Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1905-04-29
SchlR1oR5 At WORK AT CUIEBRk(

great lot of old hair bundled up in the ware
houses. It was put into vat and boiled
and cleaned. The result five hundred
good hair mattresses, which did not cost
over 81 apiece. They could not have been
bought at home for five times that money.
The sanitation officers needed a launch,
and it would have cost them 81 900 had one
been ordered from the states. They took
an old boat at La Boca and by an expendi-
ture of $500 fitted out vessel which does
very well. The same department required
a float to carry their disinfected clothing
and baggage similar to the ones used for
that purpose at Havana. They took an old
hulk with crane upon II and It serves the
purpose at one-third the cost OF a new
float
French Stationery.
Among the other valuable things left by
the French is great amount of sta
tionery. They bought things by the
ton, and this was so OF fine drawing
paper. In the basement of the administra-
ton building at Panama lies a carload or
SO of drawing sheets, each as big as a
center table. The craftsmen tell me there
is more than can be used for all the draw
ings that can possibly be made for the
canal work. and that the remainder will be
worth thousands of dollars.
In the same basement there are printing
presses and Autograph presses. all of which
have been brought into use by the commits
sion. The canal printers work night and
day. They make all the blanks used in the
work; they print all the reports and upon
the Autograph presses they are reproducing
drawings and plans.
There are hundreds of letter presses scat
tered through the warehouses here. and
there are also about six tons of steel pens
so rusty that they are good for nothing
Some of these have been shoveled out into
the ocean, and the balance. one of the
builders facetiously SAYS he intends to use
for making steel concrete
a no1I,r D;z
Some Of the greatest extravagances were
in the buildings. Ordinary cottages stand
on costly cement foundations. At the An
con stables there is a bath tub made for the
horses which is Is feet wide, 20 feet long
and feet deep. 1t is SO arranged that
water can be easily let into it. It was
the custom of the French engineers to
have their racing ponies washed off in this
way instead Of currytng them There were
also costly chicken coops, and what l
judge Is the most costly hog house on
record.
Riding up Ancon hill the other night I
discovered 1t. had passed the hospitals
and took road that led off into the jungle,
supposing 1t would bring me down the
hill on the other side. The road was paved
and guttered. and Mr.. Johnson, who was
with me, estimated that 1t must have cost
at least ten thousand dollars a mile to
build. We followed it, and its end was a
feet long. 100 feet wide and built entirely
Of concrete, with iron supports upholding
a galvanized roof. The pen was divided
into compartments each of which had its
cement trough: and 1t was, all told large
enough to have accommodated 200 hogs at
one time. l asked Mr. Johnson what 1t
would cost to build such structure. and
he replied that low estimate would be
S15 600. Similar extravagances are to be
seen everywhere.
New Roads for Panama,
Speaking of roads, the commission is rap
idly building them about Ancon hill. They
will construct highway to the Savannas,
a beautiful rolling country four miles from
Panama, and will probably repave the whole
of Panama City. The road-making now
going on is through an old stone crusher,
which the supervising architect has erected
on the side OF Ancon hill, below a natural
quarry. The rocks rolled down the
hill onto receiving platform, and thence
fed into the jaws of the crusher, being
distributed, by a shaker into the several
sizes needed for rock foundations and road
work. This crusher was made up out OF
old material left by the French. The jaws
came from one place, the steam engine
track from a third. Altogether, they form
we'll as though its parts were all new and
freshly imported from the states
FRANK @. CARPENTER
Harvard is building the largest reflector