No. 351.
Mr. Riotte to Mr. Fish.
Leon, January 21, 1872. (Received February 16.)
Sir: I beg to acknowledge the receipt of circulars No. 14, of December 7, and No. 15, of December 15, and of dispatch No. 65, of December 20, last.
It becomes my duty to advise you that about two weeks ago the agent of one or more European houses, (Erlanger is named,) of what nationality I was not able to ascertain, arrived in this city, and, after a week’s detention by fever, went to Managua. He gave out that he was authorized to propose to the government a renewal of the Prin contract of 1864 and 1865, in behalf of his employers, for the construction of an interoceanic railroad across this republic, from Monkey Point, on the Caribbean Sea, north of Greytown, to Jagiiey, on Gorinto Bay, and that, as a security for a faithful compliance with the obligations his employers might contract, he was prepared to deposit with the government any amount asked for. If this last offer showed me that his employers were fully aware of the terrible stress for money, wherein this government is staggering along from one day to the other, and of the almost irresistible temptation they were holding out by it, it not less proved to me that the movement was one apt to seriously compromise the interests of our citizens.
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If I had but the remotest assurance that Congress would be disposed to make another appropriation for carrying out the exploration of the Nicaraguan Isthmus, resolved upon two years ago, I think this new scheme would have very little chance indeed. But these people, in their eager expectation, ay, agony, for the sight of the United States exploring commission, have from day to day, for the last year, been subject to a most tantalizing ordeal, and by this time have pretty generally given up looking to that quarter for relief. I have tried to keep up their spirits, but the utter silence on the subject in all the public documents recently presented to Congress has shaken my belief too. In the correspondence likely to spring up between this government and myself, on Mr. Carmichael the said agent’s proposition, I am sure to be met by the argument, whether it was reasonable and just that the people and Government of the United States, while they are disinclined to do anything for establishing an interoceanic transit line upon the only track (as they are firmly persuaded) where it is feasible, should resist every attempt made by others to introduce an improvement which for them is a question of life or death. I myself am persuaded that the moment has come when the United States will have to make up their mind and come to a final conclusion upon this Nicaraguan transit. I have many indications tending to show that if our people will not undertake it, then the English or Germans will. That some tidal wave of abundance of funds and furor for all classes of great enterprises, like after the Crimean war, and yet more fearful, is beginning to sweep over Europe. If my Government [Page 463] will but notify me at once that it will soon send out the exploring expedition—from now till beginning of September is the most favorable season—it will be considered here a bona fide beginning, and I would fear no European proposals, be they ever so favorable.
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I have, &c,