36 National Geographic Magazine. 
On the western hemisphere there has been considerable activity 
in a variety of interest, tending to develop the political, commer- 
cial and natural resources. 
Four new states have been admitted to the American Union, 
and measures have been introduced in the Congress looking to 
the admission of two more. These acts mark an era in the prog- 
ress of the great northwest significant of a national prosperity that 
a generation ago would have been deemed visionary. We have 
also to record a tentative union formed by the Central American 
states, that at the expiration of the term of ten years prescribed 
by the compact, we may hope will be solidified by a bond to 
make the union perpetual. In South America a bloodless revolu- 
tion presented to the family of nations a new republic in the 
United States of Brazil. All thoughtful men must at least feel a 
throb of sympathy for Dom Pedro, who in a night lost the alle- 
giance of his people and the rule of an empire. Sympathy, per- 
haps, that he does not crave, for history affords us no parallel of 
a monarch who taught his people liberalism, and knowing it could 
but lead to the downfall of his empire. It seems to be true, also, 
that although depriving him of power, the people whom he loved 
and ruled with such liberality, have not forgotten his many vir- 
tues, and that the Emperor Dom Pedro will be revered in republi- 
can Brazil as heartily as though his descendants had been per- 
mitted to inherit the empire. We cannot tell if the new order of 
affairs will prove permanent, but the education of the Brazilians 
in the belief that a republic was inevitable, gives strong grounds. 
to hope the experiment of self-government will not be a failure. 
The influence the successful establishment of this republic is to 
exert in other parts of the world is a problem that has already 
brought new worries to the rulers of Europe, and not without a 
reason, for a republican America is an object lesson that the intel- 
ligence of the age will not be slow to learn. 
The assembly of the “Three Americas Congress” in Washing- 
ton, is also an event that may wield an influence in the future. 
Perhaps it may not be seen for years to come, but it lays the 
foundation for commercial and geographic developments that 
would redound to the credit of the western hemisphere. 
We have seen during the year the virtual failure of the Panama 
Canal company ; for it is unreasonable to believe that a corporation 
so heavily involved with such a small proportion of its allotted 
labor accomplished, can secure the large sum that would be 
