Ch. XIX.] ABSENCE OF PATRIOTISM. 343 



raised, but I believe there were not a score of men 

 killed on the field of battle during the whole time; the 

 town of Juigalpa was taken and retaken without any one 

 receiving a scratch. The usual course pursued was for 

 the two armies to manoeuvre about until one thought it 

 was weaker than the other, when it immediately took to 

 flight. Battles were decided without a shot being fired, 

 excepting after one side had run away. 



Of patriotism I never saw a symptom in Central 

 America, nothing but selfish partisanship, willing at any 

 moment to set the country in a blaze of war if there 



/ 



was only a prospect of a little spoil from the flames. 

 The states of Central America are republics in name 

 only ; in reality, they are tyrannical oligarchies. They 

 have excellent constitutions and laws on paper, but both 

 their statesmen and their judges are corrupt, with some 

 honourable exceptions, I must admit, but not enough to 

 stem the current of abuse. Of real liberty there is none. 

 The party in power is able to control the elections, and 

 to put their partisans into all the municipal and other 

 offices. Some of the Presidents have not hesitated to 

 throw their political opponents into prison at the time 

 of an election, and I heard of one well- authenticated 

 instance where an elector was placed, uncovered, in the 

 middle of one of the plazas, with his arms stretched out 

 to their full extent and each thumb thrust down into the 

 barrel of an upright musket, and kept a few hours in 

 the blazing sun until he agreed to vote according to the 

 wish of the party in power. A change of rulers can only 

 be effected by a revolution ; with all the machinery of a 

 republic, the will of the people can only be known by 

 the issue of a civil war. 



