The first week at his post Everett spent in reading the archives of the legation. They were most discouraging. He found that for the sixteen years prior to his arrival the only events reported to the department by his predecessors were revolutions and the refusals of successive presidents to consent to a treaty of extradition. On that point all Amapalans were in accord. Though overnight the government changed hands, though presidents gave way to dictators, and dictators to military governors, the national policy of Amapala continued to be "No extradition!" The ill success of those who had preceded him appalled Everett. He had promised himself by a brilliant assault to secure the treaty and claim the legation in Europe. But the record of sixteen years of failure caused him to alter his strategy. Instead of an attack he prepared for a siege. He unpacked his books, placed the portrait of his own President over the office desk, and proceeded to make friends with his fellow exiles. Of the foreign colony in Camaguay some fifty were Americans, and from the rest of the world they were as hopelessly separated as the crew of a light-ship. From the Pacific they were cut off by the Cordilleras, from the Caribbean by a nine-day mule-ride. To the north and south, jungle, forests, swamp-lands, and mountains hemmed them in. Of the fifty Americans, one-half were constantly on the trail; riding to the coast to visit their plantations, or into the mountains to inspect their mines. When Everett arrived, of those absent the two most important were Chester Ward and Colonel Goddard. Indeed, so important were these gentlemen that Everett was made to understand that, until they approved, his recognition as the American minister was in a manner temporary. Chester Ward, or "Chet," as the exiles referred to him, was one of the richest men in Amapala, and was engaged in exploring the ruins of the lost city of Cobre, which was a one-hour ride from the capital. Ward possessed the exclusive right to excavate that buried city and had held it against all comers. The offers of American universities, of archaeological and geographical societies that also wished to dig up the ancient city and decipher the hieroglyphs on her walls, were met with a curt rebuff. That work, the government of Amapala would reply, was in the trained hands of Senor Chester Ward. In his chosen effort the government would not disturb him, nor would it permit others coming in at the eleventh hour to rob him of his glory. This Everett learned from the consul, Garland.