It was inevitable that stagnation of commerce should have ensued, but the traders by this time no longer dared to complain openly. Francia himself, so long as he had the State to govern, cared little whether its people were rich or poor. As for the unfortunate Spaniards in Paraguay, the enactments against them became more and more severe. As evidence of his supreme contempt for these Europeans, Francia issued a decree by which they were forbidden to intermarry with a white woman. This extraordinary measure shows the length to which this strange man carried his tyranny, and how deeply was the hatred of the Spaniard implanted in his queer and grim mind.
It is impossible, however, to go fully into the details of Francia's autocratic reign, incredible as many of these are. The destruction of the Church, the secularization of the monks, wholesale executions and torturings, the suppression of the Post Office, and a hundred other acts of irresponsible and childish tyranny—these are only some of the episodes which characterized the days of his rule.
During all this while the power of the army grew until militarism became rampant—militarism, that is to say, instigated by Francia, since no officer or man of his troops dared move hand or finger unless commanded by the Dictator himself. His title was now "Supremo Dictator Perpetuo de la Republica del Paraguay" (Supreme and Perpetual Dictator of the Republic of Paraguay).
This he retained until the day of his death, no man daring to dispute for a single instant his perfect right to the title. Grim and implacable, he continued his career unchallenged to the last. Considering the circumstances, his vitality remained unimpaired for a strangely long period, for Francia died at the advanced age of eighty years, after a virtual reign of nearly thirty years.
Francia was succeeded by Carlos Antonio Lopez, who showed himself, by comparison, a liberal-minded and progressive ruler. During his reign few events of real importance occurred, although the trading facilities permitted by the new Dictator were responsible for the increasing intercourse between Paraguay and the outer world. On the death of Carlos Antonio Lopez the chief office of the State of Paraguay was occupied by his eldest son, Francisco Solano Lopez.
Francisco Solano had seen more of the outer world than was usual in the case of the Paraguayan of that period. He had resided in Paris, where he had carried out a diplomatic mission, and where his intelligence had won golden opinions from all those who came into contact with him. Indeed, the impression he had produced on all sides was favourable in the extreme, and great things were expected as the outcome of his government in Paraguay.
On the death of his father Lopez showed no small sense of initiative, for the only office to which he could assume any shadow of a right to claim at the moment was that of Vice-President. Acting in this capacity, he obtained immediate control of the army, summoned a meeting of the Deputies, and told them it was their task to elect a new President. Seeing that the building was surrounded by troops in the pay of Lopez, the great majority took the hint. Two only of their number did not acclaim Francisco Solano as the new autocrat of Paraguay, and as these two disappeared on the following night, and were never seen again, the unwisdom of opposition was strongly inculcated from the start. The Dictator's full title was "Jefe Supremo y General de los Exercitos de la Republica del Paraguay"; his familiar title, and the one he most encouraged, was "Supremo."
With the power once in his hands, Francisco Solano Lopez changed his tactics as completely and as abruptly as had Francia in his day. Tyranny once more became the accepted order of things. Lopez had brought with him from France his mistress, Madame Lynch, a Parisian of Irish descent, and it was this latter alone who possessed the slightest influence over the new autocrat. Indeed, once firmly established on his throne—for his Dictator's seat was in reality nothing less—Lopez II. showed a most callous disregard for the lives of any of his subjects, whether great or small. Ever since his visit to France Napoleon had constituted his ideal of manhood, and it was upon the conduct of the great Corsican that he loved to think he modelled his own.
Certainly Lopez was utterly free from any dread of holocaust. In a very short while the prisons had been filled to overflowing, and the red soil of Paraguay grew redder with the blood of hundreds of executions. Once again the barriers began to be set up between Paraguay and the outer world, and once again it became almost impossible for one who had crossed its frontiers to return to his native land. But, since it was the fate of Lopez to have lived in a later age than Francia, the ambitions of this third Dictator were correspondingly enlarged. It was not his design ultimately to shut off Paraguay from the rest of the Continent; it was his plan rather to cause the frontiers of his country to spread until they had enveloped all the other lands. Thus he considered he was acting in conformity with the true Napoleonic tradition, and also, incidentally, with his own desires and dreams.
In order to be prepared for the great day which was to come to Paraguay, the army was increased, trained, and drilled until it became one of the most important and efficient military organizations in the Continent. This army was completely and entirely the toy of Lopez. The men were his to be shot or promoted at his slightest whim, and the officers were subjected to precisely the same irresponsible but merciless discipline.