But it is a notorious fact that inhabitants of countries subject to earthquakes and volcanoes get inured to all idea of danger, and walk on the very brink of disaster with a light and merry heart, indifferent to the lessons of experience or the fate of their predecessors, and on that New Year’s Day the orgies of the Buccaneers were equalled, if not excelled, by many of the inhabitants.
“Where the longitude’s mean and the latitude’s low,
Where the hot winds of summer perennially blow,
Where the mercury chokes the thermometer’s throat,
And the dust is as thick as the hair on a goat,
Where one’s mouth is as dry as a mummy accurst,
There lieth the Land of Perpetual Thirst.”
At midday the bandstand in the Plaza was occupied by many of the leading citizens, who with musical instruments, upon which they were incapable of performing, were making an unearthly din, and had attracted a crowd of the common people around them. Tables laden with champagne bottles and glasses were placed between the groups of performers, who were not less ardent in their attentions to the glass than to the instruments of music which they converted into engines of torture. Whenever their confused vision was capable of distinguishing friends amongst the passers-by, an effort was made to strengthen their forces by a capture, and wise persons kept in the background, and witnessed their descent upon the unwary. Every now and then a scuffle would ensue, and those who fell during its progress were content to remain in the positions they had assumed, to the amusement of the spectators.
It is a custom to make good resolutions on New Year’s Day, and to turn over a new leaf. On the following morning, although a trifle belated, many resolves were made, and the penitents heartily swore that nothing on earth should tempt them from their vows. The fervour with which they denounced the cheering cup, and their repugnance to it, was a strong illustration of the proverb, “Familiarity breeds contempt”; but by the end of a week all traces of their exertions had disappeared, and most of them were as ready as ever to face manfully any other duty in the way of celebration that occasion might present.
IN THE MARKET, PANAMA.
CHAPTER IX
Colombia and Cartagena
IF in the matter of details the history of Colombia—the republic in the extreme north-west corner of the South American continent—has been more lurid than some of its neighbours, in general outline that history has followed the course with which students of Spanish-American affairs are so familiar. There was, first, the discovery of the territory away back in the fifteenth century by Spanish mariners, and its subsequent settlement by colonists from the mother country. Spain always started this work with magnificent enthusiasm, but the feeling of rapture over the possession of new dominions soon wore off, and the annals of these colonies during the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries make drab and uninteresting reading. Colombia’s history is no exception to the general rule. All its existing cities were founded during the early rule of the conquistadores, and the type of slavery imposed upon the Indian population was given its enduring shape. No great developments or changes occurred in the country until the Spanish rule ended and independence was declared.
Being next-door neighbour to Venezuela, Colombia was naturally one of the first states drawn into the ambitious operations of Bolivar, and for a time it looked as though its capital, Bogota, would assume a predominant importance in the southern continent, but the liberator underestimated the strong sense of nationality which had developed in the different sections of the vast country, and when his influence died down Colombia retained her individuality just as Venezuela preserved hers. Not only did the Spanish sovereignty entirely disappear from the State, but the name, New Granada, given to it by the early conquerors, in honour of the province in the mother country, was changed for the more American substitute, Colombia. At first it was known as the “United States of Colombia,” but in 1886 a reform in the direction of centralisation was brought about, and the country is now called “the Republic.”