No. 98.
Mr. Williamson to Mr. Fish.
Amapala, Honduras, February 26, 1874. (Received April 18.)
Sir: I have now completed my journey from Omoa through the most populous portions of Honduras, and it seems proper that I should have the honor of giving you the result of my observations in regard to the probable permanency of the newly-established government of President Leiva.
He seems to be very much beloved and esteemed along my whole line of travel, and is reputed to be equally so in other parts of the country. Foreigners and natives alike spoke in terms of high praise of his intelligence and disinterested patriotism. They expressed no doubt that he was and is the popular choice of Honduras. The condemnation of the usurpations and tyrannies of Arias were unmeasured and universal. Leiva holds his office by the same terms that Arias did, both being provisional Presidents, or, as they would probably be called in our country, revolutionary Presidents. They are both civilians, without any military prestige, and before the usurpations of Arias, he was thought to be as free from ambition [Page 144] as Leiva now is. He was never a popular man, I am told. It is idle to speculate upon what effect may be produced upon Leiva by the exercise of power, or upon what changes of policy may result from a more practical knowledge of the peculiar characteristics of his people; but I am somewhat hopeful he may be able to adhere to his republican ideas, and afford to Honduras a stable and good government. He has made the impression upon me, at least for the present, that he is a man of firm character and fixed principles, and likely to be subject to the mutations that seem to come over the rulers of these countries when they find themselves well installed in office.
My dispatches heretofore have contained so much about this gentleman that I will not trouble you with more, save only to say he treated me with distinguished courtesy during my stay at his capital, and gave me a handsome official banquet on the day of my reception. His cabinet was present. In reply to the toasts to the President and his representative present, I took occasion to repeat as briefly as possible the sentiments expressed by you in your report to the Senate, which I quoted in my address in Salvador, and in a dispatch of Mr. Seward, dated October 28, 1862, written in reply to a request from the government of Guatemala to take the advice of President Lincoln in regard to certain “projected organic changes in the governments of Guatemala and other Central American republics.”
I hope to arrive at Guatemala by the 2d or 3d of March. The upward-bound steamer is due here to-day.
I have, &c.,