The Democratic advocate. [volume] (Westminster, Md.) 1865-1972, 1898-01-29

upon the world he had discovered
FINALLY, overcome by age and infrmities,
he had to give up the search Fearing to
return to Spain without something to
satisfy the avarice of his sovereign, he
surrendered the command of his small feet
to his brother Bartholomew, and wept
when the carnival of murder and plunder,
which was to last three hundred years.
was begun.
SLEEPY SOUTHERN VILLAGE.
Martina village, at the mouth of the
river Of the same name, straggles in sleepy
fashion over a low sand hill. 1t has a few
white washed houses rooted with red tiles,
but the majority of habitations are mere
huts, thatched with plantain leaves.
There is somewhat pretentious church,
with chime of rusty bells in its twin
towers, and several fagstaffs float the
CANDY colors of the Costa Rican bandera.
Everything blazes and blisters beneath the
troplc sun, except at rare intervals where
the glaring picture is shaded by groups ot
indigo trees, feathery palms and the long
pale green plumes of the banana Here
and there about the place are patches of
sugar cane and clumps of cocoanut trees
wide spreading breadfruit trees, and the
slender, graceful rubber tree, which
scarcely casts a shadow and whose frosty
colored notified trunk looks like the neck
of a giraffe.
All Central American ports are un-
healthy, and this of Martina is deadly, for
vomitive and the dangerous calenturas
peculiar to the coast are continual visitors
Though our visit was timed at the least
insalubrious season of the year, we seemed
to encounter death s-head at every step
The open door of the first house disclosed
corpse, stretched upon its bier with
burning candles at the feet and head. \
little farther up the street we saw fun
eral procession vending its mournful way
to the Campo Santo; and soon another
was met returning from the same errand
''Oh, no, this is not sickly season, - said
the keeper of the cane-stalk inn, in an
swer to my inquiry. ''The fever is al
ways here. you know, but there have
been only four funerals so far this week. -
Considering that it was only the second
day of the week and the hamlet contains
less than thousand inhabitants, we con-
cluded to make our stay as brief as possible.
But nowhere else can the extent of the
banana industry be appreciated as at
Matina Hundreds of cars and thousands
of canoeloads came down to the port every
day, bringing countless punches of bananas,
and fleets of schooners every day carry
them away. One wonders what becomes
of them all, and that there can be any
profit in such an enormous crop. The
banana harvest never ends, but from Janu-
ary to December there is continuous cutting
and marketing. One sees at the same
time buds and flowers. young fruit and
fully developed bananas. Among the sew
eral colonies in this region devoted to
banana raising is the Matina Banana Com
pany (English), located several miles up
the river, whose extensive plantation is
said to be paying large dividends. Then
there is the Reynolds American Colony,
established upon &C, 600 acres of fertile
land bordering the Atlantic. Its founder,
W. ii. Reynolds, of Hornellsville, n Y,
secured several valuable concessions from
the Costa Rican Government to farther his
scheme-such as a free gift of the land,
exemption of duties for three years on all
goods and articles imported into the coun-
try for the use of his colonists, and other
privileges and advantages of minor import
ance. In return, Mr.. Reynolds bound
himself to take to the aforesaid colony not
less than 100 American families, expert
enced in agricultural labor, of good and
moral standing, and to settle them within
the limits of the specified tract, on places
which he thought best adapted to the
special branch of agriculture which each
should select; to provide each family with
a house, seeds, implements and other neces-
sary articles.
Some years earlier the Costa Rican
Government entered into a contract with
Signor Attilio Lazaro Riatti of Italy, for
the purpose of bringing into the Matina
valley emigrants of all nationalities. who
should engage especially in the cultivation
of cocoa-the soil seeming to be particu-
larly adapted to that industry. Sixteen
hundred acres of land were given to Signor
Riatti, and other facilities granted him.
The colonists came, to the number of sew
eral hundred, and cocoa fourished for a
time, but am told that most of his peo-
pie are now devoting themselves to banana
raising as the quicker and more profitable
crop.
AN ENGLISH COLONY.
The Buena Vista colony, established
under a contract with the Atlantic Rail
way, and the River Plate Loan and Trust
Company, of London, secured eight hun
dred thousand acres of land a few years
ago for colonization purposes. As usual
with our English cousins, they wanted
everything in sight; but, although their