On the Map

The first of three maps "visualizing the progress of President-Elect Herbert Hoover around South America appears this week in TIME. The Hoover Odyssey is chronicled in National Affairs. Lands mapped on the South American continent pass in brief review below:

Colombia. Of all the nations of South America only Colombia faces on two oceans. Strangely enough this does not mean that it would be easy for President-Elect Hoover to visit President Miguel Abadia Mendez of Colombia from the Pacific side. Short of flying it would be nearly impossible. For a chain of mighty mountains cuts off Bogota (see Map) from the Pacific Ocean, and the Colombian Capital is itself more than a mile and a half high (8,560 ft.). Even from the Atlantic side it takes longer to reach Bogota, by express steamer up the great Magdalena River, than to sail from America to France.

Only recently have Colombia's adamantine mountains been conquered--by commercial air routes. Today the Scadta ("Colombian-German Air Transport Corporation") headed by smart, efficient Herr P. P. Bauer, is probably the only unsubsidized passenger and freight air service in the world which is showing a really handsome profit. All the great European air lines are state-subsidized and relatively cheap (Paris to Berlin--eight hours--$50). Colombians are glad to pay relatively dear ($200) to be flown from the Atlantic to Bogota in eight hours, when the boat trip ($80) takes from eight to sixteen days, according to the state of the river. Only by air could Mr. & Mrs. Hoover drop briefly in on President Mendez--and no U. S. President or President-Elect since Theodore Roosevelt has made bold to enter an airplane (see p. 59).

Colombia is prospering vastly, not only on account of major U. S. oil and fruit developments (see Map), but because the taste of Americans is rapidly turning from strong coffee to mild--the kind grown in Colombia, whereas stronger brands come from Brazil. The popularity of platinum and the present Parisian rage for emeralds are also potent prosperity factors, for Colombia is the largest producer of the white metal and the green stone. France is less than half as great as Colombia, in area; New York City is only slightly less in population.

Ecuador. Day and night are always of approximately equal length in Ecuador, for it lies astride the equator. The ruling class is of pure Spanish blood, proud and enervated. In consequence almost half the territory which is legally Ecuadorian is actually within a "sphere of influence" impudently maintained by adjoining and militant Peru. Here again, as in Colombia, the factor of altitudes is vital and decisive. Gigantic parallel ranges of mountains, many over four miles high, cut off the nominally sovereign scions of Spain in Quito, the capital of Ecuador, from the vas' hinterland tracts which Peru has quietly and simply taken. Quito perches at an altitude of two miles, has a Savoy Hotel, steep streets, abundant flowers, about one hour of rain almost every day in the year, and--wonder of wonders--a rail connection with the seaport Guayaquil.*

In scenic grandeur the perpetually snowcapped peaks of Ecuador easily eclipse the Swiss Alps--but only hardiest humans have ever glimpsed Ecuador's grandest vastitudes. Historically the city and the civilization at Quito antedate Columbus and hark back to glorious Inca times. Politically the Republic of Ecuador has been unfortunate. President after President has seized office by violence. Eleven Constitutions have been adopted. Today President Isidro Ayora knows that he is at the beck of an aristocratic and military dictatorship, headed by the potent General Gobez.

The principal export, nay the mainstay of Ecuador's economic existence, is cacao (the seeds of which provide cocoa and chocolate), but lately this crop has declined, causing great economic distress. To speak plainly, Ecuador is the most insignificant and poorest of the South American republics. She is supreme only in her production of the finest toquilla--the straw from which so-called Panama hats are woven.

Peru. The first capital city founded by Europeans in any of the Americas was Lima (see Map). This was the "City of Kings," the very mecca of Spain's rash conquistadors, the "fairest gem on the shores of the Pacific," and the haughty citadel from which the Spanish Viceroy proclaimed his rule over "the entire Continent of South America."

For half a millennium at least Peru has run the whole golden gamut of romance, always with deep, appropriate, surging undertones of blood. In the Department of La Libertad one may see, today, a vast dilapidated circuit of walls enclosing an area of eleven square miles, the fabled and yet factual City of Chan-Chan. Here glowed the prehistoric splendor of the Chimu Empire, long, long before the great Imperial civilization of the Incas rose, to be conquered in later turn by Renaissance Spain. After three centuries of Spanish rule--galleons, slaves and sweated gold--romance in Peru was still at full tide. Only then came Simon Bolivar--hero of a continent--to end the Spanish rule of South America where it began, in Lima. In consequence Mr. & Mrs. Herbert Hoover can visit no South American capital whatsoever without finding, in some especially public place, a statue of BOLIVAR. Though born a Venezuelan his exploits included becoming President of Peru and having Bolivia named after him.

Culturally the hant monde of Lima is on a par with the similar aristocracy of Madrid, Rome and Paris. The other side of the medal must show the appalling backwardness and almost total illiteracy of the masses, a huge majority of which are Indians. Probably the great, feudal families of Peru are in no hurry to pump education or ideas into toilers who work so cheaply. Chief of the aristocratic oligarchs is Augusto B. Leguia, who is now relishing his third term as President of Peru. Twenty years ago Senor Leguia was called "The Bantam Roosevelt of Peru." Since "T. R." is now dead and "Il Duce" has risen, President Leguia is sometimes called, "The Bantam Mussolini of Peru"--except by admirers who hail him as greater than either of his nickname-sakes.

Certainly August B. Leguia is esteemed--and respected--by Wall Street. Citizens of the U. S. have felt safe in investing 200 millions of dollars under his regime--not primarily in speculative, wildcat, or oil properties, but in the solid industrial and agrarian expansion of Peru. Thus the nation has been assisted to become first among her South American sister republics in sugar production. Quinine and cocaine are old Peruvian exports; and cotton grown on Leguia-irrigated plantations is a new one. Vast coal deposits wait to be worked. Again mighty mountains are a barrier, but Peru possesses the highest standard-gauge railway in the world (nearly 17,000 ft. at one point), and other modern carriers are in project. Finally the great strides of Colombia in commercial air developments directly inspired President Leguia to organize Peruvian air line which spans hitherto almost impassable mountains in one thirty-fifth of the time previously required. With the whirr and roar of giant motors Romance seems destined to return again to Peru.

* A baby, done up in a parcel post package and marked Perishable: Please Rush! arrived at Guayaquil, last week, by Colombian air mail from Bonaventura.