The building was designed by Mr. G. N. Ruggieri of Panama, and constructed under the supervision of Mr. F. H. Arosemena. The contractors were Messrs. J. Gabriel Duque and Ramon Arias jr. The decorative painter was Mr. Enrico Conrado. The builders are to be complimented on the excellence of their work, which will stand as a lasting monument to their efforts.

THE PAN-AMERICAN RAILROAD.

But for the untimely death of that far-seeing statesman, James G. Blaine, the Pan-American Railway would doubtless now be an accomplished fact. The scheme, if not born in his brain, was certainly fathered by Mr. Blaine from the moment he became Secretary of State. Mr. A. J. Cassatt, former president of the Pennsylvania Railroad, was made chairman of the first committee from the various American republics, and all went well until death called the prime mover. After Mr. Blaine's death and during the Cleveland administrations, the Pan-American Railway fell into innocuous desuetude, and not until a little over two years ago, when Andrew Carnegie offered to finance the undertaking, did it come to life again.

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Mr. Carnegie provided the money to send commissioners to consult with the various South American publics interested, and the amount necessary to correct the surveys made by the United States Government during Mr. Blaine's hour of influence. Since Mr. Carnegie made his generous offer, there has been considerable shaking up of dry bone railway projects in South America. Both the railways of Argentina, ending at Bahia Blanca, and those of Chile terminating at Valdivia, have mooted new pro

jects for extending the South American railway system southward toward the Straits of Magellan and Cape Horn. About the Straits gold and coal abound, and with the ever-increasing tide of immigration, the temperate countries of South America find that it pays to open up new lands by the building of railroads. Argentina is now covered with a network of steel, while new projects are ever forming. A trunk line extends from Buenos Ayres to Huanuco on the border of Bolivia, where contractors are at work connecting the Trans-Bolivian railway with the Argentina railways to the south, and at the same time building northward to the Peruvian railway that is slowly making its way through that country. But there is a gap of one thousand miles between Cuzco in Peru and Guayaquil in Ecuador which for the entire distance is practically untraversed by iron rails. From Guayaquil to Quito, an American syndicate is just completing a modern railway above the clouds that may ultimately be extended to the Colombian border. There is another thousand mile gap between Quito and San José in Costa Rica, extending through the Isthmus of Panama. Within the past year, one or two applications for railroad concessions in Panama have been made, but terms could not be agreed upon. From Lake Nicaragua

to southern Mexico there is still another stretch of one thousand miles as yet devoid of railway facilities. From the vicinity of Tehuantepec however, there is not a break, and the run to New York City may be made in four days by express train. The Tehuantepec Railway is completed, the U. S. Government is digging the Panama Canal, and Central American railway schemes are hatched almost daily; in fact, a powerful corporation has already practically obtained a monopoly for railroad construction in Costa Rica, the intention being to build a line that in time will form a connecting link in the Pan-American system.

When the United States extended its network of railways into Mexico, the commerce of that country was

diverted from Europe until to-day two-thirds of the trade with Mexico is with the great republic of the north. Every year the United States sends goods of greater value to Mexico; Central America and Panama than the total of the entire exports to South America, which amounts to but a scant $50,000,000. Mr. Carnegie believes that commerce follows the locomotive, and therefore he has promised that commercial drummers will be able to Scour the South American continent inside of ten years via. the PanAmerican Railway and its ramifications.

It is a great contract for one man to undertake the building of a railway, much of which must be above the clouds. Never before has man encountered such engineering difficulties as those that confront the builders of the Andean lines; not even in constructing railways in the Himalayas of India have such stupendous obstacles presented themselves. The lowest trans-continental passes in the Andes are higher than the summit of Mont Blanc. Only slow-working natives will be able to labor in this rarefied atmosphere, and many passengers from seacoast lands will probably be compelled to take the journey in stages. Water for man, beast and locomotive will have to be carried for hundreds of miles in these high altitudes where rain seldom falls. Great bridges must span apparently bottomless gulches, and tracks laid along the edge of precipices, and in grooves cut in the mountainsides. The scenery will be the most sublime ever spread before the eye of man, but the panorama will cost the projectors of the Pan-American railway more than $200,000,000 to produce.

PANAMA'S DIPLOMATIC CORPS.

In all the capitals of Central and South America, none can boast of a better or more intelligent representation in

E. LAZENBY & SON, LTD., LONDON, ENGLAND.

FRANK ULLRICH & Co., Agents.

PANAMA AND COLON, R. P.
DRINK BUDWEISER "KING OF ALL BEERS".

which maintains both a Legation and a Consulate General. ested by reason of canal operations, is the United States, led to the appointment by the various governments of wideterests involved in the construction of the great canal has awake progressive men. Naturally the country most interThe diversity of nationalities enlisted, and international inits foreign diplomatic and consular service than Panama.

On October 20, 1906, the Hon. H. G. Squiers was appointed to the important post of Minister Plenipotentiary and Envoy Extraordinary of the United States at Panama, to succeed Chas. E. Magoon. Mr. Squiers is a native of Canada, born April 20, 1859. He received a thorough military training, and entering the United States Army on October 12, 1877, he was appointed Second Lieutenant of the First Infantry, and served in Dakota, taking part in the Black Hills expedition of 1878. He subsequently joined the Seventh United States Cavalry, as First Lieutenant, at Fort Yates, Dakota. In the fall of 1885, Lieut. Squiers officiated as Professor of Military Science and Tactics at St. John's College, Fordham, N Y., and as a testimonial of his five years' service at that institution, he was honored with the degrees of M. A. and L.L.D., in June, 1905. In November, 1890, when trouble broke out with the Indians in South Dakota, he rejoined his regiment at Pine Ridge Agency, and after taking part in an arduous winter's campaign against the hostile Sioux, he served on garrison duty at Fort Riley, Kansas, until November, 1891, when he retired from army service. Mr. Squiers held the position of Secretary of the United States Embassy at Berlin in 1894, and in 1898, during the Boxer troubles in China, he was Secretary to the United States Legation at Pekin. During the Pekin siege, he acted as Chief of Staff to Sir Charles Macdonald, for which official service he received the thanks of the British Government. He was also United States Minister Plenipotentiary and Envoy Extraordinary to Cuba from the formal inauguration of that government in May, 1902, until he resigned the position in December, 1905. His residence and office in Panama is at the American Legation building, corner of Fourth St. and Central Avenue.

Every one who has been in Panama any length of time knows of the representative of Great Britain, the Hon. Claude C. Mallet. Mr. Mallet entered the diplomatic service