The Montgomery advertiser., 1904-11-29
From Indies and South
 America They Come.
Interested Sights on the Wharves ol Mobfle When the ships are Un- loaded and Freight Cars and Warehouses Receive the
 Products.
By Will T. Sheehan.

ence. )-"Red below" yellow above" warehouse" A keen-eyed young man. with a long slender wand. sits upon a boarded perch, on the long and spacious wharf above the yellow waters of Mobile Bay. A steady stream of ne- groes. each with bent head and bear ing a heavy, green bunch of bananas, flows out of the hold of a white ship. past the perch and there dividing, but some of the green punches may go into one of the cars of the long freight train that waits on the rails a few feet away, or into tho warehouse for shipment in the near future.
 The bent figures of the negro labor CTS with their green topping of banan- as constantly shufies by the boarded perch. The keen-eye of the young man sweeps the bunch that weights down each atom of the stream. He lays his wand lightly upon each bunch as he grades it with a glance. There is colored flag at the door of each waiting car. The keen-eyed young men knows the class of bananas that is needed fer each of the waiting cars. The red flag, the yellow flag and the other colored flags, are the emblenhs the negroes un- derstand. The big negro with the lit- tie bunch of bananaS knows that when the wand Is dropped upon his burden and the judgment of yellow above" Is given his bunch belongs in the car that flies the yellow flag at the door.
 In his other hand the young man upon the perch holds a heavy cord that dangles from a metal box very similar to the fare register in a street car With each verdict he gives with the passing of each burden-bea with each falling of his wand the young man on the perch jerks the cord of the register and a bell rings, just as if a fare had been collected on street car. and the conductor had r'lng 1t up on the register in the honest and ap- proved manner.
 And constantly that stream of bur den bearers flows away from the hull of the fruiter that Is lashed to the wharf. and constantly the laborers. un- burdened and with quickened steps, hurry back to the vessels side to take their allotted place and receive each Tn his proper turn a new bunch Of ba- nanas that Is lifted to his back from a heavy mat by two negroes who stand at the ships side and receive the punches as they are rolled upon the mat. The mat is ever present when the bananas are rolled from the hold of the vessel. The mat protects the bananas from injury as they are lifted from within the hold and rolled outside that they may be placed upon the backs of the smiling. good ma tured burden bear CTS.
 The young man on the perch Is flank ed on either side by an experienced laborer, who watch the punches as they pass with eager interest. They note in an instant a ripe or rotten banana in the bunch, a defect that may spoil the bunch before 1t reaches its desti- aN1 A,Ir out the ripe or rotten banana and throw 1t into pile. The bananas that are shipped are still green. They are to ripen in the cars and in the store rooms of the retail merchants.
 There are three of these perches three of these young men and three streams of burden-bearers. The larger stream flows away from the fruit ele- fVators," an electrical appliance for economizing labor and hastening the unloading of the fruiters. One part of the elevator Is upon the wharf and an- other part descends deep into the hold of the vessel like the trunk of an ele- phant. The fruit elevator is worked by electricity and machinery upon the principle of the useful and old fash toned pump, which have a series of cups fixed one above the other upon chain When the pump is at work the cups come up from the water brimming- full and discharge their contents at the outlet.
 The fruit elevator is on the same principle, but upon q larger scale. The cups" or receptacles are of canvas or sacking that the delicate fruit may not be damaged. As the endless chain runs through tho hold where the ba- nanas are packed tier upon tier two laborers deftly and swiftly seize a bunch and lift 1t Into one of the 'cups" or receptacles. The chain revolves even as does the old-fashioned pump. and as each receptacle descends upon the wharf two other men empty it by lift ing out the green bunch and laying 1t upon mat from which 1t Is trans ferred to the back of one of the burden bearers.
 And all the time the young men upon the perches grade the punches and yank their cash register contrivance to count the punches. At each car door there is another man with cash register ar- engagement who counts the punches in the car and sees that they are properly hung and packed for railroad transpor- tation.
 An experienced man who gets a big salary travels on these banana cars There Is a thermometer In each of these cars. It is the business of this man to take and record the tempera- ture of each of these cars even as he would take and record che temperature of a sick man left in his charge. As they fly along the rails for hundreds of miles the bananas are in the critical state of ripening. A car too hot or a car too cold might spoil a car load of fruit. And so loosely speaking a doc tor is sent along to tide the bananas over the crisis.
 This is the hurried way in which bananas make their entry into Ala bama. These are the scenes and the conditions which surround their com ing into port.
 These wharf scenes would interest the family man of the inland town who stops al the corner fruit stand and ju- diciously considers the question as to whether he shall carry home bag of fruit and all the while the Grecian or Italian fruit merchants sombre fea- lures are lighted up with an ingrati- ating smile as he pries open a paper sack, saying obsequiously, De banan' you lika de banan. The Mobile wharf is the great connecting link be- tween the banana groves of Central America and the swarthy skinned fruit seller in the inland towns.
 The spread of the banana has been marvellous Young men with a slight tax on his memory can recall when at certain seasons of the year bananas were rarities in the inland towns and he can recall that at no season were they very plentiful, very common or