were otherwise, for nearly a hundred years have passed since Ecuador was left to work out its own salvation. On the liberal side, Rocafuerte, the first President, has some claims to be remembered, for he did much to establish the constitution by which the country is governed, and to found institutions modelled on those existing in more enlightened countries. Moreno, who seized the supreme power in 1860 and held it for fifteen years, is the greatest figure on the reactionary side. Although he had little or no conception of individual liberty, he proved himself a capable administrator, and since his assassination at the instigation of the revolting liberals, Ecuador has not produced the article which she so badly requires, “the still strong man in a blatant land.” It is the case of an unceasing see-saw between the contending parties or factions, but always the liberal regime is short-lived, for the reactionaries or clericals have a strong hold upon the people. At the moment reaction reigns supreme, and the events of January, 1912, tidings of which have leaked out from Quito and Guayaquil by way of the Madrid journals, reveal an exhibition of savagery which is almost incredible. The Generals, Alfano and Montero, who headed the latest liberal revolt, were hopelessly defeated by the Government forces, and then the authorities set about devising fitting punishments for them. We read that Montero, the President of the dissolved revolutionary Junta, was dragged out of prison and taken to a public street. A huge fire, already lit, awaited him, and the General was flung into it despite his desperate resistance and cries of horror. When he was already half burnt alive, he was fished out of the fire and flung into a vat of water to cool. He was again dragged forth and thrown back into the fire, and before the end came his martyrdom had lasted an hour. This was at Guayaquil. At Quito, the capital, hidden away on the slopes of a volcanic mountain, 200 miles from the sea-board, even worse horrors were perpetrated. The favourite torture was cutting out the victims’ tongues and then taunting them to make a speech. The newspaper correspondents, even those representing the Ecuadorian Government journals, confessed themselves horrified at the barbarities they had to witness. One of them remarked, “If the events which we were condemned to witness yesterday happened once in twenty or once in ten years, we should feel compelled to emigrate from this country.” These well-nigh incredible happenings occurred in January, 1912, and are not a lurid excerpt from a page of the history of the Dark Ages. The only hope for Ecuador’s salvation lies in its proximity to Panama. If the United States in 1898 put an end to Spanish misgovernment in Cuba on the pretext that they could not allow butcheries to go on at their door, there is all the stronger reason that a vigilant eye should be kept on affairs in Ecuador, which lies so close