Having thus dethroned the legitimate ruler, Guardia proclaimed himself Military Dictator, and called a Junta, composed of the men who had employed him to overthrow the Government. They met, with great formality, and solemnly issued a proclamation, reciting that the Constitutional President having absented himself from the country without designating any one to act in his place, it became necessary to choose a new Chief Magistrate. In the mean time the Junta declared Guardia Provisional President until an election could be held. The latter took possession of the Executive Mansion, called all the people into the plaza, swore them to support him, reorganized the bureaus of the Government and the army, placing the cow-boys who had come up from Guanacasta with him in charge. The father-in-law of the English banker who suggested the revolution was announced as the candidate for the Presidency, and it was expected that he would be chosen without opposition. But General Guardia, having had a taste of power, thought more of the same would be agreeable, and passed the word quietly around among his officers that he was a candidate himself. As they constituted the judges of election and the returning board, this hint was sufficient, and when the returns began to come in after ejection day, the banker and his co-conspirators found, to their surprise and chagrin, that their tool had become their master, and General Guardia was declared Constitutional President by a unanimous vote, only two thousand ballots having been cast by a population of two hundred thousand. This cow-boy, when he took his seat, could neither read nor write. He was, however, a man of extraordinary natural ability, gifted with brains and a laudable ambition. He sprang from a mixture of the Spanish and native races, had energy, shrewdness, a cool head, and a fair idea of government: in all respects the most remarkable, and in many respects the greatest man the little republic ever produced. He learned rapidly, and selected the wisest and ablest men in the country for his advisers. Under his administration the nation showed greater development than it has enjoyed before or since, and, so far as lay in his power, he introduced and encouraged a spirit of moral, intellectual, and commercial advancement, established free schools and a university, overthrew the domination of the priests, sent young men abroad to study the science of government, and preserved the peace as he aided the progress of the people. If he had been as wise as he was progressive, Costa Rica would have made rapid strides towards the standard of modern civilization, but in his mistaken zeal for the development of the country he left it bankrupt.