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IN QUEST OF
EL DORADO
IN QUEST OF
EL DORADO
BY
STEPHEN GRAHAM
AUTHOR OF "EUROPE—WHITHER BOUND?" "TRAMPING
WITH A PORT IN THE ROCKIES," ETC.
D. APPLETON AND COMPANY
NEW YORK :: :: MCMXXIII
COPYRIGHT. 1923. BY
D. APPLETON AND COMPANY
PRINTED IN THE UNITED STATES OF AMERICA
To
The literary memory
of my friend
Wilfrid Ewart
Accidentally shot at Mexico City
Old Year's Night, 1922
PREFACE
Having voyaged twice to America from British ports and once fromCopenhagen, I determined on my fourth visit to approach America fromSpain and try to follow Columbus's keel over the waters. This study ofthe quest of El Dorado is mostly on the trail of the Spaniards. Themotive of the first explorers and pioneers was generally the quest ofgold. And even to-day most people who seek America do so to make money,many to make a fortune. There is, therefore, a continuity through thecenturies of the quest of fortune.
My wife and I took Spanish ship from Cadiz in Spain to the Indies;landing at Porto Rico, whence we visited in turn Haiti and Cuba. Isaw San Salvador, the first land Columbus found, and was also in theBahamas. We proceeded to New Orleans and then to Santa Fé in NewMexico. I visited Panama, however, alone and climbed a peak in Darien,to realize once more what it meant to Balboa when for the first timehis eyes lighted on the Southern Sea. After the Panama exposition Iwas joined by Wilfrid Ewart and with him we followed out some of thefantastic adventures of Coronado, and it took us to the famous ShalecoDance at the "center of the earth." With him my wife and I rode toJemez, and later we visited Mexico, where, unfortunately, Wilfrid Ewartwas killed by a stray shot on Old Year's night. In Mexico we followedthe trail of Cortes, visiting the places which are most memorable inhis conquest of Mexico. This took us to the ancient pyramids of theAnahuac plateau and to the ruins and buried cities of the South.
Throughout the descriptions and interpretations, endeavor is madeto measure the quest for power and the quest of gold in all thesecountries and territories. I have not visited the republics south ofPanama, but have confined myself to what an American general has called"the necklace of the Caribbean"—the potential American dominion ofthe future. The drive of events is making democratic America into anempire. An imperial rôle is almost unavoidable. I have not, however,thought it necessary either to criticize or approve imperialism. I havemade an Odyssey and I tell what I sa