principal conditions imposed by Chile were the absolute cession
by Peru of the province of Tarapacá, and the occupation for a
period of ten years of the territories of Tacna and Arica, the
ownership of these districts to be decided by a popular vote of
the inhabitants of Tacna and Arica at the expiration of the
period named. A further condition was enacted that an
indemnity of 10,000,000 soles was to be paid by the country
finally remaining in possession—a sum equal to about £1,000,000
to-day. The Peruvians in the interior refused to recognize
President Iglesias, and at once began active operations to overthrow
his authority on the final departure of the Chilean troops.
Affairs continued in this unsettled state until the middle of 1885,
Cáceres meanwhile steadily gaining many adherents to his side
of the quarrel. In the latter part of 1885 President Iglesias
abdicated.
Under the guidance of General Cáceres a junta was then formed to carry on the government until an election for the presidency should be held and the senate and chamber of deputies constituted. In the following year (1886) General Cáceres was elected president of the republic for the usual term of four years. The task assumed Cáceres in Power. by the new president was no sinecure. The country had been thrown into absolute confusion from a political and administrative point of view, but gradually order was restored, and peaceful conditions were reconstituted throughout the republic. The four years of office for which General Cáceres was elected passed in uneventful fashion, and in 1890 Señor Morales Bermudez was nominated to the presidency, with Señor Solar and Señor Borgoño as first and second vice-presidents. Matters continued without alteration from the normal course until 1894, and in that year Bermudez died suddenly a few months before the expiration of the period for which he had been chosen as president. General Céceres secured the nomination of the vice-president Borgoño as chief of the executive for the unexpired portion of the term of the late president Bermudez. This action was unconstitutional, and was bitterly resented by the vice-president Solar, who by right should have succeeded to the office. Armed resistance to the authority of Borgoño was immediately organized in the south of Peru, the movement being supported by Señores Nicolas de Pierola, Billinghurst, Durand and a number of influential Peruvians. In the month of August 1894 General Cáceres was again elected to fill the office of president, but the revolutionary movement rapidly gained ground. President Cáceres adopted energetic measures to suppress the outbreak: his efforts, however, proved unavailing, the close of 1894 finds the country districts in the power of the rebels and the authority of the legal government confined to Lima and other cities held by strong garrisons. Early in March 1895 the insurgents encamped near the outskirts of Lima, and on the 17th, 18th and 19th of March severe fighting took place, ending in the defeat of the troops under General Cáceres. A suspension of hostilities was then brought about by the efforts of H.B.M. consul. The loss on both sides to the struggle during these two days was 2800 killed and wounded. President Cáceres, finding his cause was lost, left the country, a provisional government under Señor Candamo assuming the direction of public affairs.
On the 8th of September 1895 Señor Pierola was declared president of the republic for the following four years. The Peruvians were now heartily tired of revolutionary disturbances, and an insurrectionary outbreak in the district of Iquitos met with small sympathy, and was speedily crushed. In 1896 a reform of the electoral Pierola President. law was sanctioned. By the provisions of this act an electoral committee was constituted, composed of nine members, two of these nominated by the senate, two by the chamber of deputies, four by the supreme court, and one by the president with the consent of his ministers. To this committee was entrusted the task of the examination of all election returns, and of the proclamation of the names of successful candidates for seats in congress. Another reform brought about by Pierola was a measure introduced and sanctioned in 1897 for a modification of the marriage laws. Under the new act marriages of non-Catholics solemnized by diplomatic or consular officers or by ministers of dissenting churches, if properly registered, are valid, and those solemnized before the passing of this act were to be valid if registered before the end of 1899. Revolutionary troubles again disturbed the country in 1899, when the presidency of Señor Pierola was drawing to a close In consequence of dissensions amongst the members of the election committee constituted by the act of 1896, the president ordered the suppression of this body. A group of malcontents under the leadership of one Durand, a man who had been prominent in the revolution against General Cáceres in 1894–95, conspired against the authorities and raised several armed bands, known locally as montaneras. Some skirmishes occurred between these insurgents and the government troops, the latter generally obtaining the advantage in these encounters.
In September 1899 President Pierola vacated the presidency in favour of Señor Romaña, who had been elected to the office as a popular candidate and without the exercise of any undue official influence. President Romaña was educated at Stonyhurst in England, and was a civil engineer by profession. The principal political problem Romaña President. before the government of Peru was the ownership of the territories of Tacna and Arica. The period of ten years originally agreed upon for the Chilean occupation of these provinces expired in 1894. At that date the peace of Peru was so seriously disturbed by internal troubles that the government was quite unable to take active steps to bring about any solution of the matter. After 1894 negotiations between the two governments were attempted from time to time, but without any satisfactory results. The question hinged to a great extent on the qualification necessary for the inhabitants to vote, in the event of a plebiscite being called to decide whether Chilean ownership was to be finally established or the provinces were to revert to Peruvian sovereignty. Peru proposed that only Peruvian residents should be entitled to take part in a popular vote; Chile rejected this proposition, on the ground that all residents in the territories in question should have a voice in the final decision. The agreement between Chile and Bolivia, by which the disputed provinces were to be handed over to the latter country if Chilean possession was recognized, was also a stumbling-block, a strong feeling existed among Peruvians against this proceeding. It was not so much the value of Tacna and Arica that put difficulties in the way of a settlement as the fact that the national pride of the Peruvians ill brooked the idea of permanently losing all claim to this section of country. The money, about £1,000,000, could probably have been obtained to indemnify Chile if occasion for it arose.
The question of the delimitation of the frontier between Peru and the neighbouring republics of Ecuador, Colombia, and Brazil also cropped up at intervals. A treaty was signed with Brazil 1876, by which certain physical features were accepted by both countries as the basis for the boundary. In the case of Ecuador and Colombia a dispute arose in 1894 concerning the ownership of large tracts of uninhabited country in the vicinity of the headwaters of the Amazon and its tributaries. An agreement was proposed between Peru and Ecuador in connexion with the limits of the respective republics, but difficulties were created to prevent this proposal from becoming an accomplished fact by the pretensions put forward by Colombia. The latter state claimed sovereignty over the Napo and Marañon rivers on the grounds of the ecclesiastical jurisdiction exercised over this section of territory during the period of Spanish dominion, the government of Colombia asserting that these ecclesiastical rights to which Colombia became entitled after her separation from the Spanish crown carried also the right of absolute ownership. In a treaty signed by the three interested states in 1895 a compromise was effected by which Colombia withdrew a part of the claim advanced, and it was agreed that any further differences arising out of this frontier question should be submitted to the arbitration of the Spanish crown. The later development of the boundary question is dealt with at the outset of this article.
