Vermont farmer. [volume] (Newport, Orleans County, Vt.) 1870-1877, 1874-08-07
PANAMA.

We make n few extracts from letter
printed in the LoiOeH Courier, which has
been kindly sen: us by n friend, who has our
thanks. 1t is from the pen of one of the en-
gineers sent out by the United States govern
ment TO make surveys and report relative 10
the Panama canal
We had n capital run to the mouth Of the
Baia river, whittier we were bound, and we
anchored in an open roadstcad with no more
motion than there is in Boston harbor. Co
ing on shore we rambed through tho little
settlement, which can best be described by
an appeal to tho imagination. Imagine then,
you please. five matched novels with bam-
boo sides and hole in the roof for the es-
cape of the smoke, set down in mud hole,
with tho tide washing beneath them ut high
water, peopled with dozen half.dressed
adults and score of naked little Indians.
Imagine, further, a hundred long, lank. and
very lean hogs mixed up generally with the
adults and children aforesaid; and add to
these imaginings universal state Of squalor,
filth, and vermIn, and you will have before
you the mighty emporium Of Vale. The
padrone, n good-looking mulatto. with wife
and n dozen children, owns everything
pigs. filth. and naked Indians included, and
doubt not that he has his share of the ver-
min also.
The Indians dress in very primitive style
and despite the glowing descriptions we have
all read of the manly beauty of the warrior
and the graceful form of the maiden. in tho
humble opinion of the subscriber, the add-
ton of u simple, and in civilized lands, an
indispensable, upper garment, would have
beautified, ennobled, and elevated. To those
of us whose ideas of the Indian maiden had
been derived from the magnificent creatures
portrayed on favorite brands of tobacco, the
shock was great. The ideal differed so wide
ly from the real that it was hard TO believe
that they were intended for tho same. The
apron they wear IS we'll adapted to the eli.
mate; but "what is half concealed is best re-
vealed" in dress, and had something been
left to the imagination our faith in beauty
unadornod" would not have received so rudo
u blow. The contrast between Paris fash
ions with their frills and furbelows, and the
yard OF coarse mating, was too great.
The Indians are scattered along the banks
OF the Baia river, and easily manage with
their plantations and bananas to keep tho
wolf from the door. and further than this
they care not. An occasional wild hog. with
very occasional turkey, furnishes them
with their only animal food. For everything
else they are absolutely dependent on the
padrone, whose slaves thOy really are. lie
Furnishes them rs he chooses, assigns them
their hunting grounds, and even dictates
whom they shall marry, or rather take for
their wife, for there is no ceremony. And
when once married he keeps them as closely
to their wives rs he can,-no easy matter
with Central American natives.
As soon rs we had procured the help we
desired, we left Vale, and after another
pleasant day at sea, before nightfhll we
were moored in the little bay whose name
forms tho caption of this letter. The divide,
or ridge which divides the streams flowing
into the Atlantic from those of the Pacific at
this point, approaches to within mile of the
Pacific coast. As the uphill work is on the
divide, all the hard work comes at first
And real hard work it is too. Any surveyor
will testify that rise of sixty-five feet in the
hundred is no easy levelIng, and such is the
rise ut this point. Every foot surveyed has
first to be cleared of an underground so
dense that even the wild animals cannot
fOrcO their way in many spots. The woods
are magnificent. Mahogany, rosewood, and
rubber trees abound The Bongoe tree,
which rises hundred and fifty feet without
branch or leaf, overtops all. These trees
are sometimes twenty to thirty feet in diam
eter and MS straight as an arrow. The ma
tives hollow them out and use them for ca
noes. 1t. is not uncommon to see these Ca
noes fifty or sixty feet long, and ten to fifteen
feet beam, followed out Of a single trunk.
OF palm trees we have an endless variety,
and the mountain sides are covered with
ferns. The flowers are few, but In this To-
cality there are a profusion Of orchids, inn
mense scarlet flowers nearly foot in diam
eter, with numerous stamans, each topped
with bright yellow tip. Their general APP
pearancO is beautiful. The orchid is para
site, and grows directly out of the bark Of
some tree, mass Of flame. 1t is said that