The completion of the canal across the Isthmus of Panama will make us near neighbors as we have never been before, so that we may take our staterooms at the wharf at Callao or at New York, and visit each other without change of quarters during the journey. And no one can tell what the effect of the canal will be. We do know that nothing of the kind was ever done before in human history without producing a most powerful effect upon mankind. The course of civilization, the rise and fall of nations, the development of mankind, have followed the establishment of new trade routes. No one can now tell just what the specific effect of the cutting of the canal across the isthmus may be; but it will be great and momentous in the affairs of the world. Of this we may be certain, that for the nations situated immediately to the south and immediately to the north of the canal, there will be great changes in their relations with the rest of the world; and it is most gratifying to know that this great work which the United States of America is now undertaking--the cost of which she never expects to get back--a work which she is doing not merely for her own benefit, but because she is moved by the belief that great things are worth doing, is going to bring great benefits to the entire world, and to her old and her good friend, the republic of Peru. I thank you, Mr. President, for your kind reception, and I beg you to permit me to ask the gentlemen here to join me in proposing in behalf of President Roosevelt the health and long life and prosperity of the President of Peru. BANQUET OF THE MINISTER FOR FOREIGN AFFAIRS SPEECH OF HIS EXCELLENCY JAVIER PRADO Y UGARTECHE MINISTER FOR FOREIGN AFFAIRS At the Union Club, September 11, 1906 With the liveliest feelings of consideration and sympathy I have the honor to offer this manifestation to His Excellency Mr. Elihu Root, Secretary of State of the United States of America. Yielding to the generous impulses of your American heart, and of your brain of a thinker and of a statesman, you have felt a desire, Mr. Root, to visit these countries, to address to them words of friendship and of interest in their welfare, in the name of the honorable government which you represent, and to shed over this continent the rays of the noble ideal of American fraternity. Your visit will undoubtedly produce fruitful results on behalf of liberty and of justice, of peace and of progress, of order and of improvement, which you have proclaimed as being the highest principles inspiring the policy of the United States in the special mission for which their peculiar virtues and energy have marked them out in the destiny of humanity.