One of Twenty
Chile is only one of twenty flourishing Latin American Republics. They are called Latin American, because they were settled by Latin Races, Spanish, French, or Portuguese.
There are eighteen Spanish-American ones; one French, Haiti; and one Portuguese, Brazil. In these twenty Republics there are more than 75,000,000 people.
This book is too short a one in which to tell about all the Liberators of these Republics.
There was Toussaint l’Ouverture, the extraordinary coloured man, an ex-slave, who liberated Haiti. Haiti was the first Latin American Republic to declare its Independence.
In Peru, there was Tupac Amaru, the brave young Indian Cacique, a descendant of the “Child of the Sun” whom Pizarro conquered. He tried to liberate his people from Spain, but was captured with all his family, and put to death.
In Paraguay there was the tyrant-liberator Francia, about whom that fascinating romance in English, El Supremo, tells. While La Banda Oriental, as Uruguay used to be called, had for a Liberator, the bold bandit-like Artigas. In Mexico, it was the priest Hidalgo who roused the Mexican People to revolt against Spain.
The Peoples of the eighteen Spanish-American Republics, are not one People like those of our United States, living at peace under one Government and governed by one Constitution.
They are not a Union. Instead, each is a separate Republic. Each may do as it pleases without consulting the welfare of the others. This at times, brings about bad feeling, and even war.
But to prevent war and bloodshed, some of these Republics have adopted a better way.