The Indianapolis journal. [volume] (Indianapolis [Ind.]) 1867-1904, 1899-07-09
Its Striking Scenic Beauties, It's Gil
mate and What 1t VIII Do for
Broken-Down Business Men.
A SANITARIUM FOR INVALIDS
NEARLY A MILLION PEOPLE GET
THEIR LIVING FROM THE SOIL.
Visit to Uncle Sans Big Vaccine
Farm-Army Surgeons InOcuJate
Cattle by the Thousands.

Sans West Indian garden patch How
shall 1 describe 1t? 1t is different from
anything that has been published concern
ing it. 1t has more curious features than
any part of the South american continent
where / have been travelling for the past
year, and richer soil than almost any part
of the world.
I came to Porto Rico on the government
transport Mcpherson and have already
crossed the island from one side to the
other, making many excursions through the
interior. The island is revelation to me.
/ have never seen a country In which nature
has done so much to make pleasant home
for man.
Porto Rico is a combination Of the beau
ties of the tropics and temperate zone. 1t
is the new Switzerland of Uncle Sans do
minion. 1t lacks perhaps the grandeur OF
the Alps or the Rockies, but its quiet semi
tropical beauties more than make up for
lack of SHOWS and gigantic rocks. Some
times in going over it / am reminded of
Japan, and again 1 am carried back TO the
mountains of Korea or the hills of China.
There are silver streams. with matched
huts clinging to the sides of the hills down
which they run; there are regions which
equal the Blue Ridge mountains in their
| soft, hazy beauty. and other parts in which
| were it not for the bananas the cocoanut
palms the breadfruit trees and other trop-
| ical wonders you might imagine yourself at
| home in some of the most beautiful of our
| rolling lands.
Before / describe my tour of the island
| let me give you bird's-eyc view of 1t.
| Suppose we could attach ourselves for the
purpose to the tail of one of our Weather
| Bureau kites, which, believe, mount high
| err than any other kites made by man, and
| fly over it. We should see great rectan-
| gular body Of blue land rising, as 1t were
| out of some of the quietest waters of the
| globe.
Porto Rico is about !, 400 miles from New
| York on the boundary between the Atlantic
| ocean and the Caribbean sea.
| It lies between the islands of Santo Do
| mingo and St. Thomas. 1t Is so near the lat
| ter island that you can steam there in
about six hours, and so far east of Cuba
that 1t takes our best transports two days
| to go from Ponce, on the south, to the city
| Of Santiago.
| Porto Rico as we see 1t from our kite is
| a mass of rolling hills. With the exception
of light green fringe bordering the coast
it is all hills and valleys And such hills and
such valleys. The hills slope in places like
walls, and the valleys are gigantic capital
VS., with mountain streams dashing
through them. Everything is covered with
green, the dark shades Of the mountains
largely composed Of coffee tobacco and
bananas, while the sickly. green of the
coastal plains comes from the sugar plantf-
tons.
In looking at the island you see that the
hills rise higher in the center. 1t Is divided
.t.s.~ ,tzl,w fhr.sr y.
| 1t from west to east, branching out near
the cpd In two spurs This ridge looks just
like pitchfork with two great tines and a
long handle. The joint Of the fork Is about
sixty miles from the western end Of the
| island, and each of the tines Is about forty
miles long. Not far from where they join
| one green mountain rises high above the
others. This is FL Yunque, or the Anvil"
the highest point I'm Porto Rico. 1t is $500
| feet above the level of the ocean and you
| can see ii far out in the Atlantic and in the
| Caribbean.
WHERE ATLANTIC IS DEEPEST.
1t is the top of the mountain chain which,
| rising out of the sea, forms the Antilles.
| These islands are, in fact, merely the peaks
of great mountain range which extends
| far down into the bed of the ocean. If the
water could be taken away or walled off,
| you would here have some of the highest
mountains of the globe The deepest part of
the Atlantic is Just north of Porto Rico. In
coming to San Juan / sailed over Brown
sons Deep, the bottom of which Is five miles
under water. 1t was at the point in the
| ocean plain where the land rises and finally
eliminates in Ell Yunque. If you could shut
the sea off from this point the top Of Porto
Rico would be higher than any mountain
higher than anything in the world outside
the very highest of the Himalayas. The
same mountain chain springs up out of the
water in Cuba to a distance Of eight thou
sand feet above the sea. and in Santo Do
mingo. where it is the tallest, to eleven
thousand feet. 1t rapidly falls toward the
east, and in st. Thomas is rises only half
as high as Porto Rico above the water.
I have called Porto Rico a garden patch.
1t is little more than that in size COM
pared with the United States. 1. is Sc
small ii would hardly be a mole on the face
of Texas. 1t would take just about 1,0O(
Porto Ricos if they could be sliced off and
patched together to make crazy quilt COW
ering the United States. 1t is only three
times as big as Rhode Island, about half al
big as New Jersey and little less than hall
the size of Massachusetts. You could pu,
ten Porto Ricos into Indiana, and If you cut
1t up into squares it would be only sixty
times the size of the District of Columbia
Its average width is about as great as from
Washington to Baltimore. and its length i:
not much greater than from Baltimore tC
Philadelphia. Were ii level you could wall
from one end of 1t to the other in three
days and across il in one. On a bicycle yol
could travel over it in few hours from
coast to coast.
TIE PEOPLE SWARM.
Notwithstanding its smallness, however
IT is more thickly populated than any of oul
States except Massachusetts, and Rhod.
Island 1t has $4,000 people. or 22s to tn,
square mile. A square mile is go acres. L
is just a section OF land. On every section
OF Porto Rico there ara 223 people, and OF
every quarter section. or 16o-acre farm
there are living the average about fifty
four souls.
This is so notwithstanding the island ha
almost no manufactures. The people al
live of the SOIL and hence their condition
cannot be compared with that OF the peopl