Omaha daily bee., 1889-06-03


plel speaking mostly the common Lam
guage OF the country. Despite these
inroads upon the original true Castil-
ian blood, the stranger may meet al
most hourly pure Spanish beauties,
whose symmetrical forms, black Ian
gushing eyes,and expressive faces fully
warrant the encomiums which have
been lavished upon them.
THE CITY OF SAN PEDRO.
After monotonous run OF seven
hours we find ourselves at the small sta
tion OF San Pedro Sula. 1t is situated
In the heart OF the valley, with the tall
peaks of the Onoa and Merinden noun
tains upon either side, and flanked by
the majestic streams OF the Ullua and
Cheme boon. Great forests of cocoa.
mahogany and cedar trees spread out
in every direction, relieved here and
there by coffee and banana estates sur
rounded by hedges of cactl.
The city OF San Pedro was founded in
1886 by Alvarado, one of the intrepid
generals of Cortez. who performed the
first wonderful march from Mexico into
this country. But little is known of its
early history, though it came into
prominence in 1868, when large colony
of emigrants from Georgia and other
southern states located here for the
purpose of raising cotton. 1t was
thought that the leecy staple of the
south would find here Il prolific growth
in a soil Of such wonderful richness.
But they discovered too late that the
soil was unsuited to the cotton plant,
which rather inclined TO run to stalk
and branch out into a tree than to yield
the coveted fiber. After two unsuccess-
full years the colony became demoral-
lied and most of them returned to the
states. The only one left here of the
original number is Mr.. William A.
Coleman, who wisely turned his
attention to sugar-planting, and
has been eminently successful
His estate near the city is
one Of the largest in the department.
Sugar cane grows here without replant-
ing for ten consecutive years. 1t is of
excellent quality, attains u remarkable
height, and is capable of being manu-
featured into the best sugar known.
But the fruit business is perhaps the
leading industry of San Pedro at the
present time, as every train to the coast
is now laden with bananas, plantains,
coacoanuts, mangors, lines. tamarinds,
and other tropical fruits. The fruit in
dustry has increased tenfold in the last
decade, and not less than four hundred
thusand lunches of bananas alone are
shipped from Puerto Cortez every
month. OF this fruit industry, as we'll
as many others in Honduras, we shall
have more to say in a subsequent let
ter. Our next few days will be busted
with preparations for our departure
into the wilds of Olancho and the ex-
ploration of the great valley of the
Guayape.
That hacking coug hcan be so quickly
cured by Shiloh's Cure. We guarantee
it. For sale by Goodman Drug Co.
The Potato.
A Tyrone (Pa.) correspondent of the
Rural New Yorker asserts the potato
has always been sort of Proteus among
our crops. He says: 1t deties all at
tempts to lay down rules for its culture.
AS far back as the days of that first
agricultural editor, Arthur Young, who
had General Washington for a corre-
spondent, we see the same inquiries
and the same differences of opinion on
points of treatment that are found
to-day. A Montreal correspondent
speaks of sawdust as tending to induce
scab. Now, my accidental experience
last season was that the only quite clean
and smooth potatoes that / had-in
heavy loan mulched, but without. the
use of any fresh manure-were where
sawdust, used as mulch for raspberries,
had rolled into the furrow so that the
young potatoes were found bedded in it
under the soil covering. They were so
so fair and handsome that, although the
result seemed quite unaccountable,
resolved to make a special trial of q
sawdust bed for the tubers next year.