CHAPTER XXX.COLON—DEPARTURE—COLUMBUS AND MR. ASPINWALL—RAILWAY ACROSS ISTHMUS—SCENES ON THE ISTHMUS—TELEGRAPH POSTS—HOLY GHOST ORCHID—PANAMA HATS—PARADISE—MOUNT ANCON—PACIFIC MAIL STEAMER—ON THE WHARF AT PANAMA—PANAMA FROM THE SEA—LAST LOOKS.
COLON—DEPARTURE—COLUMBUS AND MR. ASPINWALL—RAILWAY ACROSS ISTHMUS—SCENES ON THE ISTHMUS—TELEGRAPH POSTS—HOLY GHOST ORCHID—PANAMA HATS—PARADISE—MOUNT ANCON—PACIFIC MAIL STEAMER—ON THE WHARF AT PANAMA—PANAMA FROM THE SEA—LAST LOOKS.
From the sea Colon had looked pretty and mysterious; gauzy vapours floated over the town, and all we could see were the outlines of palms, a few roofs, and behind the surrounding forest the dim shadows of the distant hills. We landed, and with the vanished mists all romance disappeared. We stepped from the shelter of the roofed wharf, and in the dirty, decayed village that lay before us beheld Colon, or the city of Aspinwall as it is called by the Americans.
The principal street runs along the shore, and its shambling frame-houses with verandahs and balconies are of the most tumble-down description. Drinking saloons predominate, and the various stores and shops are stocked with a miscellaneous assortment of goods, such as shells, calico, coral, toilet articles, parrots, hats, pale ale, boots, oranges, bananas, and ready-made clothing. The untidy tenement houses, the dirty lanes, the swamps, and the apparent effort to make life in the tropics as uncomfortable as possible, give an impression of squalid poverty. Nor are the inhabitants unsuitedto their dwellings; from the sallow German Jew who dispenses iced drinks across a dirty counter, to the slippered negro who beats a gong at meal time in front of a wretched eating-house, all are unkempt and unclean. The officials and their houses are too few in number to counteract the general atmosphere of unpicturesque decay, and both they and their well-appointed offices render the native unsightliness more conspicuous by contrast.
After arriving in Colon the principal aim is to get away as soon as possible. “Thank goodness it isn’t a full stop,” was remarked by a perspiring passenger, whose extreme heat must account for the want of brilliancy in his joke. The Panama Railroad Company facilitates this object by starting a train for Panama as soon as the passengers’ luggage has arrived from the steamer. As the main street is the terminus of the railway, the entire population assembles to bid farewell to their only source of income. Then may be seen a motley crowd, each member of which is endeavouring to extract some coin or other from the pockets of their late guests. Black porters appear at the last moment with some trifling article that they have taken care their employer should forget; jet-black Africans, Jamaica negroes, half-castes, yellow Peruvians, naked children, both black and brown, all endeavour to sell some article or other, either cakes, fruit and sweetmeats, or fans, coral, and smoking-caps of palm-fibre. Nor are the passengers themselves of less varied nationalities, as the steamers from New York and St. Thomas have brought emigrants, business men, pleasure-seekers, fortune-hunters, and travellers from all parts of the world.
Here is an entire German family, from the grandmother to the baby in arms, and not one of them can speak other language than their own; there are some Mexicans carrying on a rapid conversation in mixed French, English, and Spanish, with the negro fruit-sellers, and those five ladies, who have paid such a tender adieu to the captain of the American Mail Steamer, are tourists—probably you will learn that they are not travellingviâPanama on account of its cheapness, but for the sake of the sea-voyage. Then there are several commercial travellers, each of whom thinks it correct to wear one of the fibre smoking-caps and chaff the crowd in “h-less” English. Those rosy-cheeked damsels, with flower-decked hats and general gaudy aspect, are Irish servant-girls who have left New York to seek a fortune in San Francisco. On leaving the wharf I had passed two of these maidens, who were looking at the beautiful statue—the only beautiful thing in Colon—of Columbus and the Indian. Said one to the other, “Sure an’ its Mr. Aspinwall himself, the man who built the town.”
At last, amid a faint cheer, or rather a hoot of derision, the train moves slowly off, and we pass almost at once from the so-called civilization into the primeval forest. Perhaps we were a very ignorant set of passengers, but strange to say none of us—and some had crossed the Isthmus before—knew to whom the railroad or the land belonged. Some said both land and road belonged to England, others to America, and a few that both belonged to Colombia, who leased it to the United States. Afterwards we found out that the Panama Railway is American, by contract with theGovernment of New Granada,[116]to whom the land belongs.
With the history of the survey, and the building of the road, the world is familiar from the time when in 1850, “two American citizens leapt, axe in hand, from a native canoe upon a wild and desolate island, (Manzanilla), their retinue consisting of half-a-dozen Indians, who clear the path with rude knives,” up to the 27th of January, 1855, when, “at midnight in darkness and rain, the last rail was laid, and on the following day a locomotive passed from ocean to ocean.” The undertaking was intrepid, the expense enormous, and the loss of life tremendous. Pestilential vapours, reptiles, poisonous insects, fevers, incessant rains, working waist deep in water, insufficient food and shelter, all combined to sweep off thousands of the labourers. Americans, English, Irish, French, Germans, Austrians, natives of India, South America and the West Indies fell victims to the malarious climate, but misery and suffering seems to have fallen most heavily on the Chinese. Of these, one thousand had beenbrought to the Isthmus by the Company, and though as much care as was possible was taken with their health and comfort, yet before a month had elapsed almost the whole of them became affected with a suicidal tendency, and scores ended their existence by their own hands. The memory of these sad details throws a shadow over the interesting journey of forty-seven miles from ocean to ocean, where each advancing step has only been gained by the sacrifice of a human life.
The traveller will gain some idea of the deadly swamps directly the train has crossed the artificial isthmus—(for Colon is situated on the little island of Manzanilla)—which connects the island with the mainland. Dense mangrove thickets border the waters, both of the sea and swamp, the stems of those near the sea being loaded with clusters of small oysters. White egrets and an occasional roseate spoon-bill grace the banks with their presence, and the black forbidding water of the marshes is redeemed by the starry crinums and aquatic plants which grow in great luxuriance.
After passing Mount Hope, where the cemetery of Colon is situated, we are deep in the forest jungle. Cassias, pleromas, and all kinds of feathery-leaved shrubs mingle with giant cedros, ceibas, and locusts, and all are knitted together by the purple convolvulus, or by the chains of some thick-stemmed liane. Most conspicuous are the palms with their crimson clusters of fruit hanging like tassels below the green crown, and the red and yellow blossoms of the helianthus. Fleet-winged heliconias dart among the shrubs at the forest edge, and in the shady glades, which sometimes break the monotony of the jungle, silver-blue morphosand yellow and orange pieridæ flit heavily along. Now and then a flock of parroquets wheels rapidly in the air, or a black and yellow troupial pipes from a high tree top, but birds are not numerous, with the exception of the ugly “black witches,”[117]that treat the passing train with the utmost contempt. To those who have been accustomed to travel through tropical forests only, after toilsome journeys on foot or on mule-back, it is an agreeable sensation to glide—although there certainly is a good deal of jolting—swiftly through the luxuriant vegetation in a comfortable railway carriage. And yet it was strange, in the trip I have been speaking of, to witness the indifference with which most of the passengers viewed the many pretty scenes. Some did not see them at all, but played whist during the whole journey, others slept, and not a few improved the occasion by deliberately drawing up the wooden blinds, so that nothing outside should disturb their attention whilst they read. “Look at the grave-stones!” screamed one of the passengers, who hitherto had been impervious to the novel scenery. When the information was gently broken to her that the small stone-like columns were not grave-stones, but merely pillars to support the wires of the telegraph,[118]she was quite disappointed.
Near the stream called the Mindee, we saw patches of cultivated ground, and perched on the high knolls were a few picturesque wattled and thatched cottages, with clumps of bananas, mango-trees and palms. Gradually the ground became less swampy, and by the time we reached Gatun Station, situated on the eastern bank of the Chagres River, had given place to dry savanna land that stretched to the hill range. Almost immediately after leaving the station we crossed the Rio Gatun, and again entered a region of swamp and jungle. On the left rose the twin peaks known as the “Lion” and the “Tiger,” conical in shape and clad with thick forest. And thus we sped on through an ever-changing scene; from marsh and swamp we passed to plain and forest hills, and from the silence of the wilderness to the life and cheerfulness of the little settlements that dot the road.
Here was a swamp covered with pretty aquatic plants, then a stream almost hidden by overhanging bamboos, then forest trees laden with orchids, and from whose branches the pendent nests of the orioles swayed to and fro, or a narrow country-lane walled in by petrœa and convolvuli so dense and of such shapely growth that they appeared like old ruins over which time had thrown a mantle of verdure. One view of the Chagres River, which we crossed near Barbacoas over a fine wrought iron bridge, was very charming. There were wide stretches of meadow-land with cattle farms, and in the broad stream which curved off to the undulating hills cows stood knee-deep, and under the high banks groups of women wearing flowers in their black hair were hard at work clothes-washing. It formed a pretty picture in the happy blending of wild forest and ruralscenery. At a native village, composed of three rows of picturesque huts, standing in an open glade surrounded by palm trees, we found much needed refreshments, as breakfast that morning had been small and early.
All the inhabitants vied with each other in their efforts to secure customers, yet though the competition was great, fixed prices prevailed. There was a rare mixture of home and foreign productions; Bass’s ale, claret, sardines, biscuits and potted meats were carried by some, whilst others bore trays of bread, cakes, native sweetmeats, pine-apples, oranges, inga pods, mangoes, and other fruits. Here was a little urchin with a bottle of milk, and there was another with hard-boiled eggs and neat little packets of pepper and salt. The chief trade was in eggs, and though they were not sold “four for a dollar” as in the ante-railroad days, yet the charge was sufficiently remunerative. Probably, the sellers agreed with the dairy-woman who said that a smaller price than that at which she sold her eggs “would not pay for the wear and tear of the hen.” Old travellers shook their heads ominously at the quantity of mangoes, starapples, and granadillas that were consumed, and hints of Panama fever were thrown out; but the novel fruits here, and the magnificent Guayaquil white pine-apples that afterwards tempted us at Panama seemed to be irresistible. The latter were not mere consolidated lumps of sugar and water like the West Indian pine, but equalled in flavour, and in size surpassed, those of our hot-houses. It was a miracle that no one was harmed by the fruit-consumption, as everybody appeared to follow the example of Artemus Ward, who “took no thought as to hisfood; if he liked things he ate them, and then let them fight it out among themselves.” Some bulbs of the beautiful orchid[119]known as the “Holy Ghost,” on account of the marvellous image of the dove that rests within the exquisite flower-cap, were for sale, but none of the plants were in bloom, as they seldom blossom before July. They are numerous on the Isthmus, and grow luxuriantly on the decayed trunks that abound in the hot, damp, low-lying grounds.
Some of the natives wore straw hats of a crimson tint, which colour is extracted from the leaves of a vine called “china.” As yet but little attention has been paid to this dye as an article of commerce, but it must be of considerable value, as neither sun nor rain alters the colour which is said to be permanent. The vine grows abundantly in the hill districts, and sheds its leaves annually. Such a dye would be vastly superior to those so-called “fast” colours, whose only “fastness” consists in their tendency to run. The hats themselves were coarse and very unlike the famed “Panama,” specimens of which were only to be seen on the heads of some of the passengers from the West Indies. Although the plant—Carludovica palmata—from whose young unexpanded leaves the “Panama hats”[120]are made, grows on the Isthmus, yet the manufacture is confined to Moyobamba, on the banks of the Amazon, Guayaquil, and the Indian villages of Peru.
After leaving the refreshment-station the grade makes a gentle ascent until the summit—260 feet above sea level—is reached, and then we descend the Pacific slope. Here the scenery is bolder than previously, but the vegetation is as luxuriant as ever. Quickly we rush through cuttings and across rocky spurs, the Rio Grande winding through the forest maze below us; the pretty valley of Paraiso, enclosed in high conical hills, is passed, then once more we enter alternate stretches of swamp and cultivated savanna land.
We see meadows and cottages lying at the base of Mount Ancon, from whose summit Balboa, in 1513, saw the Pacific, and thus proved the fallacy of the belief in which Columbus died, that the New World was part of India and China. Then groups of huts, chiefly composed of flattened tin cans and shingles, came in view, and beyond them rose the Cathedral towers and the red roofs of Panama. Through the groves of cocoa-nut palms we caught sight of the glittering sea, and in a few minutes we entered a commodious station close to the wharf, where a tug lies ready to take passengers to the ocean steamer bound for California.
From Panama I had intended to visit Quito, and to descend the Amazon, but on account of ill-health I was advised to postpone that journey for a time, and to hasten to a colder climate. Of the town I, therefore, saw but little, and after a short ramble went on board the Pacific mail-steamer. Regarding the vessel, I will only say that she was very comfortable, and the food and attendance were very bad, and the ice and liquor supply grossly insufficient. The poor table was ascribed to the cheap rate of passage-moneyfrom New York to San Francisco, but when I pointed out that the Company reimbursed themselves by exorbitant coasting charges—a first-class ticket from Colon to San Francisco costing several dollars more than the entire passage money from New York to San Francisco—a shrug of the shoulders was the only answer. It is a misfortune for travellers that the Pacific Mail Steamers have no competitors on this line.
It might be imagined that in the great central hive of commerce, the old features of Panama would have been replaced by those of more modern date. But it is not so. Once leave the bustling wharf and freight-depôt, loaded with coffee, cacao, ivory nuts, pearl shells, india-rubber, ores, hides, woods, balsams, quina bales, sarsaparilla, wool, and other products collected from the two great continents, and pass through the quiet lanes into the narrow streets of the town, and the active life of the present is forgotten in the all-pervading memories of the past. It is like passing from the busy work-shops of the stone-cutters into the quiet shadows of the adjoining cemetery. Convent ruins, voiceless bell-towers, grass-grown walls, broken arches and fallen pillars, all tell of the departed glory of Panama. Mellow time-stains have tinged alike the carved stone-work and the rich mouldings of the plaster façades, and over the crumbling edifices and through the window-piercings, passion-flowers and luxuriant creepers twist and twine in the wildest confusion.
During my short ramble, I rested for a moment on the ancient ramparts with their old-fashioned sentry towers, at whose feet lay the waters of the Pacific; so still and glaring in the intense heat, and reflecting somany colours from the pink-brown walls and high tiled roofs that it resembled a sea of old Bohemian glass. The hot sun had caused the streets and walks to be deserted, and the only signs of life were the swinging hammocks in the heavy balconies, and the turkey-buzzards,[121]which with out-stretched wings sunned themselves on every roof and steeple. The natives of Panama have an odd legend, which accounts for the absence of feathers on the head and neck of these birds—gallinazos, as they call them. It is said that after the deluge, Noah, when opening the door of the ark, thought it well to give a word of advice to the released animals. “My children,” said he, “when you see a man coming towards you and stooping down, go away from him; he is getting a stone to throw at you.” “Very good,” said the gallinazo, “but what if he has one already in his pocket?” Noah was taken aback at this, but finally decided that in future the gallinazo should be born bald in token of its remarkable sagacity.
And now, before bidding farewell to the reader who may have glanced through these pages, let me record one more scene. Our vessel lay at anchor far out in the bay, as owing to the reef and the great rise and fall of the tide—between twelve and twenty feet—no ships of heavy tonnage can anchor within two miles of the wharf. Close to us were the pretty green islands of Perico and Flamenco, and through a quivering haze, which gave additional charm to the lovely panorama, we saw the bold and rocky promontory on which stands the city of Panama. Behind it rose the volcanic peak Ancon, crowned by a signal-station—La Vigia—formingthe centre of the coronet of undulating hills that encircle the land. On either side were glimpses of white beach, palm groves and valleys, and away to the south-east, in a tangled wilderness of forest and brush-work, a solitary tower—at least we were told it was a tower—marked the site of the “ancient city of Panama.” In the surrounding silver-green haze the town stood out like a dainty mosaic, whose tints of red, pearl, and brown flashed brightly in the warm sunlight. And in harmony with the tender beauty of the scene was the stillness which rested on all around; save the creaking of the anchor which was being weighed, and the distant notes of a song from some shore-returning boat, no other sound broke the silence.
Suddenly, some startled birds flew shrieking overhead, the water lost its sparkle and the colours faded; a rush of footsteps forward made us look to windward for the cause. Close to us, and rapidly approaching, was a long white line of foam which was driven along under a dense curtain of mist and rain. In a second the squall struck the vessel; the awning which the crew had hurried forward to save was torn to shreds, with a loud crash one of the ship’s-boats was dashed against the hurricane deck, and for a moment the ship quivered and careened over from the extraordinary force of the wind. As quickly as it came, so quickly it passed, but the land was hidden from view by the grey mist, and before it had dispersed we had steamed out into the open sea, and Panama was soon left far behind.
APPENDIX.
NATIONAL BOUNDARIESWITHBRITISH GUIANA.
Articles Published in “La Opinion Nacional,” bythe Lawyer, Francisco J. Marmol.
Official Edition.Carácas: National Printing Office.1878.
(Translation.)