At the time that the above report on relations with Colombia was prepared by Mr. Du Bois he was in this country, having come home to confer with the Department of State as to the program to be followed in the settlement of the differences with Colombia. On his return to Bogota, Mr. Du Bois submitted the following proposals to the Colombian government: (1) ratification of the Root treaties, involving the payment to Colombia of the first ten installments of the annual rental of the canal zone amounting to $2,500,000; (2) the payment of $10,000,000 by the United States to Colombia for the right to build an interoceanic canal by the Atrato route and for the lease of the islands of Old Providence and St. Andrews as coaling stations; (3) the good offices of the United States on behalf of Colombia in bringing about an adjustment of the boundary line between Colombia and Panama; (4) the submission to arbitration of the claims of Colombia to reversionary rights in the Panama Railroad assumed by the United States under Article XXII of the treaty of 1903 between the United States and Panama, estimated by Mr. Taft's secretary of war at over $16,000,000; and (5) the granting of preferential rights to Colombia in the use of the Panama Canal. The Colombian government promptly rejected these proposals and in reply demanded "arbitration of the whole question of Panama or a direct proposition on the part of the United States to give Colombia compensation for all the moral, physical, and financial losses which she sustained as a result of the separation of Panama." The Colombian minister declared: Should Colombia grant any territorial privileges to the United States after the wrong that country has inflicted upon this republic, it would result in intense agitation and possible revolution. It seems as though your people have never fully realized the enormity of the wrong the United States has perpetrated against the Colombian people. Mr. Du Bois then asked whether Colombia would accept $10,000,000, the good offices of the United States in settling the differences with Panama, arbitration of the reversionary rights in the Panama Railroad, and preferential rights in the canal, without granting to the United States any privileges or concessions whatever. Receiving a negative reply to this proposal, Mr. Du Bois, acting on his own responsibility, then inquired informally whether $25,000,000 without options of any kind would satisfy Colombia. The answer was that Colombia would accept nothing but the arbitration of the whole Panama question. Mr. Du Bois was instructed February 20, 1913, to stop negotiations. In reporting the matter to the President, Secretary Knox said that Colombia seemed determined to treat with the incoming Democratic administration.[266]