The Republican journal. [volume] (Belfast, Me.) 1829-current, 1898-02-24


wiser fills this want 1t contains over 1000
| pages and nearly 500 illustrations.
would be declared elected without oppo-
sition But they reckoned without their
host in leaving General Guardia out of the
account. Having had a taste of power,
he concluded that little more of the
same would be agreeable; and so he quiet
ly passed the word around among his
officers that he, himself, was candidate
| for the Presidency. AS these ex-cow-
boys from Guanacasta were his old friends
and constituted the judges of election
and the returning board, there was no
trouble about it. When the returns be-
gan to come in after election day, the
banker and his CO. conspirators were about
as surprised a lot of men as could be
| found in year journey. Their ignorant
tool had become their master, impossible
to manage. Then General Guardia was
declared the constitutional PRESIDENT
by unanimous vote, only 1000 ballots
having been cast by population of 300
600. He was of the mixed Spanish and
Indian race, which is perhaps the best in
the country, and like Juarez of Mexico
(who was also Spanish and Indian, with
considerably more of the latter than the
former, )he was blessed with extraordinary
energy, discretion, and shrewdness; in
short, he turned out to be the greatest
man Costa Rica has ever produced. Under
his command the nation progressed and
| developed as Bever before or since. He
| established free schools and University,
sent young men abroad to study the sci
( ence of government, and preserved the
peace as he aided the progress of the peo-
pie. He learned rapidly and selected the
wisest aud ablest men in the country for
his cabinet and officers, and so far as lay
in his power introduced an era of moral
intellectual and commercial advancement.
Ii he had been as wise as he was progress
sive, Costa Rica would to-day stand at
the head of the Central American Repub-
lies in all respects; but in his zeal for the
development of the country, he went too
fast and far and left it bankrupt.
We must not leave Costa RIGA without
some reference to the most interesting
but least known people in 1.-THE Guat-
usos, or ''White Indians of the Rio Frio.
This stream, SO named because of it's ex-
IRENE GOODNESS rises in the northern
mountains and loses itself in Lake Nicara-
qua, opposite Fort Carlos. For 400 years
the valley of the Frio has been a literal
terra incognita. What manner of people
inhabit it, how they live, what their blood,
language, customs and religion, is food
for conjecture. From the beginning they
seem to have sworn that no stranger
they have fiercely repealed all who sought
admission. Even powerful expeditions,
such as that of 1888, projected and led by
Tristan, Bishop of Nicaragua, and the
yet stronger one of 1S49, were boldly met
and driven back. Catholic missionaries,
who went on peaceful errands Jared no
better-for not one returned to tell the
tale of his adventures. The illustrious
DIR. Don Francisco de Paula Garcea Pc
laez writes of the. Guatusos region in this
WISE sit was as if these mountains were
the very gates of hell, from within which
there was no redemption. Finally, about
It's years ago, after many good priests
had disappeared within these mysterious
gates, the See of Rome fearing that the
formally cut the inscrutable region off
from all future benefits of religion and
forbade any to enter it,
The statement that the Guatusos are
white corresponds with the report of
Bishop Tristan's expedition in 1888
After marching IA days up the Rio Frio
they came at last upon number of those
Indians encamped in shady bend of the
river, whom they described as ''good size
aud white skim Later information con-
corning this singular tribe may be found
in the ''Chronista de Costa Rica," in
which an army officer says: 'Between
the peaks of those two lofty volcanoes,
Orosi and Miravalles, and the river of
San Carlos, extends a vast plain inhabit
ed by the Guatusos. 1t is pretended that
this tribe is descended from the European
colonists who fled from 'Esparza when
that city was taken by the tillibusters of
antiquity. Those who have CHANGED to
see any of them affirm that they are
white, have boards, and are practiced in
military discipline. ~ 1t is further related
that company of the Costa Rcan army,
under general George Cauty, (who de-
scended the northern mountains and en-
tered San Juan at the time when forts,
steamboats, and everything else in the