Payette enterprise. (Payette, Canyon Co., Idaho) 1909-1935, 1914-03-05
Payette Boy in
South America

WlM Ne appreciated ny Itttupu inui
= tons many friends in this commun
: ty. Mr.. Thurston left Payette M
vember list last year to go to Juiz d
Fora to accept position as teache
of chemistry and physics in o Graz
berry M. E. college. The letter DIS de-
criptiye of his journey from Ri
Janero to his destination:
1.-THE trip from Rio to Juiz de For
is thru very beautiful section o
country Perhaps my two years Il
Arizona made me think any countr.
beautiful that is green; at any rat
this was very beautiful green. Near
ly all of the hills are quite steel
but they are not very high-not many
of them could be dignified by the
name of Mountain. There are some
thing like twenty-one tunels to pas
thru. Nearly all of the little val
leys are farmed; / don't know what
the principal crop is, they seem TO
raise great many things, but every
little hut had a bunch of banana trees
near it. The native bananas are
about half the size of the ones we
get in the States and there are
about a fourth as many on bunch.
We passed several coffee plantations
the hillsides seem to be used more
for raising coffee. / shall probably
be able to tell you more about cof-
fee raising later on; most of the
coffee is raised south of here near
Sac Paulo. ("Sao' is pronounced
as near like San" as can tell you
on paper.)
The railroad is owned is owned by
the government and doesn't much
more than pay expenses in spite OF
their high freight and passenger
rates. 1t is like the custom house
every station has five or six times
as many men as are necessary to do
the work and the jobs are handed out
as political plums. The road bed
is excellent-big heavy rails and well
ballasted with crushed rock. The
engines and cars are small and
don't see how the second class cars
could be much more dirty than the
first class. First class passengers are
supposed to have only one suit case !
but are allowed as many bundles as
they wish-if one wishes to take two
suitcases, the extra one must be
wrapped in paper unless you have
1T passed to you thru the window.
The latter method seems to be the
more common practice and is seldom
questioned. There is no rule against
piling hand baggage in the aisles
and sometimes the easiest way TO
get from one end of the car to the
other is to crawl over the seats. 1t
Is a very difficult task to move about
the car while the engineer is play
ng Pop-the-Whip around the curves
My roommate got "sea7sick." The
rip requires about seven hours -
.eave Rio at six A. M. and arrive
here a little after one P. M.,; the
5are is 1880 reos which is about
1918.
Juiz de Fora is town of about
rs 900 and one Of the principal cities
If the state of Minas Geraes which,
,y the way, is several times as large
IS Texas. There are hills on every
side and there is some timber on
most of them. The prevailing coun-
Try rock is gnelss, a nletamorphosed
The closest mines are about
20 miles farther north where there
ire number of gold mines and some
diamonds are found A great many
,attle are raised in this part of the
state; we passed great many car
Dads coming out that were being
shipped to Rio. Some coffee is rails
ID but most of the farming Is for
he local market We have such
modern conveniences as electric
lights, a street-car system, water
works, paved streets, and several
picture shows. The streets are
paved with rough blocks of stone
ind are anything but smooth; ID you
ire not careful you will stub your
.oe. The drainage system isn't very
rood; every rain brings down
arge quantity of sand from the
Hills which collects In the streets
vs. there isn't enough grade for it to
wash away. I imagine that 1t costs
he city no small sum to have 1t
lhoveled up and carried away.
There are not great many Cath
,lic churches here for a South Amer
can town of this size-only five or
,ix. Two of them have very nice
with lots of grass, which is
IN expensive luxury down here. The
Methodist Church (South) is a good
,ized building which is fixed up fair
y comfortable.
This seems to be quite an educa-
ional center as there are several
,choala nrivate and Catholic as