Finally, a word of caution to those in search of information regarding the history, politics, or geography of South America. The most unfortunate result of the seven centuries during which Arab, Moorish, or Mohammedan rule dominated a part or the whole of the Spanish peninsula, is the truly Oriental attitude which the Spanish and the Spanish-American maintains towards reliable information, or what we call “facts.”
The student of the East realizes that Orientals, including Turks and Celestials, have no sense of the importance of agreeing with fact. They have furthermore a great abhorrence of a vacuum. If they do not know the reply to a question they answer at random, preferring anything to the admission of ignorance. If they do know, and have no interest in substituting something else for what they know, they give the facts. When they have no facts they give something else. They not only deceive the questioner, they actually deceive themselves.
The same thing is true to a certain degree in South Americans. Sometimes I have thought they were actually too polite to say “I don’t know.”
In South America as in the East it is of primitive importance to reach the men who know and to pay no attention to any one else. No one really knows, who is not actually on the spot in contact with the facts. The prudent observer must avoid all evidence that is not first hand and derived from a trustworthy source.
I do not bring this as a charge against the South Americans. I state it as a condition which I have found to be nearly universally true. So far as the South Americans are concerned, it is an inherited trait and one which they are endeavoring to overcome. They are not to be blamed for having it, any more than we are to be blamed for having inherited traits from our Anglo-Saxon ancestors which are unpleasant to our Latin neighbors and for which they have to make allowance in dealing with us.
In offering these adverse criticisms of the South American as he appears to me to-day, I must beg not to be misunderstood. There are naturally many exceptions to the rule. I know personally many individuals that do not have any of the characteristics here attributed to South Americans in general. I have in mind one South American, a resident of a much despised republic, whose ancestors fought in one of the great battles of the Wars of Independence, who has as much push and energy as a veritable New York captain of industry. He has promoted a number of successful industrial enterprises. He keeps up with the times; he meddles not in politics; he enjoys such sports as hunting with hounds and riding across country. The difference between him and the New Yorker is that he speaks three or four languages where the New Yorker only speaks one and he has sense enough to take many holidays in the year where the New Yorker takes but few. I know another, a distinguished young lawyer who gives dinner parties where the food is as good, the manners as refined, the conversation as brilliant, and the intellectual enjoyment as keen as any given anywhere. He, too, speaks four languages fluently and could put to shame the average New York lawyer of his own age in the variety of topics upon which he is able to converse, not only at his ease but brilliantly and with flashes of keen wit. I know another, a distinguished historian, who has been described by a well-known American librarian, himself a member of half a dozen learned societies, as the “most scholarly and most productive” bibliographer in either North or South America. But these are exceptions to the general rule.
When we look at South Americans at close range we may dislike some of their manners and customs, but not any more so than European critics disliked ours half a century ago. And not any more so, be it remembered, than the South American dislikes ours at the present day.
In this chapter and, in fact, throughout the book, I must confess to having spoken more frankly and critically than will please some of my kind friends in South America. Although they placed me under many obligations by their generous hospitality, I feel that it is better for all concerned that the truth should be told, even when it is unpleasant. We cannot have confidence unless we have facts. I cannot pretend to have succeeded in always finding the facts, but it has not been for lack of endeavor. I have had no interest in concealing anything favorable or unfavorable which I thought would make the picture clearer or more distinct. Were we not already deluged with so much official propaganda, it would have been my privilege to tell more of the wonderful natural resources which all the South American republics possess. But just because it has not been the business of “boosters” or promoters to advertise difficulties or obstacles to progress, it becomes the more necessary for the unprejudiced traveller to lay more stress on the existing human handicaps, than on the wonderful natural resources. It is an unpleasant task, but I believe it is worth doing. I have no patience with those writers who paint everything in glowing colors and leave others to discover the truth at their own expense. Nor have I any sympathy with those who distort or emphasize disagreeable truths for the sake of creating a sensation. I will, however, plead guilty to being a prejudiced observer in so far as I am an ardent advocate of closer and more intelligent relations between the United States and the South American republics, and a firm believer in the truth that international friendships, in order to be lasting, must be built on an honest understanding of prevailing conditions and racial tendencies.