Evening star. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1854-1972, 1907-04-15
IN FORESTS PR|MEvAL
Picturesque Route of the Cuban
Railroad.
TREES HUNG WITH MOSS
Fence Posts That Blossom in the Fer
tile Soil.
QUAINT TOWN OF HOLY GHOST
Conservatism of Sancti Spiritu-
Pride of the People of An
cient Trinidad.
QUAINT TOWN OF HOLY GHOST

Special Correspondence of The and the Chicago
Record Herald.
SANCTI SPIRITUS, Cuba, April 10. 1907.
Inc trains on the Cuba railroad which is
owned by Sir William Van Horne Grenville
M. Dodge and other enterprising Amert-
cans, who have done SO much to develop
the interior provinces of Cuba, plunge into
a pr1meval forest shortly after leaving the
city OF Santa Clara. The trees are covered
with orchids hanging moss, and are draped
Win vines like those in the cypress swamps
OF FLORIDA and southern Mississippi The
growth Is so dense that the forests are i'm
passable except where paths have been cut.
ana these paths are like labyrinths leading
10 nowhere. During the revolution for In
dependence the forests were the refuge Of
the insurgents. Whenever they were closely
pressed by the Spanish troops they plunged
into the green CULTS and scattered beyond
the knowledge as well as the reach of their
pursuers. Maxfmo Gomez had several camp
ing places In the timber so we'll concealed
that nobody but well-trained timber wolves
could find him, and in one of these retreats
hospital was maintained for more than
Two years by an ebony Amazon called La
Bayamesia.
An Ebony Amazon.
Her real name is Rosa Castellanos. and
she was one of the genuine heroes of the
war for liberation. She is now living at
Camaguey practicing the profession of
nurse and midwife. honored and respected
by all true Cubans.
La Bayamesia is giantess a full-blood-
ed negress six feet five inches In height
and as black as block Of anthracite Her
muscular development Is extraordinary
Her strength was SO great that she regu-
larly carried the sick and wounded insur-
q MI nc md hot ala
Clara and Puerto Principe on her back
twenty, thirty and even fifty miles to her
hospital in the Najasa Hills, southeast of
Camaguey. On a hill that is inaccessible
TO ordinary people she had row of tents
rudely supplied with the necessaries of life
and she hoisted her patients to the top In
hammocks. The hospital was impregnable;
no army could have taken It, and 1t was
so concealed by timber that the Spaniards
could never have found 1t except by acct
dent. There Rosa Castellanos nursed the
sick and wounded with the assistance of
several hospital stewards and nurses
Every native farmer and laborer in that
part of the country knew there was such a
place and respected her requests as If they
were the commands of the Almighty. They
gave her whatever she needed from their
humble stores and she was much better
supplied than any part Of the insurpent
forces.
The insurgent government gave her
commission as captain in the army. She
was much more entitled to the rank of
general than the majority Of those who
parade as such, for when her hospital was
vacant, when there were no sick or wound
ed to care for, La Bayamesia went down
and fought in the ranks. She is now be-
tween sixty and seventy years old, but as
vigorous as a woman of thirty. When the
proceeds of the thirty-five million dollar
loan We're being distributed among the vet
Grams of the revolution she received 81 800
as her share. with which she bought a
home in the city of Camaguey and there
she is living now.
Fence Posts That Blossom.
The stations along the Cuba railroad are
all on the American plan-new, modern
frame buildings. painted a bright yellow,
and all the section houses are the same
pattern. They remind you of those on the
and Ohio and the Big Four
systems in the United States The track is
Enclosed with wire fences on either side
the entire distance to keep the cattle from
interfering with the trains, and many Of
the fence posts have blossomed like the rod
of Aaron and are bearing flowers and fruit
The soil Is so fertile and vegetable life is
80 vigorous that any stick which retains
the sap Of the parent tree in Its fiber will
take root wherever 1T Is placed in the
ground. When these fences were built the
posts were cut in the adjoining forests and
those that were green have survived and
are now Towering trees. Surveyors stakes
have been known to take root and grow
Another curious freak Of nature Is orchids
growing upon telegraph wires. The atmos-
phere. like the soil, is full of fertility and
slips of air plants which have become de-
tached from the trees and have lodged
across the wires are now growing as brave
ly as any parasite you ever saw. The trees
are draped with orchids, but l am told that
no collectors ever come this way. There is
a question as to the value of the plants.
I have talked with several natives about
! I. tlox, t.,
them say that the forests contain many
rare and valuable varieties, while oluers
insist that all Of them are worthless. All
agree, however, that no competent botanist
has ever made an investigation here.
Shortage of Freight Cars.
Every station is surrounded by inn
mense piles of mahogany and cedar logs
awaiting shipment, and the owners are
for cars because they want to
take advantage of the unusually high
prices now offered for cabinet woods The
railway company, however. gives them no
satisfaction. Every available car is given
to the sugar planters hauling cane to the
mills and raw sugar to the shipping
ports. for this is the sugar season. No
railroad company in Cuba will furnish
cars for anything but sugar at this sea-
son of the year, and every one of the man.
ayers complains that he cannot get cars
enough Mr.. Orr manager of the United
Havana railways, and Mr.. Galdos, manager
of the Cuba railway, both tell me that
they could use four times as many cars
as they have, but cannot get them for love
nor money. The Cuba railway builds its
own cars, and turns out an average of
seventy a month. 1t wrecks an average
of twenty a month, which are either
ruined or have to be sent to the shops
for repairs, but that increase does not keep
pace with the development of the agricul-
tura1 and timber industries along the line
The same is true of locomotives. The
Cuba railroad has fifty. Mr.. Galdos says
it should have one hundred. Orders were
placed with locomotive builders in the
United States long ago, but the locomo-
tives are delivered very slowly.
The Cuban Hard Woods.
Mahogany Is often used for ties by the
railroads in Cuba, as well as in other
tropical countries, but Sir William Van
Horne has forbidden it on his road. He
considers 1t a crime to cut small mahog-
any trees, and there is plenty of other
timber in the forests suitable for construc-
ton purposes. bridge on the Cuba rail-
road near Santiago is built entirely of ma
hogany, but in violation of orders. The
contractor did not know, or claimed not
to know, that the caoba tree, as it Is
called in Spanish, was the mahogany
which Sir William had tabooed, and the
latter did not learn that he had ma
hogany bridge on the line until it had been
use for Sevara1 months