Darien Indians wearing wooden crowns exactly as described by Dampier and Ringrose in their accounts of the buccaneers’ trip across the isthmus
PANAMA
The Tuira River down which Sharp and his men traveled
PANAMA
Darien (Kuna) Indians, the Indians who guided Sharp and his men
Is it any wonder, then, that Panama is undeveloped, largely unsettled, backward, and poverty-stricken? Were it not for the canal and the Americans, the country would have been ruined long ago. The towns were pest-holes until our engineers stepped in and sanitized them. The country was always in debt until an American fiscal agent took charge of Panamanian finances and checked the wholesale robbery among the officials. Panama’s income is almost entirely derived from Americans [[321]]and the canal, and without our aid and support the people could not even have won their independence or have maintained it afterward.
But there is not the least gratitude for what we have done. There is no more self-sufficient, egotistical, conceited man on earth than the average Panamanian; and while he is wise enough to know on which side his bread is buttered, he detests the Americans from the bottom of his heart, and particularly resents the fact that under American supervision the treasury cannot be looted at will by every political hanger-on, grafter, and protégé of the officials.
The stranger does not at first realize the true condition of affairs in the country, and is prone to take the Panamanians at their own valuation; for they are smooth talkers and prate loudly of their enlightenment, their progress, and their appreciation of the Americans. But, like all Latin Americans, they are born diplomats, and laud America publicly and curse her privately. Indeed, were it not for the ever-present power of Uncle Sam, the lives and property of Americans would be worth nothing in the republic; and, even as it is, crimes against Americans are whitewashed whenever possible.