Contingencies  of  all  kinds  that  might  have  inter-
fered with  an  agreement  on  the  part  of  the  two  Gov-
ernments to  sign  the  complementary  protocol  could
not  have  escaped  the  prevision  of  the  negotiators,  and
if  it  had  been  their  intention  to  set  a  limit,  by  every
means,  on  the  exercise  of  sovereignty  by  Chile  at
the  expiration  of  the  period  of  ten  years,  they  would
thus  have  expressly  stipulated.  Consequently,  it
would  be  superfluous,  it  seems  to  me,  to  declare  that


432

my  Government  regards  as  in  force  in  all  their  pleni-
tude the  rights  conferred  on  it  by  the  Treaty  of  An-
con.
The  colonization  of  the  untilled  and  unproductive
lands  of  the  province  of  Tacna  with  national  farmers
will,  if  the  irrigation  enterprises  now  under  considera-
tion turn  out  to  be  practicable,  convert  the  present
deserts  into  productive  fields,  and  whatsoever  be  the
result  of  the  plebiscite,  my  Government  takes  the
view  that  the  country  that  shall  win  at  the  polls  will
unquestionably  enjoy  the  benefits  of  acquiring  terri-
tories capable  of  providing  for  their  own  needs  by
their  wealth  and  production.
If  the  Treaty  of  Ancon  conferred  on  Chile  all  the
privileges  that  sovereignty  implies,  it  imposed  on  her
likewise  the  duties  that  spring  from  it,  and  Your  Ex-
cellency will  doubtless  have  to  recognize  that  among
them  none  is  more  imperative  than  that  of  fostering
the  moral  and  material  betterment  of  the  populations.
The  circumstance  that  the  proprietors  of  the  soil
are  Chileans  in  no  wise  affects  the  rights  of  the  sov-
ereign, for  a  change  of  sovereignty  may  occur  in  any
territory  without  infringing  the  rights  of  private  prop-
erty, just  as  private  property  may  change  owners
without  affecting  sovereignty.  These  are  two  ques-
tions essentially  different.
