all Americans. It is not difficult to
assign a cause for this. In the first place, many of the negroes,
fugitive from the Southern States, had sought refuge in this and the
other States of Central America, where every profession was open to
them; and as they were generally superior men--evinced perhaps by
their hatred of their old condition and their successful flight--they
soon rose to positions of eminence in New Granada. In the priesthood,
in the army, in all municipal offices, the self-liberated negroes were
invariably found in the foremost rank; and the people, for some
reason--perhaps because they recognised in them superior talents for
administration--always respected them more than, and preferred them
to, their native rulers. So that, influenced naturally by these freed
slaves, who bore themselves before their old masters bravely and like
men, the New Granada people were strongly prejudiced against the
Americans. And in the second and third places, they feared their
quarrelsome, bullying habits--be it remembered that the crowds to
California were of the lowest sorts, many of whom have since
fertilised Cuban and Nicaraguan soil--and dreaded their schemes for
annexation. To such an extent was this amusingly carried, that when
the American Railway Company took possession of Navy Bay, and
christened it Aspinwall, after the name of their Chairman, the native
authorities refused to recognise their right to name any portion of
the Republic, and pertinaciously returned all letters directed to
Aspinwall, with "no such place known" marked upon them in the very
spot for which they were intended. And, in addition to this, the legal
authorities refused to compel any defendant to appear who was
described as of Aspinwall, and put every plaintiff out of court who
described himself as residing in that unrecognised place.

Under these circumstances, my readers can easily understand that when
any Americans crossed the Isthmus, accompanied by their slaves, the
Cruces and Gorgona people were restlessly anxious to whisper into
their ears offers of freedom and hints how easy escape would be. Nor
were the authorities at all inclined to aid in the recapture of a
runaway slave. So that, as it was necessary for the losers to go on
with the crowd, the fugitive invariably escaped. It is one of the
maxims of the New Granada constitution--as it is, I believe, of the
English--that on a slave touching its soil his chains fall from him.
Rather