The Washington times., 1902-09-07

birds from Punta Arenas. in the south
ern jumping-off place of the world:
birds from Alaska, birds from Lisbon
and Cadiz and London and Paris. And
every man jack of them was down on
| his luck and ready TO better it By any
venture. desperate or otherwise.
Adventures of their stamp rarely
| have the gift, and still more rarely the
inclination. to tell their deeds. II is a
great pity. For If ever one of those
men who 'rent into Acre could tell the
world what befell them in that voyage
up unknown rivers and through un-
known country that would be a story
worth telling.
For these men were penniless. or
nearly SO. Some of them were ragged.
They were poorly armed and were glad
enough to be equipped with weapons at
all.
They had before them hundreds of
miles of forest, through many miles of
which the way had to be tunneled pain
fully with machetes, so rank was the
tropical foliage. luXuriant with un-
counted centuries of undisturbed
growth.
Fevers steamed out of the wet ground
nights. Ever their way was saluted by
crashings of great trees, for in those
woods trees stand till they fall from
decay. And where there are millions Of
trees, as through all the country of the
Amazon and its tributaries, there are
hundreds of trees that fall every day.
Savages beset their way. Sickness.
hunger, wild beasts threatened them
But for all that there came the news
al last that the republic of Acre had
been proclaimed.
nd IL vir Ia
tering republic. A roaring time they
had. these men, cut off from all the
world. carrying in their own daring
hands the law and its enforcement.
But with it all they tried to build
empire as empires are builded today,
partly with rife and sword, but mostly
with barter and ledger. Rubber began
to pour out, carried down the broad riv-
ers to the coast and reaching the ships.
For long while none of the more or
less easy o-lucky governments around
them perceived what was going on. So
1t happened that before a year was end
ed American business men were buying
rubber and woods from these kings of
Ruritania without knowing that the
money that they paid for II went to en-
rich as romantic a band as ever cut its
way to fortune.
Still it is sad commentary on the
rough path that is prepared in this
world for the righteous that the very
fact that the kings of Acre sought to
increase their substance by honest trade |
should have led to their undoing. But !
SO il was.
Had they been content to sit In sloth |
and seize what money they could by |
virtue of their dictatorship they might |
have hPpn
years. For revolutions and proclaimed
and relationships spring up
throughout South America like mush-
rooms
But prosperity brought envy down upon
Acre. Settlers began to pour in. Most
Of them did not know what kind of re-
public this was, and less cared.
One government is much like another
there. 1t Is like the saying about whis-
ky, only turned around There are
poor governments and poorer govern
ments, but there "ain't any good gov
The intimation that somebody was ac-
ually making money aroused all the ma
.ional pride of Bolivia. Brazil and Peru,
soldiers began to move. The old boun-
larry disputes all came up with new
light on them.
Now il is a matter of almost a year
o move troops into that country from
many points of It's confines. Troops .
rom Peru and Bolivia had to take ship
1t the Pacific coast, go north to the
sthmus of Panama, cross 1t, take ship
Igain and go south, and then finally
make their way UP the Amazon country. ;
That required much time. The kings ,
II Acre sat tight and hastened only in {
heir amassing of honest wealth They !
new that when the troops arrived the 1
anne of empire would be finished.
What happened after those troops die |
ome-after months and more months | Y