cs, but they were the republics of one freeman and ten slaves;
and the battle of Marathon was fought by slaves unchained from the
doorposts of their master's houses. Italy had her republics; they were
the republics of wealth and skill and family, limited and
aristocratic. Holland had her republic, the republic of guilds and
landholders, trusting the helm of state to property and education. The
Swiss republics were groups of cousins. And all these which, at their
best, held but a million or two within their narrow limits, have gone
down in the ocean of time."

The Spanish-American Republics are nondescripts. They owe their
existence to _pronunciamientos_. They are the puppets of successful
soldiers, and are administered by generals who follow one another like
the ghosts that walked in the vision of "Richard Third," and do not
hold office long enough to be photographed. They are based on mongrel
races, steeped in ignorance, cramped by superstition, and physically
rotten before they get ripe.

Our fathers built a commonwealth on the foundation of manhood. They
recognized no other qualification, save for a period of inconsistency,
_color_; which, happily, is now wiped out of the fundamental law,
though not entirely out of popular prejudice.

The faith in the people which Jefferson, Sam Adams, and the men of '76
cherished as the distinctive tenet of their political creed, has been
justified by results. Their gigantic creation launches into the second
decade of its second century, belted with power, aggrandized with _El
Dorados_, the amazement of the world, the "Arabian Nights" translated
into every-day reality.

Unfortunately, however, in the face of this unprecedented record of
prosperity, certain un-republican tendencies begin to exhibit
themselves among us. These may well give thoughtful patriots startled
concern.

Half a century ago, before time had been annihilated by the telegraph,
and distance abolished by steam, nations were comparatively isolated;
and the American most of all. Europe was three thousand miles away.
Now-a-days, the old world is next-door neighbor to the new. Saint
John's apocalyptic vision is realized; there is "no more sea." It is
bridged by steamers, and flashed out of existence by the electric
cable. What is the consequence? The consequence is that while Europe
borrows many of our ideas, America borrows more of hers. With the
increase of travel, the growth of wealth, the enlargement of our
l