The New York herald. [volume] (New York [N.Y.]) 1840-1920, 1873-05-31


ica-A Nice Place for Healthy
Man.
By q recent act of Congress our diplomatic
establishments respectively in the Central
American States of Costa Rica, Guatemala,
| Honduras. Nicaragua and San Salvador, Ave,
are to be vacated on the 3Oth of June, and one
Minister to all these little Republics is to at
tend to the interests of our government and
people in each of them. Our government
representatives who are thus to be displaced
by the abolition of their offices are Jacob b.
Blair, at the republican Court Of Costa Rica
Silas A. Hudson reported as cousin OF
President Grant,, at Guatemala Henry Dex-
ter, in Honduras Charles N. Riotte, in Mica
ragua, and Thomas Biddle, in San Salvador
and the new man appointed to do the work Of
this diplomatic corps is Colonel George Will
hanson, of Louisiana, who fought for the
Southern Confederacy in the late rebellion,
but who has SINCE like General Longstreet
been completely reconstructed Each of these
aforesaid five Ministers resident receives 81, 500
year. and by bundling all their official duties
upon one man at $12500 there will be a
saving to the Treasury of little pin money
as thus-
sum OF the compensation OF ave Ministers at
salary Of one Minister in lieu Of these ave
Saved. ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS. $27 500
besides reductions of contingent ex-
penses This is not much as an Offset to Con-
gressional back-pay bills, Credit Mobilier cou-
pons and such fat pickings and perquisites;
but it is something in the way Of retrench-
ment, and so we take q note of it.
To the arch@ologist, the naturalist, and to
the lover of tropical richness and variety of
forms in animal and vegetable life, and to the
man who delights in diplomatic dinners and
courtly Inequalities in the Central American
! style, and official escorts and rough riding
from place to place, the bundling Of all these
| Central American missions into one mission
makes this appointment a mighty nice and
most desirable position. Assuming that Colonel
Williamson is man of taste, devotee
of Indian mythology tropical luxuriance,
beauty unadorned, and Of those old Castilian
Inequalities still maintained in the Spanish
American States, we congratulate him on his
good fortune in securing this charming
mission. What tour for pleasure and
scientific observations its travelling duties will
give him We will briefly endeavor to out
line it. Our Minister to the whole chain
OF the Central American Republics we will
say, begins his mission at the north
end Of the line in Guatemala. To get there
he has crossed the Continent from New York
to San Francisco, and thence has been carried
down the Pacific by q government steamer
and dropped at the little Guatemalan seaport
of Yztapa There state carriage and escort
Of cavalry meet him and take him over the
mountains, with fine view of several pretty
volcanoes, en- route to the capital, Guatemala
10 Nueva, city Of forty thousand inhabitants,
where his reception is public festival. He
announces to the President that as within the
limits Of . year he desires to represent the
United States at the capital of each of the five
Republics, he can give them only about two
months each, allowing the other two months
of the twelve for travelling. Then, to make
his short sojourn agreeable, it is made a con-
slant round Of festivities.
From Guatemala Ia Nueva, having finished
his circuit in that quarter, our Minister is
conducted back to the Pacific and shipped by
steamer or fishing smack to La Union-good
name-the chief seaport Of San Salvador,
where, in his conducta to the ruins of the CAPT.
tai, and afterward, the honors Of Guatemala
| are repeated, with the addition Of weeks
official exploration of some of the splendid vol
canoes Of San Salvador, still simmering and
h,,11 frov,, <hair late
over the table lands and mountains, by mule
train, he goes to Comayagua, the capital Of
| Honduras, where among other excursions, he
will have the pleasure trip to the beautiful
| Spanish built city Of Tegucigalpa, on the
| right bank of the Chalcoteca, in charm
ing amphitheatre among the hills.
Thence continuing his journey southwark by
pack mules, he crosses the mountains into
Nicaragua and to Leon, the capital of the Re-
public, on the Pacific side OF the Cordileras.
Thence, after his two months of festivities at
Leon and via the great lakes Managua and
Nicaragua and through the magnificent for
ests of the San Juan River, by fat boat, he
descends to the Atlantic coast, whence, by
coasting schooner he will proceed down the
seaboard to the port of Costa RIGA, most con-
venient for an overland mule train to the State
capital, San Jose, a busy little city, and in
full view of royal line of volcanoes. Here,
winding up the first twelve months of his
rowing commission, our Minister, il satisfied
that ''enough Of this sort of thing is as good
as q feast" will come home and write book.
Otherwise, We shall expect him to repeat the
circuit we have indicated from Guatemala
We suppose that Mr.. Secretary Fishs in
structions to Colonel Williamson will embrace
substantially the line Of travels we have indi-
Gated; but, if possessing love Of the beauti-