Under other skies and among a more vindictive people, a roving crowd of peons, clamorous for war and threatening all who opposed them, might be regarded with some alarm. But the mildness of the Andean character, its dislike for actual bloodshed, lessened Bogota's danger. Even the timid Don Jose was not apprehensive. But there were others who thought it wiser to keep these peons away from Americans living in Bogota. Not that anything would really happen--past experiences seemed to prove the harmlessness of this kind of patriotism. When the second expedition left for the Isthmus, for instance, an American, looking for novel impressions, had posed the volunteers before his camera and snapshotted them to his heart's content while they were denouncing "los Yankees." But one mob of patriots may be quite unlike another, and it so happened that when King Pedro's army of emboladores, in its aimless wanderings after leaving the Palace of San Carlos, stumbled upon a native of the United States, the encounter became a very lively one indeed. As a rule plenty of Americans are in Bogota. Some go there to do business for the merchant houses which they represent; some have their own local interests, others are after those tempting government "concessions" granted to the disinterested person who develops the natural resources of the country by monopolizing them. When the Panama "revolution" came, most Americans left Bogota, conscious that it was not a promising time to seek aid from the national treasury for their ventures. Those who were unable to leave, stayed within their respective hotels whenever a popular uprising seemed likely. It was down a blank little side street, leading nowhere in particular, lined with modest one-storied houses, in a quiet district unfrequented by foreigners, that the roving peons met the one American who had failed to conceal himself on this particular morning. After leaving San Carlos, Pedro had turned his men into the Plaza de Catedral, where they had clattered along the wide concourse, pausing to make a few fiery speeches before the capitol, whose unroofed courts--the building was unfinished at that time--and majestic Doric columns seem meant for oratory. From here they had gone the zigzag length of the principal business street. Then tiring of their progress through an unresponsive city, they had started to find their way back to the Calle de Las Montanas, choosing for this purpose the obscure Calle de Las Flores. At their approach the street was practically deserted, all the doors opening on it carefully barred and, in some instances, even the blinds of the windows drawn. Thus, it happened that a tall man, muffled in a ruana, wearing a wide sombrero, and with his back against the entrance to one of the houses, became unavoidably conspicuous as the throng of emboladores surged along the roadway abreast of him. "Viva Colombia!" shouted Pedro, giving the usual greeting. "Baja los Yankees!"