her European possessions, a Quixotic war against the Turks, and finally the foolish wars of succession to determine which of two worthless royal houses would reign in Spain. The Spanish renaissance of 1750-90, short lived and futile, came too late to have any effect on the colonies. They had learned that Spain regarded them purely as a source of revenue, and had also learned the beginnings of the lesson of selfdependence. Yet all these wars in Europe affected Panama, for the continual state of hostility gave rise to the ceaseless attacks on Spain's commerce, and even in the few years of peace that intervened at home, there was no peace in the colonies.

In this period the royal authority was threatened by a revolution in 1563, in which a leader named Mendez and his band took advantage of the absence of the Governor at Nombre de Dios to attack and occupy the city of Panama. Mendez was

Internal
Affairs.

captured and executed.

The cimarrones began a series of attacks on the Government in 1549, when one of their chieftains established himself on the Gulf of San Miguel, and devastated the country, until defeated by a regular expedition from the city. In 1553 to 1554 a negro named Bayano became so bold in his raids on the pack trains that a regular expedition was sent against him, which he defeated. A second expedition surprised and took him prisoner, but a well-meaning Governor allowed him to go on his promise to be good. He broke his parole and after a hard campaign was captured and sent to Spain. But his companions continued their depredations on the pack-train commerce. The name of this chief is retained in the region where he ruled, for the Chepo River is commonly called the Bayano.

In 1637 the Indians of Darien under an able chieftain rose against the Spaniards and laid waste the towns of that region. A treaty of peace was finally made in which they recognized the King as their suzerain, and in return were let alone by the Spaniards.

In the period 1556 to 1600 the work of colonizing Veraguas was carried on with the loss of many lives, innumerable little quarrels with the Indians, and no great benefits to any

one.

Within the city itself there was a fire in 1563 that destroyed forty buildings; and another in 1644 that burned 83 buildings, among them the new cathedral in process of con

struction. The city itself was destroyed in January, 1671, when the pirate Morgan captured it. Of this and the founding of the new city more is told elsewhere in this book (pages 117, 151, 179.)

The government of the colonies was vested in a home administration consisting of the Council of the Indies, residing in Spain, and colonial officials with various titles corresponding to the amount of authority vested in them —viceroy, captain general, governor, adelantado, cabildo. Judicial authority in the colonies was vested in Royal Audiences; from whose decisions there was an appeal to the Council of the Indies.

The Council of the Indies had jurisdiction over all matters pertaining to the colonies, was, in short, the King's adviser

on colonial affairs. Under it came even the Government. viceroys, and all the colonial officials held office at its pleasure. In the course of the first century it compiled the body of laws known as The Statutes of the Indies, from which much of the information about colonial government and its development is obtained. These laws were carefully compiled to meet every emergency that might arise, and were admirable in many respects, but they were not fitted for the conditions. In consequence the colonial governors were dictators, the courts were maintained to aid the dictators, and, except for the removal now and then of an official for notorious malfeasance, there was no restraint upon the colonial governments so long as they turned into the home treasury an annual tribute deemed worthy of the colonies.

In 1538, the Royal Audience of Panama was established with a President who had the authority of a viceroy, with jurisdiction over all of South America to the boundary of Mexico. In 1543, Panama and Nombre de Dios were made subordinate to the Audience of Guatemala. In 1563, the Royal Audience was again transferred to Panama, where it remained until 1718, when, in an effort to put an end to continual civil war in the colony, Panama was made subordinate to the viceroyalty of Peru. In 1722, the Royal Audience was restored to Panama where it remained until 1739, when Panama became a province in the viceroyalty of Santa Fe de Bogota.

There were three sources of the wealth that formed the home-bound trade of Panama-gold from the slave-worked mines of Darien and Veraguas on the Isthmus, gold and

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skins from Peru, and silver from Bolivia, known then as Potosi. In return for these Spain sent to her colonists on the west coast of South America clothing Sources of the and foodstuffs. All the efforts of the home Trade. government were to procure as much precious metal and gems as possible from the colonies, and send to them as much as possible of the products of Spain. To this end agriculture in the colonies was discouraged where it could compete with the agriculture of Spain (for instance a flourishing wine industry in Peru was broken up), and all influence was brought to bear to make the colonists work the mines.

The people who came to New Spain were not of the working class, but rather broken-down gentry or middle-class merchants who wished to recuperate their fortunes. They would not work in the mines themselves; so there grew up two distinct classes-masters and slaves. There were, therefore, two great influences interfering with the real development of the colonies,-the hostility of the home government to any but extractive industry, and the unwillingness of the colonists themselves to work.

The monopoly of trade with the colonies was vested in the Casa de Contratacion of Seville, formed in 1503, with the right to regulate trade, hear cases in admiralty, Casa de and on contracts growing out of the trade. Contratacion. It prescribed at what ports ships should land their cargo, both in the colonies and in Spain, what class of goods could be carried, with what colonies various ships could trade, and in what fleets they might sail to and from the colonies.

Trade Restrictions.

The trade with the Indies and the Spanish Main was restricted to Spanish ships, and to such of these only as had charters from the Casa de Contratacion. Ships not so chartered were regarded as piratical, and the masters and crews were enslaved or executed upon capture. The effect was to make illegal all trade by vessels of other nations; and the result was that for two centuries the French and English "free traders' harassed the islands and the Spanish Main, capturing treasure galleons, destroying cities, and finally driving the commerce away from the isthmus to the longer but safer route around South America.

PRIVATEERS, BUCCANEERS, PIRATES.

As early as 1525 an English ship beaten out of its course by storm visited the West Indies. Upon its return to England the stories of the wealth to be gained by trade with the Spanish colonies excited the cupidity of seafaring men, and within twenty-five years English and French ships were carrying on a clandestine trade with the islands.

Spain looked upon these "free traders” as pirates, and whenever they were caught they were executed outright or held in servitude. Many of them worked out their lives building the walls of old Panama.

Instead of deterring the "free traders," Spain's drastic policy drove them to self-defense. They were not gentle, kind men, at best; but rough sailors, adventurers, cutthroats, unwashed people generally. Their attitude toward a fight was to go through it, never to avoid it or back out. Men-of-war in those days were merchant vessels with cannon aboard, and a skipper who could mount a few guns was just as well prepared to fight as a ship of the line with an equal number of guns. The English and French ships were smaller, and better-handled than the Spanish.

So it turned out that Spain had her hands full protecting her commerce; and she had no greater enemy in her efforts than her own subjects in the new world, who preferred the illegal trade, with its freedom from taxes, to that upon which the king levied his customs dues. In short, the trade with French and English was as advantageous to the Spanish colonists as it was to the "free traders," and evidence is not wanting that the so-called "pirates" were unofficially welcomed by many a colonial governor.

Officially, however, Spain hunted these "free traders," and forbade them the use of Spanish colonial ports and markets. On this account the ships' crews would go ashore on the mainland or an island to hunt wild cattle and procure other food. In one generation this business of supplying ships of the "free traders" became specialized, and French and English outcasts on various islands became meat-curers, or boucaniers. They gave their name to the semi-piratical "free traders," who later were known as buccaneers.

The dividing line between the privateers, like Drake, and the buccaneers, like Morgan, was purely legal. Essentially they were both pirates, stealing the property of

others. The Spaniards in turn stole from the Indians and their negro slaves; so it was "dog eat dog;" and the real producers, as usual, got nothing but an existence from their labor.

So what Spain by her foolish policy left undone to kill her colonies, the English and French privateers and pirates did. The two hundred years following the founding of Old Panama were characterized on the Spanish Main by an international effort to get rich without working. The system is still popular in Spanish America and the United States.

French and English privateers and pirates were active in the West Indies as early as 1550, but it was not until Francis Drake attempted to take Nombre de Dios in Drake, Oxen- 1572 that the formal raids against fortified ham, and places began. On the night of July 9, 1572, Others. Drake surprised Nombre de Dios and had it at his mercy, but he was wounded and his men, taking fright, carried him to the ship and sailed away without the dear-bought booty. He hung around the coast, however, the scores of islands giving plenty of hiding places; made an unsuccessful foray into the interior, including a fruitless attack on Cruces (January 31, 1573); and, finally (May, 1573), surprised a treasure train from Panama near Nombre de Dios, and got away with considerable booty. In this work Drake was aided by Indians and runaway slaves. By the aid of cimarrones, John Oxenham crossed through Darien in 1577, and from the Gulf of San Miguel sailed out upon the Pacific, the first Englishman to sail on that sea. He captured some small trading ships and from these captured a treasure galleon. Later he was captured by the Spaniards and his company enslaved or killed. In that same year an English freebooter named Sylvester captured Concepcion, in Veraguas, and robbed the mines.

ma.

In 1578, Drake plundered ships in the West Indies, rounded South America, plundered along the Peruvian coast, and sailed around the world without having attacked PanaIn 1585, he invested Nombre de Dios and Fort San Lorenzo at the Chagres mouth, but did not attack either. In 1595, however, with a fleet of 27 ships and 2,500 men he set out to take Panama. He attacked and destroyed Nombre de Dios (January 6, 1596), silenced the guns of San Lorenzo, and sent a force of 700 men in advance toward Panama by way of the Nombre de Dios trail. This force met such stout