Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1904-06-11
PUERTO PLAZA SCENES
va
Appearance ofthe City Sur
prises theTStranger.
CLEAN AND ORDERLY
PROVIDED WITH DRY STREETS
AND BRICK SIDEWALKS.
Many Persons Speak English-The
Red Cross Hospital-Land Owner
ship-Young Ladies' School.
Special Correspondence Of The Evening Star.
PUERTO PLATA, Santo Domingo,

After having heard 80 much about the
| disorder and strife in this turbulent repub-
| lie Of Santo Domingo. the stranger, upon
! landing at Puerto Plata. can scarcely ex-
| IIess less than surprise at the general ap-
| pearance of this little city. To one who has
| not only been in other West Indian cities.
| but has read SO much about the insanftary
| arrangements, filth and disorder in the
| towns of the so-called negro republic
| Puerto Plata is indeed agreeable sur
| prises We arrive fully expecting to go
| about the streets stumbling into mudhoias,
sloughs and unspeakable filth to be greeted
| by brutal negro police, holding out one
hand supplca tingly for the strangers coin
| while he clutches his cocomacacque stick
! threateningly with the other. and to be
l>disturl ed day and night by fierce TRADES
| and murderous quarrels on the streets by
| 4 people who have so Intellectually strug-
gled for upward of a century to show the
! world their capacity for self-government.
| But. if the rest of the republic should prove
| to be as orderly and well kept as this little
| city on the north coast, l shall be able to
! say that the entire country has been most
| outrageously maligned.
! From the sea Puerto Plata is first seen as
| narrow strip of notified white nesting
| close under rugged mountain covered
| with dark green foliage, so steep that 1t
seems as though the yenturesome mountain
| CllmDer COulQ scarcely ma a lOOtnOld upon
| its rugged sides, yet lay at anchor
! in the open roadstead at night the glmmer
of fire. like the red eye of an ogre, way
up upon the mountain side tells US that
there are people there, a settler who per-
haps has found agreeable abiding place
far away from the turmoil of the little city
at his feet over which he may cast mis-
searching gaze far away to where the line
of horizon melts in the blended mist of sky
and sea.
First Colony of Columbus.
1t was on this north coast where Column
bus founded the first colony in the new
world and as we sail along this coast We
recall his description of the island upon
his return to Spain, when. 1t is said, that,
cIumpling sheet of paper in his fist, he
threw 1t down saying, The island is like
that" And so it seems to us that this
comparison was most apt one, for
look at Santo Domingo from the we
see a disordered mass of crumpled noun
tains, their jagged peaks against the sky,
corrugated with deep ravineS and cre2ses
just as the sheet of paper which Columbus
crumpled and threw down may have looked.
And all is green, dense green foliage, save
where a brown spot high up upon steep
slope shows where a bit of land or the
mountain side itself has slid off, tumbling
into deep valley below.
Landing at Puerto Plata we find a min
iature harbor surrounded on two sides by
a well-built sea wall with two substan-
TALLY built iron piers projecting into the
bay, and, although it is midday when the
tropic sun beats most fiercely overhead,
we are famed by cool breeze, which at
once increases our already favorab.y formed
impression of the place. And to
prise, as we enter the town, we find in
place of the usually followed out streets of
West Indian city with a ditch through
the center serving as an open sewer and
gutter, high and dry streets, well rounded
and naVH1 with a he sides
clean brick sidewalks. The houses are
mostly all built of American lumber, with
corrugated iron roofs, there scarcely being
a trace left OF the old Spanish construction
of colonial days. AS matter of fact, tie
Spanish city, founded at the beginning of
the fifteenth century, was entirely de-
stroyed by the Spaniards upon their evac-
uat1ng it in 1865, after their fruitess at
tempt to regain possession of the island at
! the invitation of one of the revolutionary
governments.
1 stop to buy some fruit at a little shop
kept by negro, and of course, address
him in Spanish for am l not in Spanish
speaking country? But to my surprise as
try to figure out the difference between
the national currency and our own, which
Is fVe to one, the shopkeeper enters into an
explanation in good English l take it that
he is native of one of the British West
India Islands, and. upon putting the ques-
ton to him, he replies:
"Oh, no. / am a Dominican but MANY
OF us speak English the same as Spanish"
And so l learn. AS l am introduced to
TINS one and that. whether a government
or1clal or merchant, or have an errand
for the black boatman on the wharf. | find
myself many times at loss which lam
guage to use-Spanish or English
The Red Cross Hospital
| A middle-aged mulatto woman poking
her head out of a window as / stroll along
addresses me:
You came from off the man-of-war sir?
Would you not like to visit our Red Cross
Hospital, where we have many wounded
from the last battle with the rebels?''
AS l hesitate she invites me in, a small
room OF a very small house of dry-goods-
COX proportions. scrupulously clean, with
j piano on one side, a center table contain
Ing flowers and just room enough left for
three or four chairs Her English is spoken
with that soft gentle flow peculiar to the
creoles or the south, with scarcely trace
or foreign accent, yet she tells me that she
has never been out of the Island of Santo
Domingo and that she learned her English
rlght mere She relates the work of the
Red Cross, maintained entirely by the vol
untary contributions of the ladies of
Puerto Plata for taking care of the wound
ed sent in from the field.
'Or course, she said I'VE have not the
1aclntles Tor taking care of them that you
people have, yet think we are doing very
wen. Before the last batch of wounded
that was sent In to us arrived were
notlfled or their coming. Our superintend-
ent came to me and informed me that we
needed SIX more beds; we did not have
them told him he need not worry about
that, the beds would be ready by the time
the wounded arrived, and they were, all
sent by the ladies to whom 1 made our re-
quirements known"
She then took me into the hospital i'm
provised rooms of adjoining houses. The
wounded soldiers were stretched upon can
vas cots shrouded in clean linen. Every
thing appeared clean and orderly, and there
We're many expressions of contentment and
gratitude upon the 4swarthy faces of the
wounded. How different from the lines
which had read in one of our publications
few days before leaving New York, and
which l may here repeats;
Every Dominican may pound with his
cocomacaque and hack with his machete,
whose poisoned wounds heal slowly. Rifles
are universally distributed, and machine
guns are plenty. BIT though they possess
and manipulate all the deadly engines of
modern warfare, the blacks know nothing
of the appliances for relieving the suffer-
tngs of the wounded There are no sur
geons, no medicines; fallen with a broken
leg, or faint with loss of blood. the soldier
Is left to succumb to hunger and thirst, or
to be devoured by the wild hogs that In
fest the forest
Now. this may all be true, but have no
evidence OF 1t In and around Puerto Plata.
The army which 1t is claimed, you see