The three years in South America Fessenden looked back upon as the most picturesque and satisfying of his life. He had twice nearly died of fever, and he had been stabbed and shot, but life had been adventurous, exciting, never worth a moment’s purchase; above all, one long test of his gifts and resources, with victory in the end. Where immediate bribery had availed not with the suspicious villain in temporary power, he had tracked the biding rival to his lair, furnished him with the necessary outfit and promises, while Keene and other agents persuaded the ever-disaffected people that another revolution was due. With the impromptu gunboats and inexhaustible ammunition sent down by Mr. Abbott, the revolution was an invariable success, and the enthroned dictator, with all the vices of his kind, was still shrewd enough to comprehend that did he wish his reign to be permanent he must be true to his benefactor and give him a free hand. As a state passed into Fessenden’s control he built a railroad close to the coast, and as he employed native labor as much as possible, and there was a rapid influx of American merchants, he was reverenced as the White God who had brought security and prosperity to a tormented country. With the more advanced states it was a mere question of capital, particularly as the enterprise was a private one, and sure to bring an increase of civilization and wealth. The last tie had been laid seven years ago, and South America girdled by a complete system of railways, with at least one train on each section running daily. To-day the trains had increased ten per cent., many thousands of discontented North Americans had emigrated, there were American school-houses, churches, villages, and towns in every state, and a new and enormously profitable investment had been found for American capital. Four hundred thousand negroes had emigrated, and, reverting easily to a state of amiable and naked barbarism--sinking to the bottom as naturally as the black mud of the Mississippi--worked in the fields for the white man and forgot the Constitution of the United States. Fessenden’s praises had been sung until he might have become conceited and obnoxious had it not been for the hostile press, which called him a robber baron, an unscrupulous blood-letter, and a future Czar; and so preserved the balance.