Barton County democrat. [volume] (Great Bend, Kan.) 1885-1915, 1902-05-16
BEAUTIES OF COSTA RIGA.
Remarkable Fertility of the soil-
Natives Peaceable and Fine-Look-
ing-City of San Jose.

Port Limon, on the eastern coast of
Costa RIGA, town of several thousand
inhabitants, is practically owned and
controlled by Americans. 1t is the
headquarters of the American Fruit
company, which owns 60 per cent. of
the banana plantations in that vicinity
1t employs about 500 persons, says the
Milwaukee Free Press.
At the company's plantations are
grown some 1,4O0 acres Of banana
trees. They cut from 1000 to 6.OOO
punches week. Bananas are a sure
crop and easily grown requiring al
most no cultivation, and trees will
are set out. They are planted in hills
like potatoes and grow up to consid
cradle height, and are cut off when
fruit is cut and send up new shoots.
gearing fruit the year round; a plan
tation is good for 2o,or 3oyears.
There is a good opportunity for
.oung men with energy and little cap
tai, as land is cheap and everything
stuck in the ground grows. Tt is
fact that the very telegraph poles
branch and start to grow. I saw sew
era1 of them with green shoots on
them. It is said one can't put pole
IN the ground that it doesn't start to
grow.
The weather is not excessively warm.
AT Port Limon it was 95 degrees in the
shade, but in San Jose, the capital city,
the climate is fine and the scenery
beautiful. The tropical trees and
plants, the deep mountain gorges and
canyons, the waterfalls and abundance
IF ferns and flowers make it quite an
deal place to live in. The country
seems well governed and the natives
are fine looking and peaceable and con-
tented with their lot. They can't work
very hard-not that they are lazy, but
ahe climate and the fevers and their
general rundown physical condition
seems to be against them. They die
quickly if stricken by any disease. 4
great many work on the coffee pIanta
tons, which is one of the chief indus
tries of the country.
One man, German, I think, is grow
ing rich exporting alligator skins. He
sold about 1000 last year, they tell me.
Another man has made fortune in
fine woods, such as cedar and mahog-
any.
San Jose, the capital, is city of be-
tween 10000 and 10000 people. 1t is
situated 1000 feet above the sea level
The buildings are all low, one-story af-
fairs, on account of the frequent earth
quakes they have there. Most of them
are built of adobe, few of wood OF
brick.
The city has magnificent theater,
one of the finest in the world. 1t has
beautiful frescoes and paintings by
Italian artists, marble statuary and
gold leaf decorations and inlaid floors
of rich woods. It was erected at cost
of 81, 500, 900. The exterior is not pre-
possessing and the whole thing has
proved to be an elephant on the peo-
pies hands, as they have little good in
the amusement line at any time of the
year. There is a fine church, Catholic
of course. I attended a military mass
there one day. The military band
played during the entire service, which
was an elaborate and enigmatica1 one
to stranger.
The streets are narrow and unpaVed
and there are no sidewalks. An Eng
lish company runs an electric line in
the city and there is telephone serv
ice. All the real work that is done in
that country is done by foreigners
mostly English, Americans and Ger
mans. great many of the men who
once owned property and were wealthy
have been reduced in the last few years
to poverty, the low price of coffee max
ing it almost impossible for them to
run their plantations at a profit. They
are all looking forward to the in
creased wages and higher prices thai
the Nicaraguan canal, if put through
will bring them.