zuelan Government. On the south side of this building stands a monument with a big scar on the pedestal, where some name has been roughly chiseled out. The negro explained that this monument had been erected by the tyrant Barranca, who occupied the Venezuelan presidency for eight years, but that when Barranca was overthrown by General Pina, the oppressed people, in order to show their hatred of the fallen tyrant, erased his name from the monument.
Strawbridge stood looking at the scar and nodding.
“Did they have to rise against this man Barranca to get him out of office?” he asked in surprise.
“Rise against him!” cried Gumersindo. “Rise against him! Why, señor, the only way any Venezuelan president ever did go out of office was by some stronger man rising against him I But come: I will show you, on Calvario.” They moved quickly along the street, which was changing its character somewhat, from a business street to a thoroughfare of cheap residences. After going some distance Strawbridge saw the small mountain called Calvario which rises in the western part of the city. The whole eastern face of this mountain had been done into a great flight of ornamental steps. Half-way up was a terrace containing three broken pedestals.
“These,” decried Gumersindo, “were erected by the infamous Pina, but when Pina was assassinated and the assassin Wantzelius came into power, the people, infuriated by Pina's long extravagances, tore down the statues he had erected and broke them to pieces.” The black man stood looking with compressed lips at the shattered monoliths in the sunshine.
There was a certain incredulity in Strawbridge's face. The American could not understand such a social state.
“And you say they just keep on that way—one president overthrowing another!”
