The South American Republics, Part 2 of 2

by Thomas Cleland Dawson

DON RAMON CASTILLA.

The Porfirio Diaz of Peru was at hand, a little, quiet, rough, and unpretentious soldier, who for twenty years had been modestly doing his duty, observing events and slowly maturing in character. All Peruvians knew him as one of the heroes of Ayacucho, but none appreciated his latent possibilities, and he had been passed by while his more showy companions of that historic day had pushed themselves to the front. Ramon Castilla had been a colonel on Gamarra's staff at Ayacucho, and was rewarded by being appointed prefect of his native province—Tarapaca, the most southern part of Peru. About 1830 he began to take part in the civil wars, but he never started a revolution on his own account, and always seems to have chosen the side that best promised stability and respect for the Constitution. To Orbegoso. Castilla was long faithful but abandoned him when he made alliance with the Bolivians. He went into exile when Santa Cruz was victorious, and returned with Gamarra and the Chileans. At the battle of Yungay he commanded the Peruvian contingent of the allied cavalry, and when Gamarra became president gave him his adhesion; but was taken prisoner at the fatal battle of Yngavi, where his chief was killed. Returning from captivity he found Peru torn to pieces by the armed rivalry of contending generals, and Menendez, the legal president, a fugitive. Unhesitatingly he threw himself into the conflict against those whose claims rested on their own pronunciamentos. Landing at Arica with only five men, his cool audacity saved his life in the first attack; his little band increased; Vivanco's partisans were confounded by the rapidity of his movements; their opponents hastened to join him. Castilla obtained control of Arequipa and Cuzco, and finally, in July, 1844, completely overthrew Vivanco's army, putting an end to the civil war. The first use he made of his victory was to declare a general amnesty; the second to restore Menendez to the position of acting president. The latter called a convention, and ten months later Castilla was elected president of Peru without opposition.

The country realised at once that it was in the hands of a master—a man strong enough to be generous, but with whom it was not safe to trifle. Almost instantaneously commerce felt the impulse which assured peace always gives. The turbulent military leaders found their occupation slipping away, while the orderly elements of the community grew in power. At heart the vast majority of the people were law-abiding, and the class which promoted revolutions was numerically an insignificant element of the population. But it was not alone Castilla's personal force of character, his shrewdness as a politician, his prestige as a general, his popularity so nobly won by generosity and moderation, which made his position secure. At the moment he assumed supreme power bountiful Providence placed in his hands riches untold. Holding the strings of a purse into which poured the millions from the guano and nitrate deposits, he could reward his friends, keep his troops contented by regular pay, relieve agriculture of taxation, place the disordered finances on a sound footing, and promote general prosperity by works of public utility. Europe suddenly realised the value of the bird manure found on the desert islands of the Peruvian coast, and soon hundreds of ships were coming annually to load the precious fertiliser.

Instead of squandering this fairy gift on the enrichment of his creatures, or on the creation of a vast, useless, and wasteful swarm of office-holders,—the hardest of all temptations for a South American politician to resist,—Castilla paid interest on the foreign debt which Peru had incurred during the war of independence, and refunded it, with the accrued interest, that already amounted to more than the principal. The internal debt was also consolidated, care being taken to admit no fictitious claims; telegraphs and railways were constructed; steam vessels added to the navy; and all legitimate branches of the administration adequately provided for. But the moment Castilla's strong hand was removed, extravagance and corruption grew to alarming proportions. Under General Echenique, his successor, public offices and pensions were multiplied; concessions were granted not to promote honestly new industries, but to favourites to be sold for what they would bring; and finally a measure was rushed through congress to extend the time fixed by Castilla for presenting claims to be funded in the internal debt. It was openly charged that the ministerial ring had arranged to put themselves on the roll of national creditors. Public opinion was scandalised, and the discontent and jealousy soon showed itself in open revolt. The first insurrection was suppressed, but in the beginning of 1854 Castilla decided to put himself at the head of the movement against Echenique. Though the government regulars were better armed and provided than the militia which rallied around Castilla, the latter advanced from one position to another and finally overthrew the president in the decisive battle of La Palma. Echenique fled the country and Castilla assumed the reins of power once more, not to lay them down until 1862, when he voluntarily retired to private life. His second administration was as orderly as his first except for a local insurrection at Arequipa. He was not, however, so successful in restraining the predatory disposition of the Peruvian politicians and was unable to restore the administration to its old economical basis. The eighteen years of almost uninterrupted peace which elapsed between the beginning of Castilla's first administration and his retirement changed the face of Peru. A generation had grown up to whom the early years of independence were only a tradition. War, age, banishment, discouragement had thinned the ranks of the Ayacucho veterans, and the days were gone when one of them had merely to issue a pronunciamento to be forthwith hailed as president, dictator, supreme chief, protector, regenerator, by a turbulent soldiery and a fickle, ambitious Creole aristocracy. Peru's subsequent troubles have been financial, not military.

In 1860 the Constitution which still governs the country was adopted. Framed under Castilla's influence it retains the centralised system of provincial government through prefects appointed from Lima, and gives the executive preponderant powers, although it is liberal and humane in its guaranties to the citizen. Slavery and Indian tribute, which continued to exist until 1855, are forbidden; forced recruiting, the scourge of old revolutionary days, is a crime; all Peruvians who can read and write, who own property or pay taxes, are entitled to vote.

Castilla was succeeded by his old friend and companion in arms, General San Roman, a straightforward soldier who resembled his chief in his unquestioning obedience to lawful authority, but whose unfortunate death six months after his inauguration prevented him from demonstrating whether he possessed the same statesmanlike qualities. Vice-President Pezet peacefully took his place. Castilla had encouraged foreign immigration into the coast valleys, so admirably adapted to cotton and sugar, but where labour was scarce. Chinese coolies had come in large numbers, and the flattering offers had also attracted some Europeans. Among the latter were seventy Basque families, who shortly claimed that they were badly treated. Making a protest against a breach of contract committed by the proprietor of the estate on which they were working, they were attacked and some of them killed. The criminals escaped punishment, and the Spanish government made an international question of the affair, finally demanding an apology and three millions of dollars as indemnity. This being refused Spain broke off diplomatic relations and sent a powerful fleet, which seized the Chincha guano islands. Too weak alone to bid defiance to the Spanish ships, Pezet temporised, meanwhile asking Chile for help, and hoping for the early arrival of war-ships ordered in Europe. But the Spaniards pressed him so hard that he thought himself forced to yield to their demands. He concluded an agreement derogatory to the national honour, and a terrific outburst of public indignation followed. Prado, prefect of Arequipa, made preparations to march on Lima and depose the pusillanimous president; the Chileans, who had meantime determined to join in resistance to Spanish aggression, supported the insurrection; the terrible old Castilla went himself to the presidential mansion and gave Pezet a sound rating. The latter gave in and offered his resignation. Prado became supreme chief, issued a declaration of war against Spain, and signed a treaty of alliance with Chile. During the absence of the Spanish fleet the batteries at Callao were heavily reinforced, and an immense force of volunteers flocked to man the guns. When the Spanish ships appeared and, gallantly running into range, opened fire on the 2d of May, 1866, they were met by a determined resistance. Though the Peruvians suffered most severely—two thousand being killed and wounded—their opponents were unable to effect a landing or obtain the slightest concession, and their ships were so badly damaged that they abandoned further hostilities.

Prado now found that the unconstitutional character of his position had only temporarily been ignored when he attempted to hold the power against General Canseco, second vice-president, who was Pezet's lawful successor. Castilla, now over seventy years old, landed in his native province, determined to unseat him. But the enfeebled frame of the aged warrior was unable to withstand fatigues and he died of exposure on the march. Canseco, however, roused Arequipa. Prado failed to take the place by assault, and gave up further opposition. Meanwhile Colonel Balta had headed a formidable insurrection in the north, and though Canseco was allowed to fill out his legal term, Balta's friends controlled the electoral college, and he was inaugurated president in August, 1868.

With his accession Peru entered definitely upon a new era. The race for fortune absorbed the energies of the ruling class; cane and cotton planting, nitrate mining, railroad building under foreign direction, opened up vistas of profit without labour; social and civil intrigue replaced fighting and pronunciamentos. Castilla's liberal refunding of the old debt, the scrupulous regularity with which international obligations had been met, and the immense and increasing revenue from nitrate and guano, gave Peru credit in the money markets of Europe. Balta and his advisers were full of schemes for the material progress of the country and their own enrichment. A great railway system was projected and more than two thousand miles constructed at a cost of near forty million pounds. Enormous sums were spent on port works; expensive moles and piers built in the wave-lashed roadsteads which are Peru's only harbours; for the first time serious efforts were made to explore and develop the forested plain east of the Andes; the city of Iquitos was built at the head of deep-water navigation on the Amazon; office-holders multiplied; and new parks and public buildings embellished the cities. English capitalists eagerly took the bonds which the Peruvian government recklessly issued, and the foreign debt increased from five millions sterling to forty-nine millions before the end of Balta's term—a sum upon which two-thirds of the gross revenue would hardly suffice to pay interest. Such a debt was truly stupendous for a country most of whose population of scant two millions and a half was poor, non-commercial, non-industrial, and without other resources than a rude agriculture. Leaving out the proceeds of the guano monopoly and the nitrate royalties, the total revenues could not pay the interest.