen back in his chair, his face drained of color, his hand pressing his side. He waved away the glass which O’Leary hastened to offer him.

“It is nothing,” he gasped in a moment. “Only an old pain, to which I should be well accustomed. It is passing now. I am sorry, Your Excellency. You were saying?...”

“I have said enough for one day, Señor. I blame myself for having held you so long in talk when you are indisposed. O’Leary will show you to your room, and I will have one of our army surgeons wait upon you at once.”

“Your Excellency is too kind. The talk has not harmed me. Indeed, under the inspiration of your words I have quite forgotten my infirmities.

“I am a plain man, Excellency, it is difficult to express my feelings. But I would have you know that you have shown me a vision of brotherhood, of neighborly working together which touches my very soul. Be assured that when the Assembly meets I shall raise my poor voice in earnest advocacy of the noble purpose for which you have convened it.”

As he left the room, leaning heavily on O’Leary’s arm, Bolívar shook his head. “A splendid gentleman, Pedro, whom it is an honor to know. But, I fear also, a very sick man.”

“Oh, you exaggerate, Simón. Señor Anderson is subject to these attacks of indigestion. They pass quickly. However, my old friend, since you are summoning a surgeon for him, will you not favor me by asking him to examine you as well?”

“I? But what do you mean, Pedro? I am not ill.”

Gual’s round face grew sober. “It is two years since I saw you last, Simón. I take the liberty of a friend to tell you that I was shocked at your appearance. You have lost weight, and no man of forty-three should have those sunken cheeks and that deeply furrowed brow. You are overdriving yourself, compadre. I am worried for you.”

“Nonsense, Pedro!” Bolívar threw a careless arm about his friend’s shoulders as he drew him toward the door. “I have been thin since my illness in Pativilca. It means nothing. Tell me, do you think Señor Anderson was favorably impressed? And will his word carry weight with his government?”

“As to the latter, I cannot say, except that I know both President Adams and Mr. Clay place confidence in him. That he was favorably impressed can hardly be questioned, in view of his last words. I think you have won a powerful ally there, Simón.”

“Please heaven! This Congress must not fail, Pedro. For fifteen years I have had but one purpose, to free America from the Spanish yoke. With that purpose accomplished, all the hopes of my being concentrate themselves upon a further aim, one which in all humility I dare to call sublime.

“A united America, Pedro, owing neither fear nor favor to old Europe, strong in her own strength, righteous in her own right! Think of it, man! A brave new world where injustice and oppression, slavery and war become empty words, the forgotten shadows of an outworn past! Think—” He broke off with an apologetic laugh. “Your pardon, Pedro. For the moment I was carried away. I did not intend to make you an oration. No one knows better than yourself how I feel upon this subject.”

“And no one knows better than you how heartily I am in accord, Simón. You must be patient, however, and not expect too much of this first Assembly. Remember, it is only a beginning. Such results as you envisage are not accomplished overnight.”

“Good old Pedro, always the practical man!” Bolívar laughed. “What should I do without you to keep my feet on the ground? Do not fear, I shall have patience. My only concern is that at Panamá the seed shall be well and truly planted. Then let its growth be quick or slow, let the flowering come in our time or after, it matters not. What though it take ten years, a hundred years, a hundred centuries? Some day, my Pedro, the little seed we plant at Panamá shall grow into a great tree of brotherly love, and all the peoples of the Americas shall take comfort in its shade.”

XXXI

The Path Leads Downward

Bolívar had chosen his friend Gual to represent him at the important Panamá Conference because it seemed impossible for him to go in person. The fatal weakness of his new ship of state was beginning to show itself. Simón Bolívar was only one man; he could not be everywhere at once.

Where he himself could be upon the scene, things went well; where he could not, they went badly. During his long stay in Lima things there went very well indeed; there were peace and order and a constructive beginning of a better life for all free men. This was gratifying, for Lima was an important capital. But there were other capitals too, equally important. And it had been six years since the Liberator left Caracas; five since he last saw Bogotá.

Caracas and Lima are farther apart than New York and Denver. In 1826 no telegraph, radio, telephone, railroad, or even pony express existed to make communication easy between the two capitals. There was no regular mail service. A messenger from Caracas must travel overland by pack train across the Andes to Buenaventura on the Colombian coast, then by sailing vessel south to Callao, the port for Lima. The roundabout route made the distance to be covered about 2,800 miles, and often took many months.

News from Bogotá followed the latter half of the same route, overland to Buenaventura and thence by sea.

It is not strange that little real information reached Bolívar as to the course of events in Caracas and Bogotá. Disquieting rumors there had been, but the Liberator, his hands full with affairs in Bolivia and Peru, had paid little heed.

Vice-President Santander, at Bogotá, was head of the union of Venezuela and New Granada they called Colombia. However, for convenience of administration, Venezuela had been divided into three military districts. The important one containing Caracas was presided over by General Páez. In Bolívar’s absence a bitter quarrel was developing between these two men.

At this late date it is impossible to estimate the merits of that quarrel. The two generals resembled each other only in that both had shown skill and courage in battle, and had performed important parts in the liberation of their country. In every other respect they differed as much as any two men could very well do.

Francisco de Santander was a gentleman and a scholar, learned in the law, intellectually arrogant, accustomed to doing the thinking for his subordinates. Páez the Centaur, the easygoing cowboy leader who was “Uncle” to his men, had yet a sturdy native independence which resented domination. Santander’s authority, based in faraway Bogotá, sat lightly upon him. He governed his section of Venezuela to suit himself, disregarding Santander’s instructions when he disapproved of them.

The Colombian Congress, on Santander’s complaint, suspended him from command. Páez, supported by his army, refused to accept the suspension.

This was the situation in September, 1826, when Bolívar received communications from both Santander and Páez, each denouncing the other and urging the Liberator to take action.

Bolívar left Lima and hurried north to settle these difficulties. He was never to return to the city where he had known an interval of peace and tranquility. He was never to know such an interval again in any city. In Lima he had reached a pinnacle of glory beyond the hopes of ordinary men. The long, steep ascent was over; over, too, the brief period of rest on the summit. The way now lay downward, through lengthening shadows. As the Uruguayan historian Rodó puts it, “Whatever remains of that life is sorrow.”

The Liberator lingered in Bogotá only long enough to hear Santander’s version of Páez’ insubordination.

There were other things to be heard there, to which in the press of graver matters he was obliged to close his ears. The union of New Granada with Venezuela was losing popularity in Bogotá. In the old Spanish days there had been no love lost between the provinces; New Granadans had long had a saying, “as tricky as a Venezuelan.” The Venezuelans, on their part, considered the Granadans highhanded and arrogant.

Bolívar had labored earnestly to erase these sectional differences, founded on nothing but ignorance and prejudice. While war raged they were magnificently ignored, but they were not dead. Now they were cropping up again, on both sides of the border.

This spirit of nationalism was strong in Páez and Santander. It lay at the root of their differences with each other, and in days now quickly to come it was to divide both of them from the commander whom both had served so faithfully.

Bolívar himself had no vestige of it. Venezuelan-born, he thought and spoke of himself as a “Colombian,” a citizen of that threefold republic of his own creation. Or as an “American,” having in mind that he was also, by congressional decree, a citizen of Bolivia and of Peru.

That Páez should be an advocate of “Venezuela for Venezuelans” is not strange, considering his lack of education and limited background. It is more remarkable that Santander, the traveled intellectual, should take the same narrow view with regard to his own province.

That he did take it, Bolívar had long known. Many a campfire had been enlivened by vigorous argument on the subject. However, Santander had put aside his own opinions and worked loyally for the establishment of the union. Its interests had seemed entirely safe in his hands.

They had been safe in the beginning. But now, with Bolívar’s presence removed, engaged in a heartbreaking struggle to restore prosperity after a devastating war, Santander found himself listening to his fellow countrymen who were quick to blame everything that went wrong on “those rascally Venezuelans.”

There was plenty of reason for blame. Venezuela was finding it hard, after more than a decade of war, to settle down to the less exciting occupations of peace. Caracas was full of soldiers who had saved their country and felt that she owed them a living.

They swaggered about the city, drinking a little, gambling a little, adding to the color of the streets and doing no particular harm. But out in the country districts the plantations stood idle, their trampled fields choked with weeds. Roads and bridges, destroyed in war, cried out for rebuilding. Hard, sweaty, inglorious work was needed to put Venezuela on her feet. And Páez, the picturesque, hard-riding, hard-fighting llanero, was the last man to realize this or to do anything about it.

Santander, on the other hand, had set about at once to get New Granada back to everyday life. Crops were planted, roads were mended, trade was encouraged. To the industrious Granadans, paying their taxes and soberly supporting their government, it seemed that they were carrying on their backs the improvident, pleasure-loving Venezuelans.

No wonder their ancient prejudice revived with new strength. No wonder they asked themselves, “Why? Why must we stagger under this burden? Why can’t we cast it off and devote ourselves to the rebuilding of our own precious New Granada? What do we want of this union anyway?”

Páez arranged the welcome to Bolívar at Caracas, and he did a magnificent job of it. Arches of palms and willows, festooned with ribbons of the national colors and crowned with flags, were set up in the streets. Páez himself read the address of welcome, although some are unkind enough to say that he employed a brain trust made up of one poet, one lawyer, and a horse auctioneer to compose it. It ran to some twenty manuscript pages, and here is the opening salutation: “Hail thou Liberator! Hail, First Born of Fortune, Creator of the Three Republics, Genius of War and Peace! Hail, thou who from the Temple of the Sun hath come armed with an Olive Branch, to restore Life to the Father-land!”

General Santander, back in Bogotá, was supposed to be something of a master of rhetoric. It would seem that Páez rather gave him something to shoot at here.

There was a Te Deum at the cathedral, and then the presentation of two crowns of laurel by fifteen maidens representing the civil and military virtues. One crown was for Bolívar’s military triumphs, and one for his accomplishments in peace. With unsuspected irony he presented the second crown to Páez, who accepted it delightedly.

After the ambigú, the state banquet tendered by the municipality, Bolívar was escorted to his own house, that Casa Bolívar in which he was born. Here his sisters waited, and their children, and old Hipólita, the black “mammy” of his baby days.

Of them all, only Juana had seen the Liberator in the past five years. She had returned to Caracas from Angostura when the patriot forces began their march over the mountains, but when her brother established himself at Bogotá she followed him there. Later she went to Lima, leaving in tears because of real or fancied snubs by some of the Royalist ladies. It seems sad that María Antonia, the sister Bolívar most truly loved, should have been kept by her responsibilities from his side, while childish little Juana persistently tagged his footsteps. María Antonia would have shared his hardships, but Juana was careful to turn up only when things were going well and there were luxury and glory to share.

She was in mourning now for her son Guillermo, who had been a captain in his uncle’s command. Guillermo was a daring youth who fell in one of the minor battles before Boyacá. Juana’s daughter Benigna, who had fluttered all hearts at Angostura, was in Caracas, too. Charming as ever, she was now the bride of Bolívar’s loyal friend Briceño Méndez.

Young Fernando, son of the dead Juan Vicente, was waiting to remind his famous uncle of an early promise. He had just finished his studies at the University of Virginia, and was ready to take up his duties as private secretary. Bolívar, who had as many as five secretaries at a time and was said to dictate to three in the same breath, readily promised to make room for him.

Mrs. Gregor MacGregor was there, María Antonia’s daughter who had married a dashing young Scot of the British Legion. Proudly she presented to her uncle the tiny red-headed boy he had not yet seen. There were other children, too, for most of the nieces and nephews had grown up and married since their uncle saw them last. Old Hipólita had a new generation of babies to spoil.

The happiest reunion of all, however, was with María Antonia. She was a silver-haired woman of fifty now, but as vigorous as ever, and as deeply devoted to her beloved “Simoncito.” She had followed his career with an intelligent interest, writing him her views at length on many national questions with which he had to deal. He valued her opinions highly, and would sometimes take her advice when he would take no other.

Brother and sister sat late on that first night, after the others had gone to bed. Ruefully Antonia rendered her accounting of the family fortune whose administration had been left in her hands. The ravages of war had left very little. San Mateo, the plantation, had been the scene of a battle in which the buildings were burned and the orchards destroyed. At his order she had placed heavy mortgages on other properties, sending him the money to pay his troops. Those properties were now lost to them. All that actually remained were this house and the copper mines at Aroa, not now in production.

Simón Bolívar brushed aside her explanations and apologies lightly enough. Personal misfortune never affected him greatly. He tried, too, to reassure her on another point. Like his old friend Pedro Gual, she was horrified at his appearance of ill-health. He was nothing but a bag of bones, she protested tearfully. What in Heaven’s name had he been doing with himself?

He replied a trifle impatiently that he was quite well, and changed the subject. Had any letters arrived from Panamá? He had told Pedro Gual to write him here. By this time there should be some definite news of the Congress.

There were letters. She brought them, and stood by apprehensively while he read them, watching the light die out of his face.

The news was disheartening. The Brazilian envoy had never arrived, nor had the one from Chile. But most tragic of all, Mr. Anderson, the Norteamericano whose support was to have been so valuable, had been stricken with a recurrence of his ailment at Cartagena, just as he was about to embark.

Everything possible had been done, Dr. Gual emphasized. The best army surgeons had attended him, the nursing sisters had lavished the most tender care upon him. All was to no avail. Don Pedro regretted to report that the illustrious gentleman had passed away of “an inflammation.”

As for the Congress itself, it had accepted Bolívar’s proposals in a fine spirit of co-operation. The envoys of the four countries represented, Mexico, Guatemala, Colombia, and Peru, had drafted a treaty embodying the principles of arbitration and mutual assistance. Gual enclosed a copy of the treaty, an elaboration of all the points that had been discussed by the three men at Lima. He pointed out, however, that the delegates had no authority to bind their governments. They could sign, but they must submit the treaty for ratification to their several Congresses when they returned home.

Dispiritedly Bolívar handed the letter to his sister. “And so ends a splendid dream!” he said bitterly.

She ran through it. “But, Simón, it is not an end, it is a beginning! Does he not say that the envoys drafted the treaty you desired? Why, here it is, in your very words! What more could you want?”

He shook his head. “Four small states, with the bulk of both continents either hostile or indifferent! What can we do? What strength lies in such a union? If the North American gentleman had lived, there would have been hope. Or if the Chileans had responded, or Dom Pedro had kept his promise. But now—”

“If you had gone yourself?” she ventured. “Perhaps it would have been better—”

“I do not think so. I considered it in the beginning, and decided that for me to go would seem an attempt to influence the proceedings for personal glory. The Chileans and Argentines do not feel kindly toward me as it is, and I did not want my presence to be an irritation to them. Now—I do not know. Perhaps I should have gone. But there was so much to do, in Lima, and Bogotá, and here in Caracas! So much to do, and only one man to do it all!”

“Poor little Don Quixote!” She laid her hand upon his bowed head. “Always, my dear one, you must be riding about the world, righting all wrongs—really, it is too much! Come now, you must not give way to despair. When has Simón Bolívar allowed the first defeat to turn him from any purpose he cherished? This is not like you, brother.”

He raised his head and looked dully at her. “I feel,” he said slowly, “as though I were that mad Greek who stood upon a rock in mid-ocean and tried to direct the tides. Or—yes, you are right, I am Don Quixote. When I was young I thought him a very fine fellow, but now I know that he was a figure of fun for all the world to scoff at. A would-be knight whose great enterprises all came to nothing. Just as I am. Just as mine have done!”

“Simón!” She stared at him in blank dismay, and then, womanlike, she jumped to an unwarranted deduction.

“It is just as I said, you are ill! You have never taken any care of yourself, Simoncito, and now the long strain is beginning to tell on you. When will you settle down and live like a rational being? You are not made of iron! Surely the time has come now for you to relax and take your ease. If you do not, mark my words, you will be sorry.”

He got to his feet, straightened his drooping shoulders, and managed a smile. “It may be that you are right, sister mine. I do feel weariness now as I never used to do—aye, and discouragement, too. But I promise you that I will find more time for rest soon. Let me once get this trouble with Páez cleared up, and we shall see.”

XXXII

Darkening Clouds

The interview between Bolívar and Páez was a touching one. The simplehearted llanero wept like a child, assuring his chief that never, never had he dreamed of personal disloyalty.

It was all Santander’s fault, he insisted. Sitting there in Bogotá and issuing orders like a viceroy! What did a Granadan know about the needs of Venezuelans, anyway? They had fought and bled to rid themselves of foreign rule. What good were all their sacrifices, if they were still to be ordered about by foreigners? Madrid or Bogotá, there was little to choose between them, in the general’s opinion.

Patiently Bolívar reasoned with him. How could he call the Granadans foreigners, when they had all fought side by side for liberty, a band of brothers? They were brothers, in the brave new union of Gran Colombia. What was this talk of Granadans and Venezuelans? All were Colombians now, Americans! Surely Páez must understand that?

Under the spell of his leader’s eloquence Páez acknowledged that he did understand it. He had been wrong, he had been hasty. He was not fit for the authority which had been delegated to him. He was only a rough soldier, good enough to fight when fighting was needed, but too artless to handle this mass of red tape with which the clever Granadans were enmeshing his beloved country. All right, then, he would go. He would retire to a quiet little farm and let Santander, so brilliant, so able, have his way.

Between tears and laughter Bolívar smoothed the ruffled feathers. There was to be no talk of retirement. Colombia had need of Páez in peace no less than in war. Now that this little talk had made everything clear, there would be no more trouble. Páez and Santander would work side by side, as they had fought. All would be well.

At the banquet that night, Bolívar publicly presented Páez with one of the ceremonial swords he had brought back from Peru. Accepting it, choked with emotion, the Centaur said, “In my hands this will always be Bolívar’s sword; my arm may wield it, but his is the directing will. I am prepared to perish a hundred times before this sword shall ever leave my hand. Armed with it, I will follow him to all eternity.”

Back in Bogotá, Santander, austere, upright, legalistically-minded, waited to hear that Bolívar had confirmed his dismissal of Páez. In his opinion the matter admitted of no other settlement. Páez had added insubordination to incompetence. He must go. Santander expected Bolívar to see to it.

Instead came the news of the Liberator’s amazing generosity. Páez was not merely to retain his post, he had been signally honored by the gift of Bolívar’s own sword.

It was the last straw. For years Santander had swallowed his pride and worked under Bolívar’s orders, yielding in matters where his own strong convictions ran directly counter to the Liberator’s. He had done it, not in the belief that Bolívar’s ideas were actually better than his own, but because he felt that harmony would best serve the cause of liberty to which both men were devoted.

Now he must have concluded that the time had come at last to press his own views. He had a large faction of the Congress behind him, and most of the influential citizens of Bogotá. In an angry statement which he afterward withdrew he went so far as to state that New Granada must be separated from Venezuela, even if it meant declaring war against Bolívar.

The Liberator was still in Venezuela when this news was brought to him. Sick at heart, he hurried back to Bogotá.

There he went before the Congress and offered to resign the presidency, if it would restore good feeling. They refused to accept the resignation, but made no secret of their concern over the disturbance which was rapidly growing throughout the country.

Santander had apologized for his hasty statement and had pledged formal allegiance to Bolívar as president. However, the relations between the two men remained badly strained. Santander flatly refused to make any effort to co-operate with Páez, and the Centaur, back in Caracas, was doing nothing to indicate that he had changed his methods of administration in spite of his promises to Bolívar.

The personal rivalry between these two men was being zealously taken up by their partisans in both countries. The secessionist movement was rapidly gathering force; bad feeling broke out in fighting on the border. In Quito, too, there were rumblings of discontent. The currents of war had pretty thoroughly mixed the three nationalities. There were minority groups in each country whose presence suddenly became a focus of irritation.

Even in faraway Bolivia there was trouble. Sucre, whom Bolívar had left in charge, found his task a hard one. He, too, had the vexatious spirit of local patriotism to contend with.

Bolivia had been until lately a part of Peru. Many citizens continued to regard themselves as Peruvians and to agitate for a return to the mother country. They had plenty of support from Lima. Rebellion broke out, and fighting in the city streets. Sucre himself was wounded and forced to resign the presidency. He returned to Quito, carrying, in his own pathetic phrase, “broken the arm which fought at Ayacucho.”

In whatever direction Simón Bolívar turned, black clouds were gathering on the horizon. Santander’s friends had called a convention at Ocaña to draft a new constitution. It began by declaring the old one superseded, and broke up after five months without having adopted one to take its place.

To all intents and purposes, the voiding of the old constitution dissolved the union with Venezuela and left New Granada, which appropriated to itself the name “Colombia,” without a basic law.

Bolívar continued to act as president. By doing so, in Santander’s view, he was arbitrarily acting as a dictator. This is true enough, but it is hard to see what else he could have done. The country had to have a head of some sort, and without a constitution there was no legal way to elect a new president.

XXXIII

The Dagger Strikes

In the midst of these disturbances something happened which was more serious than any of them. A deliberate attempt was made upon the Liberator’s life.

On the night of September 25, 1828, Bolívar lay ill in his bed at the presidential palace. The palace, a combination of residence and executive offices, housed a miscellaneous collection of people. The families of his aides and secretaries found shelter in the great sprawling Spanish-built house; as many as forty persons habitually sat down to dinner there. In its council chamber, cabinet meetings and military consultations were held.

On this September night the palace was very quiet. Don Simón’s illness had cast a shadow over the gaiety which usually prevailed; there had been no dancing in the mirrored salon after dinner. Most of the household had dispersed to their beds. By the dying fire in the library young Ybarra, captain of the palace guard, lingered over a last glass of wine, a good-night cigar, with Colonel Ferguson of the British Legion. And with the two officers, in the red breeches and gold-laced white tunic of a dragoon, Manuela Sáenz brandished her cigar and expressed with a good round oath her low opinion of the latest shipment of French wine.

Manuela was actually Mrs. James Thorne, the young wife of an English physician practicing in Quito. Her impoverished Creole family had married her to the first comer very much as Aunt Josefa had disposed of María Antonia, and for the same reason. María Antonia’s tomboy exploits, however, grow pale indeed beside those of Manuela.

At the age of twelve she had disguised herself in boy’s clothes and joined the patriot army. When she was brought back and sent to a convent she escaped by blackening her face and, basket in hand, convincing the lay sister at the gate that she was a Negro servant bound for the market place. Once free, she hid herself in the Negro quarter for several days while her frantic family ransacked Quito for her. Dr. Thorne’s sister, a newly arrived English lady who apparently did not know burnt cork when she saw it, was on the point of engaging the “colored” girl as her personal maid when the indignant parents traced her.

The doctor himself interceded for the child, and begged that she should not be punished. He was a man well past forty, but the distracted Sáenzes chose to assume that his interest was a romantic one, and in some way or another a marriage was the outcome of the affair.

The doctor was a gentle, well-meaning man and, as he himself ruefully observed later, “no lion tamer.” It is doubtful whether even a highly accomplished lion tamer could have exercised much control over the headstrong Manuela. Freed from her family, she twisted the bewildered English husband around her finger and went her own way. That way, from the day that she leaned from her balcony to watch the liberating armies march into Quito, was the way of the patriots.

Now a well-grown, athletic young woman of twenty, she presented herself first for enlistment as a common soldier. Coolly she demonstrated to the skeptical sergeant that she lacked no soldierly skills. She rode superbly, fenced equally well, was a dead shot with pistol and rifle. When, in the face of all these qualifications, the sergeant refused to enroll her, she took her plea to the Liberator himself.

With his undying affection for María Antonia, Bolívar had always a soft spot in his heart for tomboys. His talk with the girl showed him that she was intelligent as well as brave, and she had a keen wit which set him to roaring with laughter.

In the end, although no official commission was ever granted her, she was allowed to attach herself to the patriot forces. Her position was similar to that of a “drum majorette,” or perhaps a mascot. Mounted on her white horse, slim and pretty in her handsome uniform, she lent a colorful note to parades. There is no record of her having actually participated in any major battle, although she was allowed to take part in some minor skirmishes against the Pastusos, and acquitted herself well. The soldiers adored her, and made a point of securing mustaches from Spanish prisoners to give her. She had a mantle edged with them.

The idle chatter in the library dwindled into yawns, and Manuela had risen, stretching herself, reaching out for a candle to light her way to bed, when a sound outside the palace arrested her.

“Listen, comrades!” She held up her hand. “Do I dream, or do I really hear a sort of roaring—what can it be?”

Obediently they listened, and on the suddenly silent room there fell a confused clamor, far away and faint, but growing stronger as they waited.

Dismay, swift and sudden, struck the group in the library. Well enough they knew that Bogotá seethed with unrest. Ever since the disastrous failure of the Ocaña Convention there had been frequent rioting in the inns and in the city streets. General Padilla, a Colombian who had openly preached rebellion against Bolívar, was in jail, but his followers were many and active. One of the local newspapers, owned as it happened by Santander, was printing a series of articles depicting Padilla as a martyr. The pot had been bubbling for weeks past; tonight it was boiling over.

The noise outside was unmistakable now. It was the shuffling of many feet on the uneven cobblestones of Bogotá, it was the hoarse shouting of an angry mob. “Death! Death! Death!” The single word, chanted over and over, sent a shiver down the spine of the listening girl. White-faced, she turned to Colonel Ferguson.

“‘Death’—you hear it too? Colonel, what do they mean? Death—to whom?”

The mob answered her before Ferguson could. “Death—death to the tyrant!” they were howling now. And then, long-drawn and shrill, a woman’s voice. “Come out, Bolívar, tyrant! Come out and die!”

The library door burst open and showed the face of José Palacio, Bolívar’s Negro servant, ash-gray with fright. Ybarra and Ferguson were buckling on their swords, looking to the priming of their old-fashioned pistols. On the palace portals a rain of heavy knocks began to fall. A sentry’s sharp challenge was answered by a rattle of rifle fire.

With a magnificent effort Manuela controlled her panic. “The Liberator—they would tear him limb from limb, those madmen! Ah, but they shall not! Jose, come—”

She seized the Negro’s hand and hurried him with her down the long corridor to Bolívar’s sleeping quarters. They swerved aside to let a file of soldiers pass: the small company of household troops responding to Ybarra’s shout.

Hastily lighting the candle, they wakened the sleeping man. Under the girl’s frenzied directions Palacio dressed his master, dragging trousers up over his nightshirt, wrapping him in his long uniform cape. As Don Simón stood swaying from weakness, demanding to be told what had happened, a heavy crash jarred the flickering candle flame. The great front door had given way, and the howling of the mob grew suddenly louder, the words more distinct.

Simón Bolívar struggled to clear the mists of sleep and fever from his brain. “What is it, child? Who seeks me? Listen, they call my name. I will go out to them.”

“My general, you cannot!” She leaped to the door, barring his way. Taking ruthless advantage of his weakness, she thrust him into the Negro’s arms. “Quick, José!” she chattered. “Out of the window with him. There is no time for talk—it is his life!”

The black man picked him up like a child and lifted him over the window sill, down into the garden outside. Then, at a sign from the girl, he leaped after him into the night.

Manuela Sáenz waited no longer, but boldly threw open the door. A fearful sight met her eyes.

The great door at the palace entrance hung from its hinges, and through the archway surged a wild-eyed throng, their faces illumined by the light of pitch-pine torches. A dozen men still carried the huge timber with which they had battered in the door; others flourished rifles and machetes. Their unheeding feet crushed the bodies of the two sentries and tracked their blood over the marble floor as they came on toward the Liberator’s bedchamber.

Their first rush carried them right past the little file of soldiers hastily massed under young Ybarra. He himself went down, one arm virtually severed at the shoulder. From the library door a pistol barked, and Manuela heard Colonel Ferguson laugh as one of the invaders threw up his hands and spun blindly into a statue of Julius Caesar, which crashed down upon him. In the next second, however, the brave colonel himself crumpled before a bullet. As he fell writhing to the floor a dozen gun butts clubbed him into merciful death. The mob streamed on to the doorway where the white-faced girl awaited them.

“Bolívar!” The foremost man, a greasy mechanic reeking of the tanyard, brandished a reddened knife in her face. “Out of our way, you! We have come to settle with the tyrant!”

“There is no tyrant here, gentlemen.” Manuela smiled through stiff lips. “If it is the Liberator you seek, that is another matter. He is in the council hall, in the far wing.”

“Council hall—at this time of night! He is here in his bed, and we mean to have him. Step aside!”

With dramatic suddenness she moved to show them the disordered, empty bed. Snatching up the candle, she held it high to light the corners of the room.

“The council hall, gentlemen, you will find him there!” she insisted feverishly, listening all the time for footsteps on the paved patio outside the window. Surely the Negro must have hurried his master to safety by this time? Yet she must delay these murderers as long as was humanly possible.

To her relief, after muttering among themselves, they went tramping off to the council hall. And finding it dark and deserted, they came tramping back, to run full tilt into Ybarra and his men, now grimly organized for action. They were thirty men against an unnumbered, desperate mob, the dregs of the city’s slums, and they died where they stood.

The fighting that night was not confined to the inside of the palace. The plot was a widespread one, carefully laid, and it involved several companies of mutinous troops. Outside in the darkened streets bullets were flying, too.

“There is no tyrant here, gentlemen”

Bolívar, shaken and confused, unable to distinguish friend from enemy, let himself be persuaded by the faithful Palacio to hide in a wayside ditch. Then the shouts over his head made all clear. “Death to Bolívar, the tyrant!” was one rallying cry, but the mob had another, too. “Viva Santander!” they yelled. “Long live Santander, our Liberator!”

They had bundled Bolívar out of his home without his sword. And when realization came to him, he sprang from the ditch, snatched up a billet of wood, and plunged into the battle. He was recognized almost at once by a soldier of the loyal Vargas regiment, which had left its barracks at the first word of trouble. With wild acclaim his followers rallied around him, helping him onto a horse, thrusting a sword in his hands. Under their beloved leader the men fought like demons. By the time the tropic dawn flushed the gray streets the insurgents were in rout everywhere.

Bolívar returned to the palace to find Ybarra desperately wounded, his faithful guard dead or dying, and Manuela Sáenz lying across his bedroom threshold, in the first and only womanly swoon of her adventurous life. For her heroic conduct she was ever afterward called “La Libertadora del Libertador,” the Liberatress of the Liberator. Long after Bolívar’s death, when she was an old woman trying to support herself by keeping a little tobacco shop in Peru, the government belatedly honored her by voting her a generous pension for life. Garibaldi, the Italian patriot, visited her in 1858, and reported her the most gracious and witty lady he had ever known.

The conspiracy resulted in more than a hundred arrests. There were disgruntled army officers among the prisoners, petty politicians, and a newspaper editor or two. The confessions of some of these implicated both General Padilla and Vice-President Santander.

Santander vehemently denied all connection with the plot, and there is reason to believe that he spoke the truth. He was known to his countrymen as the “man of laws”; and it was his insistence upon strict law enforcement which had earned him the dislike of Páez. It is hard to believe that such a man would stoop to the cowardly methods of gangsterism.

However, he was tried with the others, and all were found guilty and sentenced to death. Bolívar commuted the sentences of all those who protested their innocence. Santander went into exile, returning several years later to become president of Colombia. That was after the union with Venezuela had long since been dissolved, so that he realized his dream of serving only his beloved New Granada.

To Bolívar, who did believe in Santander’s guilt, the conspiracy was a crushing blow. “I have really been murdered,” he wrote to a friend. “The daggers have entered here in my heart.”

Fate was sharpening other daggers to penetrate that generous heart. The trial of the conspirators had shocked and sobered the Bogotáns for the moment, but in the other republics unrest was a rising tide.

Peru, under a new president antagonistic to Bolívar, had gone to war to recover its lost province of Bolivia. The part of southern Colombia centering around Quito was agitating for a separate government under the name of Ecuador. The Royalists of Pasto were in rebellion again, still proclaiming themselves subjects of the Spanish crown. The garrison in Guayaquil mutinied on general principles.

Páez wrote that Venezuela was in a state of insurrection, refusing to submit any longer to the domination of Bogotá. His letter failed to mention the fact that he himself was gathering his army together and massing it on the frontier, but that word came from other sources.

On top of all this, reports arrived that the Spanish in Puerto Rico were outfitting a strong expedition to recover their lost provinces. This last rumor proved unfounded, or at least the expedition never sailed. But the other troubles were real enough.

Bolívar’s health was failing rapidly now. He had had another serious illness while the Convention of Ocaña was in session. At the time of the assassination attempt he had not left his bed for several days. However, with something of his old spirit, he nerved himself to new undertakings, and rode south to do what he could in Quito.

He met Sucre there, and between them they succeeded in restoring a sort of wretched armed peace which satisfied nobody. Bolívar, so ill that it was torture for him to sit upon a horse, dragged himself wearily back to Bogotá.

His Council of Ministers met him with a doleful report of innumerable small rebellions. No sooner was one put down than another broke out somewhere else. Blood was being shed in Colombia again, and it was not that of Spaniards, but of Colombians.

Also, they said, it was right for him to know that the press of both Bogotá and Caracas was attacking him personally. He was being called a despot, a tyrant, a man who would sacrifice the welfare of a continent upon the altar of his own ambitions.

Weak and sick, Bolívar listened. The Council, emboldened by his lack of comment, went on to outline their solution. Such a state of affairs, they declared, proved but one thing. The people of America had no gift for self-government. They did not understand or want it. It was time this farce was abandoned. It was time they had a king to rule over them.

Bolívar listened, and groaned aloud. He had spent youth and wealth and strength to give these people the priceless boon of liberty. For twenty years he had labored for it, had seen sacrificed for it the blood and very life of men like Rooke and Girardot—yes, and the tears of their widows and orphans.

At this tremendous price the right to self-government had been bought for the people of Colombia, these same people who were now deciding that after all they didn’t really want it. They thought they would rather have a king!

In that moment Bolívar took a resolution from which he was never afterward to depart. Gently, as though to thoughtless children, he explained to the ministers that the idea of a monarchy was an impossibility. What foreign prince would accept a throne so surrounded by danger and misery? And certainly no Colombian general would consent to subordinate himself to a comrade vested with regal authority.

“No, not even to me,” he added, forestalling the words upon their lips. “Least of all, as you should know, to me. Immediately upon the assembly of the Congress, I shall resign the office of president. My work here is done.”

He was as good as his word. One last office he performed, that of arranging with Páez a peaceful settlement by which Venezuela withdrew from the union, leaving the old state of New Granada to continue as Colombia.

The Quito government of Ecuador was already organizing itself as an independent nation. Bolivia and Peru were nominally at peace.

The whole structure of the American union of which Simón Bolívar had had such high hopes was in ruins, but the flags of five free republics had replaced the red-and-yellow banner of old Spain.

So much and no more remained to show for all those arduous years. How much it really amounted to, what it was worth or how long it would endure, Simón Bolívar could not know. In that troubled year of 1830, no one could know. But this is the twentieth century, and we know.

Look around you. Count the free flags that still float over free countries. There are not as many as there used to be. Most of them are in the Western Hemisphere now, and the five of them which Simón Bolívar flung to the breeze have never yet been hauled down.

On April 27, 1830, Bolívar sent to the Congress a message renouncing all his presidential powers. If the advice of his ministers had done nothing else, it had convinced him that his continuance as president was making the restoration of harmony impossible. While influential men believed, or pretended to believe, that he was a selfish dictator grasping at personal glory, there could be no hope of peace.

He wrote to the Congress therefore: “You must be assured that the good of the country imposes on me the sacrifice of leaving forever the land which gave me life, in order that my presence in Colombia may not be an obstacle to the happiness of my fellow citizens.”

A few days later he left for Cartagena, intending to sail for Jamaica or Europe. That he did not do so was due to the fact that he lacked both strength and money. He had written María Antonia to sell the copper mines and send him the receipts, but this she was not able to do at once.

While he waited he became gravely ill once more, and friends took him to the little town of Santa Marta to recuperate. He was not able to walk down the gangplank, but had to be carried ashore in a chair.

Long years ago, in Bonaparte’s Paris, a frightened woman had glimpsed a vision. “A long road winding,” Fanny du Villars had said, “and at the end is darkness.” Yet the youth to whom she spoke her fears had answered firmly, “I must tread it.” The road was nearly wound now to its darkened end.

XXXIV

“We Have Plowed in the Sea”

Bolívar arrived in Santa Marta on the first of December, 1830. He had spent several months in and around Cartagena, waiting for his sister to realize some money for him. This she was not able to do until after his death.

He brought a draft for 8,000 pesos, which sounds a comfortable sum, since the peso of old Spain had been about equal to our dollar of today. But the inflationary period following the war had reduced the value of the Colombian peso to about twenty-two cents. Simón Bolívar had never had the slightest regard for money, and he had none now. Out of this last dwindling sum left to him he continued to give generous alms to the beggars in the streets, extravagant tips to those who served him. Before leaving Bogotá he had presented his country estate to a friend.

He was not as impoverished as he seemed to be. The Colombian Congress had voted him a yearly pension of 30,000 pesos, to be paid early in the coming year. Ecuador, hearing that he was in need, raised a substantial sum by public subscription. And Bolivia, with a delicacy that does her credit, appointed him ambassador to the Holy See in Rome, at a generous salary.

These evidences that he still had friends would have touched his heart had he known of them. Messengers were on the way to tell him, but none of them arrived in time.

He did receive a message from his good friend General Urdeneta in Bogotá, telling him that revolution had broken out, and that the rebels were calling for Bolívar to return and lead them.

He wrote to Urdeneta firmly declining. He would assume no power, he wrote, deriving “from the agitation of a mutiny or the votes of biased friends.” In any event, he had no heart for making war upon his own countrymen. The sword of Bolívar was sheathed, and for no such sorry purpose would he draw it again from its scabbard.

He was a very sick man now, dying of tuberculosis. He was an exile, deposed, discredited, penniless. Yet Fate had still one last crushing blow to deal him.

News was brought of the death of Sucre, slain by assassins.

It has been said of Simón Bolívar, with some degree of truth, that he was a man who loved causes rather than persons. The circumstances of his life had not been such as to favor close personal relationships. He had been thrown into association with men who were not particularly congenial to him, and most of his waking hours had been passed in their company. The soldier on active campaign service cannot pick and choose his comrades with the freedom possible in civilian life.

Bolívar had given unfailing courtesy to all, and warm friendship to many. His whole heart he gave to only three people: his sister María Antonia, his delicate little child bride, and his well-beloved comrade Antonio José de Sucre.

He was not alone in loving Sucre. The historians assure us that everybody loved him. The most hostile of them, the ones whose spite would strip every shred of nobility from Bolívar himself, have not one harsh word to say of Sucre. Political opponents of his own day have written glowing accounts of his chivalry and purity of purpose.

It is hard to see how he could have had an enemy. But in the gloomy mountains of Pasto, where hatred flourished like some poisonous plant, there were men who did not hesitate to hide and wait in cowardly ambush. Sucre was riding alone; no one saw the shot fired. No one ever knew for certain whose hand fired it, or whose brain planned the murder.

Bolívar never rallied from this blow. Up to that time he had had his moments of hopefulness. A quiet, placid evening of life in France, such as San Martín had had—there were worse fates, he thought. He had a French doctor, a Bonapartist émigré named Réverend. He and the doctor held long discussions about life in the pleasant city of Paris which they both loved. Bolívar even went so far as to write to his cousin Fanny du Villars, asking her to find him a quiet little house in the suburbs.

The news of Sucre’s death put an end to all that. It was not merely the deep sense of personal loss. He was affected still more by the knowledge that Sucre had been killed, not in the satisfaction of some private grudge, but in the name of patriotism.

The people of Pasto were free citizens, freed by Bolívar’s sword and by that of Sucre. If they had any reason for dissatisfaction with the man as a public servant, there were legal means by which to express that dissatisfaction. The whole point of the long struggle was there. The people now possessed the right to choose their leaders, and to hold them accountable for that leadership. In the old bad days of Spanish misrule, assassination might be the only weapon open to desperate men. But to grasp that dagger now, and to plunge it into that noble heart whose every beat had registered his love for his fellow men—no, it was beyond bearing!

All night long Bolívar paced back and forth in the courtyard, and would not be consoled. The bitterness against which he had so long struggled found its way to the surface now. It was at about this time that he wrote to a friend, “We who have fought for liberty in America have plowed in the sea.”

It was hot in Santa Marta, with the steaming oppressive heat of the low-lying town. The few friends who shared Bolívar’s exile knew that his days were fast drawing in. He was too weak to leave his bed, and he suffered terribly from inability to breathe the heavy, humid air. There was no money for the ordinary sickroom comforts.

In this sad state of affairs a Spanish gentleman, Don Joaquín de Mier, came forward. He was not an old friend, nor even a sympathizer with Bolívar’s political beliefs. But he was a chivalrous and kindly man, and his priest, the bishop of Santa Marta, had pointed out the opportunity for a sublime act of Christian charity. Don Joaquín offered the use of his country villa, a modest estate known as San Pedro Alejandrino. Bolívar was carried there upon the shoulders of his friends.

They gathered about him there, the little knot of faithful men. No one of his own blood was with him; the nearest was Colonel Laurencio Silva, who had married his niece. María Antonia, frantically trying to raise money in Caracas, could not come. There were no women at all in the forlorn little household, for Señor de Mier was a bachelor and kept only men servants. But of the men who surrounded him, most were soldiers and one was a priest. They knew as well as any woman might the way to tend a dying man.

The good bishop of Santa Marta was a daily visitor who brought comfort with him. Simón Bolívar, born and bred in the Catholic faith, had frequently been forced into conflict with the Royalist clergy, but he had never let these differences turn him away from the Church.

Father Estévez, perceiving that the end was near, gently prepared the patient’s mind. At his suggestion Bolívar made his will, disposing of the few pathetic trinkets which were all that he had to leave. His sword was to go to Sucre’s widow, his books to the University of Caracas. The Washington medal to the state. Any money that might be realized after his death was to be divided between his two sisters and the children of his dead brother, with a generous legacy to his servant José Palacio.

The Irish aide, O’Leary, was there at the last, and so was the Venezuelan Ybarra who had shared his duties; Maríano Montilla, an old comrade of the Society of Patriots, and Colonel Wilson, of the intrepid British Brigade.

These, and a few local men like Señor de Mier, and the French Dr. Réverend, were all witnesses of the will, and witnesses too of the extraordinary document which Bolívar dictated a few days before his death and which he called his farewell to his countrymen.

He died, at the age of forty-seven, on December 17, 1830. It was the eleventh anniversary of the founding of Colombia. He had received the last rites of the Church, and he died tranquilly in the supporting arms of a few brave men who loved him well. He told them he was glad to go.

They gathered about him there, the little knot of faithful men

XXXV

But This Remains

Twelve years later there was another gigantic procession into Caracas. All the way from the port of La Guaira, where the ships of England, Holland, and the United States dipped their flags to half-mast, the sorrowful procession wound its way back into the hills.

Again, in the city itself, arches of palm and willow spanned every street, although now the ribbons which entwined them were the dead black of mourning. Black-clad throngs lined the pavements, tears instead of roses fell as the women leaned out from their balconies.

Muffled drums of the old regiment beat their sad tattoo; a red-eyed soldier led a riderless white horse. Behind it, in a laurel-wreathed float, the inevitable white-clad maidens chanted a funeral dirge. Long lines of marching men followed, officers subduing their cavalry mounts to slow pacing, and an immense horse-drawn funeral car upon which rested a flag-draped casket.

All the church bells tolled, as slowly, slowly, the melancholy cortege moved on to the central plaza. The cathedral itself could not begin to hold the throng which surged about the square, so the president had had a broad dais erected across the cathedral steps. Here, on gilt chairs brought from the presidential palace, an impressive array of dignitaries waited. Every South American nation had sent a representative; so had many European ones and the United States.

The old comrades were there, and Juana, and the children and their children. María Antonia had died suddenly, dramatically, of heart failure a few days before, as she was being fitted for the special gown of heavy crape in which she was to have sat in the place of honor beside the president. Don Pablo Clemente, her good-for-nothing husband, turned up and made himself conspicuous by noisy weeping. His name had once appeared on a petition demanding that Bolívar be forever exiled as a despot and a traitor, but apparently he was prepared to let bygones be bygones now.

The creaking funeral car was backed awkwardly into place before the dais; the horses were unhitched and led away. Higher than a man’s head, visible from every corner of the square, the flag-draped casket rested from its journeying by sea and land. Simón Bolívar, El Libertador, had come home.

Páez had arranged it all. President Páez, the strong man of Venezuela, who was to guide the fortunes of his country for many years, and to die at last, a broken, lonely old exile, in Brooklyn, New York, in the United States.

Páez the Centaur, the child-hearted cowboy-general whose folly had contributed as much as any other thing to the Liberator’s downfall, had done what he could to make amends. Years of preparation and patient planning had gone to bring about this day. Funds had had to be raised; envoys had run back and forth from Quito and Bogotá and Caracas, settling the important details of precedence. Bolivia and Peru, willing enough to honor the memory of Bolívar, were not on sufficiently good terms with Páez to take an official part in the proceedings. They did, however, send honorary representatives.

Curiously enough, Páez’ most enthusiastic fellow worker in the enterprise was his old enemy Santander, then serving in the Colombian Congress after two terms as president. They disagreed to the last as to whether the remains were to be interred in Caracas or in Bogotá, but they united in persuading their respective Congresses to appropriate funds and to detail warships and army divisions to add glory to the spectacle. General Santander died nearly two years before the great day actually arrived, leaving the field to Páez.

These two men who had failed the Liberator only once, and that fatally; who had proved themselves incapable of grasping the magnitude of his vision; whose own limitations had ranged them against him: these two must have found some comfort in one indisputable fact. They did give him a magnificent funeral.

The ceremony before the cathedral was long and elaborate. There was an outpouring of flowery oratory, none the less sincere for being intolerably long-winded.

Speech followed speech, interspersed with the reading of odes and choral singing. The hot tropic sun beat down, and on the far outskirts of the crowd a tiny child fidgeted and cried on his mother’s shoulder.

“Hush, niño mío” she soothed him. “You are a big boy now, you will remember this day. And when you are an old, old man you will tell your children, ‘I was there! With my own eyes I saw it, the whole world gathered to do honor to the Liberator, because he made us free!’”

And now a boy stepped to the edge of the dais, a slim young Ecuadorean poet chosen for his golden voice. A stir went through the crowd. “Now it comes,” they whispered. “It is for this that we have waited so long. It will be as though he spoke to us again. Now we shall hear the message he left to us!”

The youth stood before the draped sarcophagus, with the five flags massed behind his head. The five free flags. His eyes were bright, and his head was held high as he waited for perfect silence. If Simón Bolívar could have seen him then he would have seen in that gallant young figure the Future, prototype of that great race of free Americans who today are the hope of the world.

The boy unrolled a crackling parchment, and in clear ringing tones began to read the words written by a dying man at Santa Marta.

Colombians!

You have witnessed my efforts to establish Liberty where Tyranny had formerly the ascendant. Sacrificing my fortune and my tranquility, I have labored with disinterestedness. I renounced the supreme command, because you were distrustful of the integrity of my intentions. My enemies have abused your credulity, and trampled upon what I held most sacred—my reputation for love of liberty. I have been the victim of my persecutors, who have brought me to the precincts of the grave. I pardon them.

In disappearing from among you, my affection for you admonishes me that I ought to signify my last wishes. I aspire to no other glory than the consolidation of Colombia. All ought to exert themselves to maintain the inestimable blessings of the Union—the people by obeying the present Government, that they may deliver themselves from a state of anarchy; the ministers of the Sanctuary by offering up their prayers to Heaven; and the military by using their swords in defense of the social guarantees.

Colombians! My last wishes are for the happiness of my country. If my death will contribute to reconcile the parties and to consolidate the Union, I shall go down to the tomb in peace.

—Simón Bolívar

Other Interesting Books about Simón Bolívar, His Time and His Country

Man of Glory, by Thomas Rourke. Published by William Morrow & Company, New York, 1939.

The Passionate Warrior, by T. R. Ybarra. Published by Ives Washburn, New York, 1929.

Simón Bolívar, by Guillermo A. Sherwell. Published by the Sun, Baltimore, 1921.

Bolívar, by H. R. Lemley. Published by The Stratford Company, Boston, 1923.

Foreign Legionaries in the Liberation of Spanish South America, by Alfred Hasbrouck. Published by Columbia University Press, New York, 1928.

Irish Participation in Bolívar’s Campaigns, by Enrique Naranjo M. Published by the Colombian Consulate, Boston, 1937.

Bolívar el Libertador, by Michel Vaucaire. (In French.) Published by B. Grasset, Paris, 1928.

Simón Bolívar, El Libertador, by F. Loraine Petre. Published by E. Stanford, London, 1906.

José Antonio Páez, by R. B. Cunninghame-Graham. Published by W. Heinemann, Ltd., London, 1929.

Journal of an Expedition across Venezuela and Colombia, 1906-07, by Hiram Bingham. Published by Yale Publishing Association, New Haven, 1909.

“Bolívar as Internationalist,” by Raimundo Rivas. From Bulletin of the Pan American Union, Washington, December, 1930.

A View of South America and Mexico, by John Milton Niles. Published by H. Huntington, Jr., New York, 1825.

Narrative of the Expedition to the Rivers Orinoco and Apure in South America, by G. Hippesley. Privately printed in London, 1819.

Simón Bolívar y la Emancipación de Sud-America, by Daniel Florence O’Leary. (In Spanish.) Published by Biblioteca Nacional, Caracas, 1879.

History of Colombia, by Henao y Melguizo and Arrubla. (Translated into English by J. F. Rippy.) University of North Carolina Press, Chapel Hill, 1938.

Histoire de Bolívar, by H. L. V. Ducoudray-Holstein. (In French.) Published by A. Levavasseur, Paris, 1831.

Latin America, by F. A. Kirkpatrick. Published by University Press, Cambridge (England), 1938.

The United States and Latin America, by John Holladay Latané. Published by Doubleday, Page & Co., Garden City, N. Y., 1920.

American Foreign Relations, by John Mabry Matthews. Published by the Century Company, New York, 1928.

La Ultima Enfermedad de Bolívar, by Dr. A. P. Réverend. (In Spanish.) Privately printed in Santa Marta, Colombia, 1831.

Bulletin of the Pan American Union. Washington, December, 1930.

Appleton’s Cyclopaedia of American Biography. 1888 edition. (Look up Bolívar’s associates under their own names.)

“Don Simón.” Memorial volume produced under supervision of the Venezuelan government at Caracas in 1940. In this work every present-day scholar, poet, and artist of the five Bolivian republics offers his tribute to the Liberator.

Note: If you live in New York City, or plan to visit it ever, you will want to go and see the beautiful Bolívar statue which Venezuela presented to the United States. It is at 83rd Street and Central Park West in Central Park. If you go on his birthday, July 24th, you might like to take a single flower and add it to the heap you will find there. “One flower—one heart,” his countrymen say, and there at his statue you will see how many hearts remember his birthday.

Index

(Here are the original index entries from the print version of this book. The page numbers have been removed since they are no longer useful. With the Search feature in your ebook, these terms will be easily available.)

Anderson, Richard Clough

Angostura

Battles of the Revolution:

Ayacucho

Bombona 

Boyaca 

Carabobo 

Junin 

Pantano de Vargas  

Tenerife

Bello, Andres

Bogota

Bolivar, Fernando (nephew)

Bolivar, Juana (sister)

Bolivar, Juan Vicente (brother)

Bolivar, Maria Antonia (sister)

Bolivar, Maria de la Concepcion Palacios (mother)

Bolivar, Maria Teresa del Toro (wife)

Bolivar, Simon (the Liberator) 

birth

boyhood

education

marriage

visits U.S.A.

as orator

as soldier

as writer

political views

death

“Last Testament"

Bolivia

as Spanish colony 

republic 

withdraws from union

Bonaparte, Joseph 

Bonaparte, Napoleon

Brazil

Britain  

British Legion

Caracas

Carlos IV of Spain

 Cartagena

Cartagena Manifesto 

Ciudad Bolivar, see Angostura Clay, Henry 

Clemente, Pablo  Colombia, see New Granada 

Columbus, Christopher  

Congress

of First Venezuelan Republic 

of New Granada

of Third Venezuelan Republic 

of Gran Colombia 

of Bolivia 

Constitution

of First Venezuelan Republic

of Third Venezuelan Republic 

of Gran Colombia 

of Peru 

Convention of Ocana

Council of Ministers 

Creoles 

Cucuta

Declaration of Independence

del Toro, Bernardo

Domingo Diaz, Jose

“Don Quixote”

du Villars, Fanny

Earthquake of 
Ecuador, as Spanish colony

Royalist sentiment 

secession

“El Negro Primero”

Fernando VII of Spain

Foreign Legion, see British Legion “Fundamental Law of Colombia” 

Generals and high-ranking officers of the Revolution:

For the Patriots,

Anzoatagui

Arismendi

Brion

Carvajal

Cordova

Ferguson

Guzman

La Mar

Lara

Miller

Montilla

Rondon

Silva

Soublette

Urdeneta

Wilson

Ybarra

For the Spanish,

Barreiro

Boves  

Canterac

Garcia 

La Serna 

La Torre

Monteverde 

Morales

Morillo, Pablo 

Gran Colombia 

Grievances of South and North American colonists compared

Gual, Pedro

Haiti

Hart, Miss  

Hipolita

Incas, the

Jamaica

Jamaica Letter, the

Junta, of Cadiz 

Junta, of Caracas

Lafayette, Marquis de 

“Last Testament” of Bolivar

Lima

Lincoln, Abraham 
Llanos

Lopez Mendez, Luis 

Madrid

Mestizos

Miranda, Francisco de 

Missionaries  

Monroe Doctrine  

Monroe, James 

Mt. Aventine

New (Nueva) Granada

as Spanish colony

first Revolution 

under Santander 

O’Leary, Daniel Florence 

Paez, Jose Antonio  

Paine, Thomas  

Palacio, Jose  

Palacios, Carlos (uncle)

Panama Canal  

Panama Conference

Paramo de Pisba  

Paris  

Pasto  

Peru 

under Spanish rule 

revolutionary struggle

republic 

war with Bolivia

Petion, Alexandre 

Pizarro, Francisco

Portugal 

Quito

Regency, see Junta, of Cadiz Ribas, Jose Felix

Rodriguez, Simon   

Rome

Rooke, James

Rousseau, Jean Jacques

San Martin, Jose de

San Mateo

Santa Marta 

Saenz, Manuela

Santander, Francisco de Paula  

Setenta  

Slavery 

“Society of Patriots”  

South America 

Spain

Conquest of New World

colonial policy

under Bonaparte

Restoration

under Fernando VII  

Sucre, Antonio Jose de

Torres, Camilo

Upper (Alto) Peru, see Bolivia 

Ustariz, Marquis of

Venezuela

under Spanish rule

First Republic

Second Republic

Third Republic

under Paez

Washington, George  
White Guard  
World Court