PART OF THE SEA WALL AT PANAMA
The only serious effort to colonize in the Panama region by any people, save Spaniards, was the founding of a colony of Scotch Presbyterians, headed by one William Patterson, who had occupied a Scotch pulpit. Beside theology he must have known something of finance, for he organized, and was one of the first directors of, the Bank of England. His colonization project in Panama was broadly conceived, but badly executed. Taking the rich East India Company for a model he secured a franchise from Scotland, granting him a monopoly of Scottish trade in the Indies in return for an annual tribute of one hogshead of tobacco. Capitalizing his company for $600,000, he backed the shares with his reputation as a founder of the bank and saw the capital over-subscribed in London. But the success woke up his rivals. They worked on the King, persuaded him to denounce the action taken in Scotland and pushed a law through the English Parliament outlawing the Scotch company in England. In every country the people interested in the established companies fought the interloper who was trying to break into their profitable demesne. But the Scotch stuck to their guns. They rallied at first about Patterson as in later years the French flocked to the support of De Lesseps. Ships were built in Amsterdam, pistols were bought by wholesale, brandy and bibles were both gathered in large quantities, and in 1768 volunteers were called for to join the expedition. Every settler was promised fifty acres of agricultural land and one fifty-foot town lot.
THE PELICANS IN THE BAY OF PANAMA
Politics had bothered Patterson at the outset by arraying the English against the Scotch. Now religion added to the dissension. The church and the kirk factions—or the Episcopalians and the Presbyterians—fell afoul of each other. The kirk carried the executive council and Patterson, the only man who knew anything about the expedition, was permitted to accompany it only as an ordinary settler. Graft stepped in and though the colonists paid for six months’ provisions they discovered when far out at sea that they had but enough for two. Moreover nobody on the ships knew where they were going to settle, for they sailed under sealed orders. When these were opened and the tidings spread that Panama and not the East Indies was the destination, there was renewed distrust and disaffection.
ROAD FROM PANAMA TO LA BOCA
The story of this luckless enterprise is short and dismal. On the voyage out forty-four of the adventurers died, and after landing the deaths continued with melancholy regularity. They were spared trouble with the Indians who, on learning that they were no friends to the Spaniards, welcomed them warmly, and urged them to join in driving the Spaniards from the land. But illness held the 900 colonists gripped, and malaria, the ruling pest of those tropical shores, is not wont to stimulate a militant spirit. They had settled on the Atlantic coast in the Darien region, as far from the rich traffic of the East Indies as though they were in their old Caledonian homes. Curiously enough they made no effort to get across to the Pacific, whence only could trade be conducted, but perhaps that was as well, for the Spaniards though much broken by the recent invasion of the buccaneers would have resisted such an advance to their utmost.
