14 SAN JUAN DEL NORTE. Book I. 
ning of the eighteenth century, and that, from 1796 down 
to the time of Central American independence, it was one 
of the official ports of entry for the Spanish dominions in 
this part of the world. The more recent history of the 
place, since it has acquired some importance in American 
politics, is not without interest, intimately connected as it 
is with the question of the Mosquito Protectorate, with the 
contended stipulations of the Clayton-Bulwer treaty, with 
the disputed territorial rights of Nicaragua and Costarica, 
with the claims of the different transit companies, and the 
adventurous expeditions of the modern filibusters. At the 
time of my arrival, the town was governed by the British 
Consul for the King of Mosquitia. In the name of this 
sovereign the custom-house duties were collected ; in his 
name the building-lots of the town and divisions of land in 
the neighbourhood were sold ; and this state of things con- 
tinued until, on the 1st of May of 1851, the inhabitants, 
with the consent of England, have declared their com- 
munity to form a free city and independent republic under 
a constitution of their own, which they adopted in 1852, 
and which has ever since remained in force. In 1854, 
after having considerably increased, the place, by an act of 
the government of the United States, which has been 
almost universally condemned, was totally destroyed, so 
that a few houses only remained, — a proceeding which, 
though produced by no other ostensible cause than a 
quarrel raised between the town and the Accessory Tran- 
sit Company, is not without some political signification, in 
so far as the question of the British Protectorate was 
thereby put to a decisive test. A consideration of this 
kind is the only motive which can explain a severity un- 
justified by the trifling nature of the pretext. 
The town of San Juan del Norte, which, since the 
