They are not to be classed as lands of revolution, because two-thirds of all Latin America has known practically no revolution during the last fifteen or twenty years. The revolutions which occurred should possibly be called evolutions, and are efforts of their peoples, even though sometimes crude, to improve their permanent conditions of prosperity and progress. They are not by any means solely “tropical lands,” as is often supposed or as may be judged from a glance at the map. The great southern section of South America, including southern Brazil, Uruguay, Argentina, Chile, and a large section of Bolivia, are in the South Temperate Zone, where they have climatic conditions corresponding to those of the United States. The countries, moreover, which are actually under or near the equator have a mingling of high lands with low lands which means much for their future development. There are high plateaux ranging from three thousand to twelve thousand feet above the sea, covering oftentimes individual areas as large as that of Connecticut or Massachusetts, where the climate the year round is like that of New England in June or September and where the white man can live in corresponding climatic comfort. Although, because of the slight seasonal changes, the average temperature of the low-lying lands of the tropical sections is somewhat trying to the resident of northern bringing up, yet under the influence of modern methods of sanitation and practical methods of living, they are being transformed into healthful sections of growing population, commerce, and influence. The example which the United States has set at Panama, and the demonstration which this government is giving there of the possibility of white men thriving in the tropics, is having its influence throughout the tropical belt of our sister republics and great changes are resulting. The approaching completion and opening of the Panama Canal gives a special interest to this work of Mr. Van Dyke’s. Only the person who has thoroughly studied what the Panama Canal means, its effect not only upon the commerce of the world but upon the commerce and influence of the United States, and what it will do for the Latin American countries, as well as for the United States, can appreciate fully how important to the future of the relations of North and South America is the completion of this mighty waterway. Its opening should be followed not only by a great development of the export trade of the United States to those countries but of their export trade to this country. It should cause a remarkable increase in the travel between North and South America. There is no better influence for commerce and friendship than that of mutual acquaintance of peoples of different countries. When the Canal is completed there should be a great increase in the number of North Americans going to South America and of South Americans coming to the North.