of the region, partly adventitious or accidental,
contributed at an early date, and until very recently, to emphasize
and enlarge the importance consequent upon the geographical situation
and physical conformation of this narrow barrier between two great
seas. For centuries the West India Islands, circling the Caribbean,
and guarding the exterior approaches to the Isthmus, continued to be
the greatest single source of tropical products which had become
increasingly necessary to the civilized nations of Europe. In them,
and in that portion of the continent which extended on either side of
the Isthmus, known under the vague appellation of the Spanish Main,
Great Britain, during her desperate strife with the first Napoleon,--a
strife for very existence,--found the chief support of the commercial
strength and credit that alone carried her to the triumphant end. The
Isthmus and the Caribbean were vital elements in determining the issue
of that stern conflict. For centuries, also, the treasures of Mexico
and Peru, upon which depended the vigorous action of the great though
decadent military kingdom of Spain, flowed towards and accumulated
around the Isthmus, where they were reinforced by the tribute of the
Philippine Islands, and whence they took their way in the lumbering
galleons for the ports of the Peninsula. Where factors of such
decisive influence in European politics were at stake, it was
inevitable that the rival nations, in peace as well as in open war,
should carry their ambitions to the scene; and the unceasing struggle
for the mastery would fluctuate with the control of the waters, which,
as in all maritime regions, must depend mainly upon naval
preponderance, but also in part upon possession of those determining
positions, of whose tenure Napoleon said that "war is a business of
positions." Among these the Isthmus was chief.

The wild enterprises and bloody cruelties of the early buccaneers were
therefore not merely a brutal exhibition of unpitying greed,
indicative of the scum of nations as yet barely emerging from
barbarism. They were this, doubtless, but they were something more. In
the march of events, these early marauders played the same part, in
relation to what was to succeed them, as the rude, unscrupulous,
lawless adventurers who now precede the ruthless march of civilized
man, who swarm over the border, occupy the outposts, and by their
excesses stain the fair fame of the race whose pioneers they are.