Page:Mexico, California and Arizona - 1900.djvu/296

276 "We, on the contrary, incline to make it one of his merits," I said—"a proof of his superior enlightenment. He stepped over the boundaries of narrow prejudice and jealousy, and allowed a beginning to be made of developing the country by those who were ready to do it, without waiting farther for those who would not."

"His enemies say he was bought," rejoined the colonel, who had evidently no great love for Porfirio. "He has not been wholly above corruption in his time. He made fabulous sums out of the liquidation of the military arrears, for instance. He paid a million dollars for his magnificent hacienda in the state of Oaxaca. Where did that come from? There is a great weakness among us for official corruption. There are too many examples of it. A defaulting person in a high place is rarely punished. When I see a case of that kind treated with severity I shall begin to conceive new hopes." "But," I argued, "the Americans certainly have no other designs than that of commercial profit. They do not want your country. What Americans have anything to gain by taking it? Who would put his hand in "his pocket to pay the expenses of a war of annexation? We look out for ourselves as individuals, and we fail to see where the profit comes in. We are large enough now to gratify our own vanity on that score. Love of glory and territorial aggrandizement is not one of our national traits. Spoliation might rather be feared at the hands of some ambitious prince, if you had any such for a neighbor, who could turn it to personal account."

"You will not annex us with bayonets," he returned; "you will annex us with dollars. I feel it; I know it. Your great commercial enterprises will insensibly get hold of the vitals of our country, and the rest will follow. Perhaps there may be disturbances, and your government