ELEVENTH ANNUAL YEAR BOOK — PART IV. 161 



some places they are so narrow, abrupt and obstructed that the stranger 

 recoils in despair of effecting a passage. The loads carried by mules are 

 necessarily light, and the expense of transportation becomes so great as 

 to effectually prohibit the exportation of the more bulky products of the 

 state, except from places near the coast. All articles of importation, also, 

 which can not be packed on mules require to be transported on the should- 

 ers of men; and pianos, mirrors and other foreign articles of bulk and 

 value in the larger towns of the interior have all been carried in this man- 

 ner from the sea ports — distances varying from sixty to one hundred miles. 



"The importance of these material considerations is well understood 

 by all the educated people, and it is but just to say that they are disposed 

 to make use of every power, alike by the encouragement of foreign enter- 

 prise and by an active co-operation on their part, to hasten the develop- 

 ment and secure the prosperity of the state. 



"It is only by a judicial system of colonization, which shall ultimately 

 secure the predominance of white blood, and at the same time that it shall 

 introduce intelligence, industry and skill, that the country can hope to 

 achieve peace, prosperity and greatness. With vast resources, a climate 

 adapted to every caprice, not less than to the products of every zone, and 

 an unrivaled position, it would be a practical denial of the evidence of 

 high design to doubt the future power and greatness of the hitherto lit- 

 tle-known, the long-distracted, and as yet utterly undeveloped republics 

 of Central America." 



I might go on and tell you more of this "country of manyana, the ham- 

 mock and banana," where the women do the work; but I fear your minds 

 are much the same as that of a celebrated Roman poet (the one who had 

 fourteen children, and learned from some oracle or other that his second 

 wife would maintain an average still better), who said: "Hold, I've got 

 enough!" 



DISCUSSION. 



Mr. Ryan: I would like to ask Mr. Downing to give his idea 

 as to what the effect would be on the meat produced in this country 

 if the tariff w r ere removed so as to let meats come in free from 

 Central America? 



Mr. Dow 7 ning: It wouldn't make any particular difference if 

 it was possible to bring them in. In the first place, I would say 

 that it is impossible, for the reason that there is a quarantine on 

 now, and it is going to remain on. I don't think any of us will 

 live to see it raised. It is due to the fact that there are Texas 

 fever cattle ticks from Texas down to Buenos Ayres today. "We 

 have ticks of our own and don't w T ant to bring in any more. But 

 if those meats could come in here it wouldn't make any particular 

 difference, for this reason : At the conclusion of the Spanish war, the 

 livestock industry of Cuba was devastated, and they began to get 

 11 



