492 IX THE DIPLOMATIC SERVICE-III 



strous of those creatures who have found their breeding- 

 bed in Central American politics. lie seems to have mur- 

 dered, as far as possible, not only all who opposed him, 

 but all who, he thought, might oppose him, and even 

 members of their families. 



It was not at all surprising that Baez, clear-sighted and 

 experienced as he was, saw an advantage to his country 

 in annexation to the United States, lie probably ex- 

 pected that it would be, at first, a Territory of which he, as 

 the foremost man in the island, would become governor, 

 and that later it would come into the Union as a State 

 which he would be quite likely to represent in the United 

 States Senate. At a later period, when I saw him in Xew 

 York, on his way to visit the President at Washington, 

 my favorable opinion of him was confirmed. lie was 

 quiet, dignified, manly, showing himself, in his conversa- 

 tion and conduct, a self -respecting man of the world, ac- 

 customed to manage large affairs and to deal with strong 

 men. 



The same desire to annex the island to the United States 

 was evident among the clergy. This at first surprised me, 

 for some of them were exceedingly fanatical, and one 

 of them, who was especially civil to us, had endeavored, a 

 few months before our arrival, to prevent the proper 

 burial of a charming American lady, the wife of the 

 American geologist of the government, under the old 

 Spanish view that, not being a Catholic, she should be 

 buried outside the cemetery upon the commons, like a dog. 

 Hut the desire for peace and for a reasonable develop- 

 ment of the country, even under a government considered 

 heretical, was everywhere evident. 



It became my duty to discuss the question of church 

 properly with the papal nuncio and vicar apostolic, lie 

 was an archbishop who had been sent over to take tem- 

 porary charge of ecclesiastical matters; of course a most 

 earnest Uonian Catholic, hut thoroughly devoted to the 

 annexation of the island to the Tinted States, and the 

 reason for his opinion was soon evident. Throughout the 



