Page:Dramatic Moments in American Diplomacy (1918).djvu/262

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242
DRAMATIC MOMENTS

and hold-up ever attempted in daylight by any civilized country. They proposed that the price be doubled and that the treaty should wait until the French concession should lapse and then take the French $40,000,000 for themselves. In other words, purely and simply, that they should hold up one party to the agreement, and entirely steal the interest of the other. That is the whole case, completely substantiated by the documents, which I would give if there were space. No one who has not read them is qualified or has a right to discuss this Panama affair.

What should be done under these circumstances? Panama said Revolution. Old Doctor Amador had been sent to get the guns. He had found bad counsel, and was inoculated with the impossible dream of help from Washington. His legal friends in New York had failed even to approach the White House with the proposal.

But Bunau-Varilla was out to find a plan. Cognizant of every detail of the history of the