The Washington herald., 1911-12-31
STRANGE LAND BEYOND PANAMA:
SAN BIAS INDIANS DEFY WHITES

white men and just ripe for somebody
with brown skin to slip in and subsi-
die trouble, then I'm glad we kicked
Congress into neutralizlng the canal with
l4-inch guns and couple of brigades OF
infantry.
Another point in favor of the theory
that the San Bias are of Asatic origin
was brought out by the first officer of the
Panama last time l went north on leave
He declared that a San Bias was as able
a seaman as any Lascar. and asked what
American Indian was worth three triple
dashed something's on shipboard. Not
only are the San Bias good sailors, but
they make their own boats-cayucas, the
spicketies call 'em-Out of single trees
ard I've seen one of their dugouts so big
that it was decked over and schooner
rugged.
You can sail up and down either coast
of the San Bias country in one of ouI
government tugs and see no end of good
hardwood jungle or rich open country
that would grow three crops a year. The
Spickety government will be only too
glad to sell you as big a concession as
YOU are willing to fall for. but you'll
have to reach your land in an aerOplane
None of our shippers will risk a boat
crew setting you ashore. and as for going
overland, the tribe maintains regularly
relieved piCkets on every stream and
trail Less than a year ago a cayuCa full
of canal employees padded too far up one
OF the rivers running out of the San Bias
hills, and Zing. there was an arrow stick
ing out of the starboard bow, They
dropped the paddles to grab their guns
and the current naturally carried them
downstream. They held a council of war
padded up to the same point again, and
zing, there was another arrow not an
In h..
let her drift
The only man who ever got any dis
tanCe inside, Won T, the Austrian,
barely succeeded in getting out with his
own life and his brothers body-that Is
to say, most of il. He found the Ip-
dians worshipiDg a nasty little idol called
Tomai-Beebe, within forty miles of Pan
ANA Cathedral and our supercivilized
Canal Zone, with it's model police force
and Y. NJ. c. A. buildings. In fact, Won
T came within a split millimeter of
being offered up as sacrifice to TOmai-
Beebe. That's all the use the San Bias
have for a white man
But why do they keep up their
grouch?" protested the young tourist.
Wed only develop their old country and
do 1t good. They must have seen enough
of us Americans on the isthmus to know
that were different"
"Hombre,' said the old Isthmian softly,
how much difference does it make to
the natives of any country what kind of
a white man comes in there after gold?''
Gold in the Mountains.
"GoId?" The arm of the wicker chair
creaked as the young man leaned across
it, the Klondike lust in his eyes.
Those hills are jaundiced with it.
We've dug up wagonlOads of prehistoric
ornaments. not counting the German
made stuff you buy on the Cathedral
plaza, right up to the border. and every
San Bias you meet packs a thick pair of
homemade earrings. Won T says he
stumbled on deposits rich enough to start
a Cripple Creek stampede, II they had
been anywhere else"
declared the young tourist through set
teeth. Once I'm inside l guess they'll
think twice before they lay hands on an
American citizen within forty miles of
regiment of United States regulars
You do, eh? Let me tell you that while
the Zone government may give you
lift down the coast on a tug and set you
ashore at any place you pick, it won't
move a policeman or a soldier to keep
you from being pan broiled afterward.
If you cross the frontier you play lone
hand.
Uncle Sam is down here to dig the
canal, not TO start any more Seminole
wars, and he and the San Bias let each
other alone They never bother US and II
any of our convicts jump the chain gang
and beat the Zone police to the border
we write them of as dead. They never
return.
Were not anxious to butt into South
America. big stick first, but IL ever we
take over this marionette show OF re-
public, or II they try to build the next
link southwark of the Pan-American
Railroad il will be up to the United
States army to clear the way. They'll do
II, but what II will cost and what
they will find there no man can tell.
Probably it will be all swamps. cut up
sentries and poisoned arrows: but per-
haps our boys will find themselves hiking
into Manoa or Ell Dorado as they did into
Pekin. A good many people think that
the old tabled city OF gold lies somewhere
between the San Bias hills and South
America
Between here and little old New
York. declared the young tourist, "is
good enough for me-"
.Trumpins.
From the Christmas Psck.