The Washington herald., 1915-08-15

f, ter and wiped out nearly the entire cen
| ter Of the city. The trade winds carried
| of in smoke to South America the whole
business section. It changed Colon to q
semi-colon.
| While the place has now the genera
aspect of a singed cat. 1t won't look tina
way long. 1t is rising from its ashe.
with remarkable rapidity. I had no ides
there could be SO much activity anc
virility in such an enervating climate
There is hardly a block where laborer.
! are not planting the roots for concrete
buildings. No more wooden shacks to be
licked up by torch in q night. They
tell me the whole place will be rebuilt IL
six months. and believe them.
The Washington Hotel, the new rail
] road station. the Strangers Club and the
/ new docks just escaped. The new docki
are fireproof anyway, and have beer
opened within the year Only two are
completed and seven more are under
| way. They are beauties, as docks 20
enormous. commodious and practical Nc
! American city has anything to touch
them. 1t is to be hoped that in time
commerce will come to fill them with
shipping bound canalwise Just now 1,
is only meager trickle through thii
crack that Goethals made. The cana
fares are pretty stiff and probably some.
| thing of a detriment. 1t cost the Pan
ama-Pacific Line more than $4,000 to
send one ship through. The brown khaki.
clad government oficial who came
aboard to do the measuring showed me
the bill. or course, they tell you that Is
| a good deal cheaper than sending the
ship around the Horn. but the answer
to that is-then why send 1t at all?
However. ! am not concerned with that
question Let's leave those deep thoughts
to Roger W. Babson and the folks in
Washington
Why the Colon nre overlooked the
strangers Club no fellow knows. II is
| Just the kind Of structure a FIRE would
enjoy. and it is right alongside of where
| the names did their most conscientious
| work You should know that the Stran-
gers Club Is a ~orld-famed institution
What the Savage Club is to London, the
Jockey Club to Paris. the Lambs Club
to New York, SO Is the Strangers Club
to the Zone. Rex Beach gave it a place
in literature under the name OF the Trav-
elers' Club in his novel. The Ne'er-do-
we'll
1 had numerous letters of Introduction
and looked forward 70 a delightful even
ing on a windswept veranda overlookins
the oily rollers of the Caribbean in place
OF my deck chair on the ship tied up 10
heat-Soaked concrete pier with q
steamer alongside loading countless bags
OF smelly raw sugar and another in the
next berth rafting in Thousands OF CO.
coanuts. So I went to the Strangers
Club
found it in what is practically a
freight yard.
After some lodging managed to get
safely through a string Of cars that q
Snnrtv rsh zinc ~
and that and pulling TO pieces without
any apparent object or purpose whatever.
narrow and rickety flight of wooden
stairs led up one side OF a veranda on
stills. and back of this were the rooms
Of the club and back Of these again was
the ocean front A glance at this showed
a muddy and rocky shore well Uttered up
with garbage and not inviting. Nobody
seemed keen to contemplate it, They
gathered on the other veranda, abutting
over the railroad tracks where they
could gaze on an ever-chansing scene
That Is. the cars would be ever chang
ing. Sometimes there would be only two
freight cars to look at and again as
many as eight. There was no monotony.
That noisy little engine kept them on
the jump all the time. except once in
awhile it would snort away from them
entirely and strut up and down the
tTdCk IN 'front.' OF Inc CluD all bV itself.
just to show Of.
In addition TO the outlook and the d.
verting noise Of the engine and the
clanking cars We were swept by ocean
breezes. 1t was the warm and moist
trade wind and IL came laden with
punsent soft coal smoke from the engine
IT was more than laden. 1t was loaded
to the guards with smoke. I'll bet that
trade wind gets round-shouldered carry
ing it.
Now ! have no fault to and with the
Strangers Club as a club. only WON
der it can be so popular and famous in
such surroundings, not to say exist They
treated me charmingly: talked mainly
about the big government cold storage
plant, and how cheaply and quickly one
can have laundry done In Colon. u was
a relief to learn that The need is es-
sential. AS to the canal and its future.
they seemed to take about as much in
terest as the average New Yorker does
in the Barge Canal.
Buck, who comes from somewhere east
Of Third avenue. is having life revealed
to him in new phases. He gets acquaint-
ed with many things on shipboard with
out being introduced. For instance, he
refers to his stateroom steward as that
there he.chambermaid." and all the Of
fcers from the captain down to the
youngest ouartermaster he address, as
Say. Bill
Among other modern contraptions. this
ship is fitted with air mattresses. It was
when it left New York. They are
scarce now. Buck didn't approve
DO ye think I'm going TO sleep on an
overGrown hot-water bottle?' said he.
'Nothin' doin'. II that Northumberland
don't give me q regular mattress ri
hitch a fife TO this thing and make It
play me to sleep like a self-actin' bag
pipe"
Then some one stuck . pin in Buck's
bed and he awoke at o'clock from a
dream that he was being bounced on a
cobble pavement. The air had gone out
and left nobody home and Buck was
rolling about on the bolts and stats at
the bottom Of the bunk that two thick
nesses Of rubber failed to obliterate.
When in Colon, before drifting through
the canal-driftins is the word. as IT,
takes nine hours to go the less than fifty
miles-Bessie bethought her that being
in the land Of tropical fruits 1t would
be we'll to revel in them. They were, Of
course, mainly out Of season. They gen.
orally are where they grow. She did