The Democratic advocate. [volume] (Westminster, Md.) 1865-1972, 1898-01-29
Our Olin.
Banana Culture an Unending Har-
vest.

Fannie B. Ward in Philadelphia Record.
Dull and sleepy as Costa Ricas At
lantic port looks during most of the day,
when everybody is enduring the heat as
best he can, in hammock slung some
where in the shade-it springs into sur
prising activity in the cooler mornings and
evenings. Long trains of cars, drawn by
dwarfsh engines and laden with coffee and
bananas. wind down from the interior
and the whole water front swarms with
busy life Steamers from Liverpool, New
York and New Orleans move up to the
pier amid a crowd of sloops, schooners and
other sailing craft; and half-naked roust-
abouts file back and forth across the gang
planks, loading them from the wharfs and
warehouses; The coffee is allowed to ac-
cumulate under shelter until the vessels
arrive; but the bananas must not be picked
until the last moment, at telegraphic
notice, on the morning the steamers for
which they are designed are to sail
Every plantation of account has its side
track, connection with the Transcontin-
cllIdI 1tdANdN3 oNCl NlIICh CdIS SllC SShC W
convey the half-ripe fruit to port, still
glittering with dew. The shipment of
bananas from Costa Rica is something
comparatively new. Only a few years ago
the United States received all its supply
from Honduras and the West Indies; but
nowadays since the development of plan
tations around LimOn, owing to the rail
way-this port has almost the monopoly.
Often single steamer receives as many as
so, 900 punches, representing 6, 900. 600
bananas; but so perishable is the fruit that
generally half the cargo is thrown over
board before its destination is reached.
All around Limon. for a radius of 80
miles Or more, is wild, tropical jungle,
the haunt of gorgeous birds, venomous
serpents, monkeys and tiger-cats. Straight
through it runs the railroad, and along its
line great many plantations have been
opened, all of which produce prolifcally.
Most of these settlers are from the United
States, particularly from the South-ex-
Confederates whose all was swallowed up
in the Lost Cause, who subsequently
drifted here, took up Government land,
and are making moderate fortune. 1t
is the fashion among them to christen
their places, and the traveller reads on
sign boards posted over the entrance such
suggestive names as Johnny Reb's Last
Ditch ~ Baltimore Belle, "Pride of
Alabama, ''Old Virginia Never Tire, -
etc.
WHERE BANANAS ARE PLENTY.
But the banana growing region of the
world, par excellence, is along the Matina
River, nearly 100 miles north of Limon
To reach it you take one of the little fruit
schooners that has discharged its cargo at
the port of shipment and is returning to
Matina, the village at the mouth of the
river A fruiter is not Il pleasant craft
for nervous people to travel on, being gen
orally swarming with vipers, tarantulas
and vermin of all sorts, inadvertently
brought on board concealed in the great
punches of bananas; but the trip is well
worth making, if for nothing else than a
view of the jungle. Coasting close along
shore, you see patriarchal trees, stately
and venerable, draped with long Spanish
moss, each rugged like ship with
ropes of vine, every limb covered with
wonderful orchids, radiant as the plumage
of the birds that fit among them and plenti-
full as daisies in New England meadow.
Over all hangs veil of mist-a luminous
curtain, stretched from the mountain tops
to the foam -fringed shore--miasmatic va
pors bring poison to the lungs of men, but
in which the air plants find congenial food.
Coasting this region of romance and
tragedy one thinks most of Columbus-not
as the triumphant discoverer, but as the
disappointed old sailor, bowed with years
and in6rmities, seeking for what he never
found The geography of the new world
was clear enough in his mind; the earth
was globe-there could be no doubt of
that, and somewhere around it must be
belt of navigable water. So be explored
the whole coast, from Yucatan to Trini-
dad, cruising into every little river and
following the coast-line Of each tiny gulf
and bay, searching with painful resistance
for the passage which he felt should be
there. But he found only an unbroken
line of continent, in direct contradiction to
all his theories-an impossible obstacle to
the hopes he had cherished for lifetime.
In course of those explorations he put into
what is now Costa Rica' s Atlantic Har-
Dor, and marked the place on his chart
Puerto Limon Port Lemon) because of
the wild lime trees, golden with fruit,
which covered the adjacent islands. In
| stinctively he hovered around this narrow
est portion of the continent, where but
slender strip of land, upheaved by some
mighty convulsion of nature, shattered his
theories and defed his dreams. BY this
| time little was left of the intrepid naviga-