Walker came back from Sonora, defeated but not disheartened. He had proved himself a leader of men, even in so small an arena. Thenceforth, until his star of "destiny" was eclipsed in death, his name was worth a thousand men wherever hard fighting and desperate hopes might call him. It must be said in his favour that he sought popularity by none of the tricks of the demagogue. In camp or field he was ever the same cold, self-contained, fearless commander, inflexible in discipline, sparing of speech, prodigal of action. He won the devoted obedience of the wildest spirits by governing himself. His word of command was not "Go," but "Come"--the Napoleonic talisman. Only to the youngest of his followers would he ever unbend his solitary dignity. One of them, whose name, William Pfaff, appears on the San Diego parole, was a youth of fifteen. He was with difficulty restrained from following his leader to Nicaragua. He lived through four years of service in our Civil War, but no dangers or hardships could erase the memory of his experience in Sonora. "The rebellion was a picnic to it," said he, in the fine hyperbole of California. The trial of the filibuster leader for breaking the neutrality laws of the United States ended in a prompt acquittal. Walker resumed the editorial chair, supporting Broderick in the _San Francisco Commercial_, the personal organ of that ill-fated politician. Let us leave the filibuster in his Elba, and visit the country which was destined to become the scene of his dazzling but brief career of glory, defeat, and death. CHAPTER VI Nicaragua--"Mahomet's Paradise"--Buccaneering visitors--Philip II. and an Isthmian Canal--Nelson defeated by a girl--The apocryphal heroine of San Carlos. Nature in lavishing her favours on Nicaragua, left little for man to add. It is a tropical country with a temperate climate, one half of its territory having a mean elevation of 5,000 feet above the level of the sea. In that favoured land the primeval curse is stayed; where nature forestalls every necessity, no need for man to toil or want. Fruits grow in the reckless profusion of the tropics, and clothing is a superfluity wisely counted as such. Two-hundred and fifty thousand children, young and old, occupy a domain as large as New England. They are poor in accumulated wealth as the poorest peasantry of Europe; they are rich, knowing no want unsatisfied, as a nation of millionaires. But Nicaragua is a country in which to study with doubt the doctrine of the survival of the fittest. The early discoverers called it "Mahomet's Paradise," an apt name for a land of sensuous happiness.