ommunity, that hope soon vanished. They
proceeded to assert unfounded claims to civil jurisdiction over Punta
Arenas, a position on the opposite side of the river San Juan, which was
in possession, under a title wholly independent of them, of citizens of
the United States interested in the Nicaragua Transit Company, and which
was indispensably necessary to the prosperous operation of that route
across the Isthmus. The company resisted their groundless claims,
whereupon they proceeded to destroy some of its buildings and attempted
violently to dispossess it.

At a later period they organized a strong force for the purpose of
demolishing the establishment at Punta Arenas, but this mischievous
design was defeated by the interposition of one of our ships of war at
that time in the harbor of San Juan. Subsequently to this, in May last,
a body of men from Greytown crossed over to Punta Arenas, arrogating
authority to arrest on the charge of murder a captain of one of the
steamboats of the Transit Company. Being well aware that the claim to
exercise jurisdiction there would be resisted then, as it had been on
previous occasions, they went prepared to assert it by force of arms.
Our minister to Central America happened to be present on that occasion.
Believing that the captain of the steamboat was innocent (for he
witnessed the transaction on which the charge was founded), and
believing also that the intruding party, having no jurisdiction over
the place where they proposed to make the arrest, would encounter
desperate resistance if they persisted in their purpose, he interposed,
effectually, to prevent violence and bloodshed. The American minister
afterwards visited Greytown, and whilst he was there a mob, including
certain of the so-called public functionaries of the place, surrounded
the house in which he was, avowing that they had come to arrest him by
order of some person exercising the chief authority. While parleying
with them he was wounded by a missile from the crowd. A boat dispatched
from the American steamer _Northern Light_ to release him from the
perilous situation in which he was understood to be was fired into by
the town guard and compelled to return. These incidents, together with
the known character of the population of Greytown and their excited
state, induced just apprehensions that the lives and property of our
citizens at Punta Arenas would be in imminent danger after the departure
of the steamer, with he