Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1914-07-19
he determined.

be determined
Salvadoriaps fnrWar,Ie.I the foreign
relations committee of the Senate pro-
test against the treaty. That meant that
they thought they should have some say
in the matter, and were not too modest
to make known their thoughts.
The country and the people who are
thus seeking to forge ahead factors
in in,ernat onal affairs are often cor
fused with the rest of Central America.
This is a mistake. because they have an
individuality all their own, just as Costa
Rica has. The differences between the
peoples of these Central American COM
monwealths are only beginning to be un-
marked as those between European
countries, which are geographically con-
tiguous.
Salvador is about the size of Rhode
Island. 1t is an agricultural beehive.
just as Rhode Island is an industrial
beehive. A similar comparison some
times is made between Belgium and Sal
vador. Most of the Salvadorians pre-
fer 1t because they know more of Bel
GUM than of the different states in the
American Union.
There are somewhere between a mil
lion and a million one hundred thousand
inhabitants. This population is almost
entirely an agricultural one. engaged in
coffee cultivation. fruit raising and
other forms of tropical farming. In
travelling over the country on muleback
one seldom gets far from a human hab-
itation. The grass-thatched huts of the
natives everywhere dot the landscape.
For a tropical population the Salvado-
rian laborers always seem to be in
dustrious.
labor of w,men and children. part of
the male population also engages in 1t.
Some Of the coffee fncas and planta-
tions are very large, yet for densely
inhabited country Salvador has very
fair proportion of small landowners, in
this respect resembling Costa Rica,
which is much more sparsely settled.
The more thoughtful public men in
Salvador have noted an economic ten
dency in recent years which they de-
p1ore. This is the desire of the big
plantation owners to get more land. In
prosperous coffee years. such as the
present one, the tendency is especially
noticeable. No legislative measures
have yet been adopted for correcting it,
that something should be done to limit
the size of individual landholdings.
The population OF Salvador is basicaI-
ly Indian. and is not lacking in homo
BciSOub elSIueHtS- uuI III us SntlIeIy II
Is a mixed population. Some African
blood from Jamaica and elsewhere has
mixed with the native Indian stock.
There is also the Spanish strain COM
ing from the early Spanish colonists
who mingled freely with the native In
dian races.
The people of the interior are kindly
and rather shy. So great is their polite
ness that they hesitate to give the trav-
eler an answer which may cause him men
tai discomfort. When asked how far the
next coffee flnca, village, wayside
inn may be they have an invariable an
swer:
Just a little farther on
The place about which the inquiry is
made may oe half days weary pour
ney on muleback, but the Salvadorean
peasant always says the same thing. 1t
is just a little farther on.
I knew American travelling in Sal
vador who left the ship at La Libertad
and hired mule to take him to the
capital. The saddle was one Of those pc
cuiiar contrivances. comfortable to look
upon, for it was shaped like the roomy