enabled to make a journey which would only extend over a few days without inconvenience. Had it been tried in the rainy season, we should in all human probability have never heard again of Capt. Pim, and the flag-lieutenant on the station would in a bumper of champagne have wished him a pleasant passage to the Pacific. Those who take

*

an interest in naval affairs must remember that within the last few years her Britannic Majesty's ships, as well as the American, have lost one-third of their crews by fever on that fatal coast,—I do not include Lord Nelson's ship: she lost nearly the whole of her crew, who ascended the river,- although they were never allowed to go on shore, or to be exposed to sun and rain on board. Owing to the clearing and drainage of the land around Colon, the health of the people there is vastly superior to that of the residents of Grey Town. Still, during the rains and two or three following months, no ship can lie in the port for a week without contracting fever. Few of the railway officials escape without several attacks every year: they are now seldom fatal at the time; but the constitution becomes so impaired, that a change of climate is indispensable if the patient wishes to save himself from being a sufferer for life. It is singular to mark the affinity which this fever has for those who have once suffered from its attacks. In more than one instance I have seen it return in a few days after landing, when a person had been eight years absent from the country. During the construction of the Panama Railway every possible care was taken to keep the labourers in health; yet the line is said to be fenced with the graves of the dead of all nations, whose number no man can tell.

Does Capt. Pim imagine that his labourers could preserve their health amidst swamps of a similar nature to those which proved so fatal in this earlier undertaking? The manner in which he speaks of the eagerness of the sparse population to commence the great work proves that he does not understand the nature of the race he would employ. Throughout Central America no man will work more than is necessary for a bare subsistence. Want of labour paralyzes every undertaking, and that which is imported can alone be depended on. Let the traveller study the faces of the numerous labourers who may be working on the jetties when he lands at Colon. In a few months he will see a completely new lot; the former, having made a few dollars, return to their huts in the country, till necessity again bids them work.

Colonel Totten, the great engineer of the Panama Railway, the man by whose indomitable skill and endurance the isthmus was first spanned, has often informed me of the great straits they were frequently reduced to for want of labour; and it was only by the introduction of a colony

* “Several old Indians at Cape Gracias a Dios agreed that Lord Nelson's expedition had been undertaken at an improper season of the year; that his men had been restricted in their mode of acting, and were obliged to conform to habits of discipline, and diet which dispirited them. Disease, discontent, and disappointment were the consequences, and the enterprise was abandoned after a partial success."-Roberts' Narrative.

from Carthagena that the work was ultimately completed. The inhabitants of the isthmus contributed no more towards making the railway, than the Neapolitans in 1859 did towards liberating their country. Both are indebted to the foreigner for success.

At a rough guess, the proposed line from Monkey Point to Lake Nicaragua might be about three times the length of that of Panama. Goods, on arrival at the lake, would have to be embarked in a steamer and carried to the opposite side, there to be disembarked and again loaded up. On arriving at Realexo a similar unloading and loading must take place before the much-handled merchandize would be afloat on the broad Pacific.

In the endeavour to launch his scheme, Capt. Pim treats with injustice the site and advantages of Panama. We all know it is a serious disadvantage for ships to have to discharge their cargoes and passengers into lighters for transmission to the terminus of the railway, or vice versa. But we are also cognizant that the directors had determined on running a pier into deep water if the New Granadian Government had had the good sense to have renewed their charter. It is a misfortune for the commerce of the world that they did not; and, in the end, no people will be such losers as the contemptible, corrupt officials of New Granada. If they imagine for a moment that the Colossus who now overshadows the whole northern continent will quietly give up possession of the key of the two worlds when his lease. is up, their vanity must have set them beside themselves. In six months after the departure of the Americans, supposing such an event should ever take place, the forest would again meet over the track which an energetic people have hewn through it at a huge expense of life and treasure.

Calms certainly prevail at intervals in the Bay of Panama, just as they do in any other tropical region. But, after a long experience of the place, I may with truth assert that I have seldom heard merchants mention them as an evil which pressed heavily on commerce. Steam is everywhere advancing with such giant strides, that before many years have elapsed all the valuable carrying trade of the world will be done by steamers. Even Capt. Pim's railway, if made, would not greatly facilitate commerce, if steamships were not in waiting at either end to clear the glutted stores.

Colon is undoubtedly a bad port in the season of the Northers, but some seamen may not be aware that the wind never blows home; and the swell, which is so much dreaded, seldom or never comes in more than about once a year. I have known four to pass without such a visitation. Another proof that the port cannot be so very dangerous is the fact that the Panama railway brigs have been running monthly to New York since the opening of the road, without meeting with a single casualty. Neither, with the exception of the West India mail steamer Avon, have I heard of the wreck of any vessel there. The

See a statement of the weather in the different months of the year in the Nautical Magazine, volume for 1856.

Avon, when trying to steam off in a Norther, broke the quarter-spring in canting, and the swell striking against the wrong bow drove her on the beach.

I believe the uncertainty which now exists concerning the renewal of the lease alone prevents the company from making improvements which would greatly increase the security of the port. A breakwater running out from Point Toro to the North-east would effectually shelter the shipping at the wharves, as well as those in the bay. Between the island of Manzanilla and the main land is a deep estuary, sheltered from all winds, that might be converted into an inner port by dredging out the mud. American energy only requires permission to work marvellous changes in the ports on both sides of the isthmus,-changes which would for some years amply meet the increasing demands of a commerce which is yet in its infancy.

A word about the political difficulties of the undertaking. The people of the state through which the line must pass belong to a race proverbially false and faithless,-a race that will without hesitation give any number of guarantees without the slightest intention of observing any one of them. At this day the inhabitants of Colon (native and foreign) are taxed, although the treaty with the New Granadian Government states distinctly that no taxes are to be levied on the land made over to the railway company.

The shareholders in the proposed line must also remember that they would have to take their chances of the mishaps which revolutions might bring on them. English statesmen have wisely resolved not to intermeddle in the politics of the New World, and the present position of France with regard to Mexico is a proof of the correctness of their views. In a country where one party seizes your horse for the service of the existing government, and a second your mule for the provisional one, it would be advisable before sinking millions of dollars to care-· fully examine the subject in all its bearings. The Americans are the people most deeply interested in the subject of railways across the isthmus, and Englishmen may rely that a people who are now constructing one, regardless of expense, from East to West through their own vast territory, would not allow Capt. Pim's route to slip through their fingers if any solid advantages, commercial or otherwise, could be reaped by appropriating it. But I will conclude my remarks with a few notes of my experience of the climate of Nicaragua.

A wag once informed our captain, in answer to his inquiries if there were any peculiar features of the land by which Grey Town might be recognized, that on nearing the coast a dense black cloud would be seen, and by steering for the centre he must find Grey Town. We neared the coast in the afternoon, and saw a cloud stretching along the whole of the horizon to the South-west. At 5h. the ship was taken aback by a sudden shift of wind from the direction of the cloud. The wheel ropes broke, and for the moment there was some little confusion. In a few minutes, however, the force of the wind had passed, and it commenced to rain, and such rain! It did not fall in drops, but in sheets of water, reminding one of the exterior edge of a cataract. Aa

But

officer remarked, "The hotter the war, the quicker the peace." he was mistaken. Hour after hour the deluge kept pouring down, lighted up by that pale blue ghastly lightning which delights to hover over the pestiferous swamp in all tropical countries.

At daylight the weather cleared, and the rising sun came up from behind in a dense mass of opaque cloud, which rose from the valleys like a wall. "There is fever," said an old coaster, "plain and palpable in those masses. You might dig them with a spade." A low sandy beach was in sight about four miles distant from us, glistening in the pale sunshine with a sickly yellow hue; behind it rose the impenetrable jungle, and a few low hills topped at intervals with the gigantic cotton tree. As the ship slowly closed the shore, the light land wind came off with a damp unearthly coolness, which made men shiver, although the thermometer only fell to 75°. On the beach the heavy surf was breaking with that peculiar melancholy sound which must be heard to be appreciated, and sending showers of spray over the summits of the trees, that stood like a dense wall at the distance of a few yards from it. The surface of the sea was discoloured with mud, and far as the eye could reach strewed with the trunks and branches of trees. Flecks of foam, patches of grass, reeds, and other débris brought down by the River San Juan were strewed about the surface of the sea.

When within a mile of the entrance of the port a Yankee pilot came off in a canoe, and the following dialogue, which I subsequently found correct in the leading features, took place regarding the weather, &c. Captain. "Does it often rain like it did last night?"

Pilot. "I guess it does, and a great deal harder too sometimes. If you get a slant to-day, you had better unbend the sails, and get as many ropes down as you can, or they will soon rot, for nothing stands long here except American pitch pine; English oak and ash rot very quickly, so look out for your boats' oars."

C. "When will the rainy season be over?"

P. "I cannot exactly say, although I have been here more than two years, as the rain lasts longer than on any other part of the coast, and is more uncertain. However, it gives over a little about Christmas, when the Northers set in, and while they last the place is bearable."

C. "Do the Northers occur frequently, and last long?"

P. "No; there are seldom more than three or four in the season, and they rarely blow strong over a few hours."

C. "Are you greatly troubled with musquitoes or other insects whose stings induce ulcers?"

P. "Yes. If you attempt to penetrate the jungle, the musquitoes attack you in swarms; and, unlike the generality of these insects, when they have tasted blood they are not easily shaken off, but allow you to kill them wherever they alight. On the beach the sand flies are a great torment; and should a manzanilla tree be near, their sting is so venomous that the mark remains for a fortnight afterwards. No precaution will protect you from this annoyance, as they get inside your clothing."

C. "Is there much fever here?"

P. "Yes; we are never clear of it for any length of time. Walker's filibusters die by hundreds. You will see a batch on shore who have just come down the river,-mere skeletons of men, although they have only been six weeks in the country, at a fort named Serapaqui. It is impossible for a white man to expose himself to sun or rain, and escape an attack of the shakes. The crews of the French and Italian brigs who trade with this port suffer severely. Not long since one of your vessels stationed here used to send a fishing party to haul the seine in the cool of the evening: the result was that seventy men were on the sick list in a short time."

There is a peculiarity about this fever which always astonishes medical men when they first come on the coast. I allude to the circumstance of its frequently breaking out nine days after the vessel has sailed, although not a case may have occurred while lying in port. When this takes place the attacks are generally troublesome, often fatal indeed. I have seen some which could not be detected from the worst species of yellow fever.

In no part of the American continent have I found the atmosphere so oppressive as at Grey Town. When the rains hold off for a day in the wet season the air becomes a perfect vapour bath, covering everything with damp and mould, so that in a few hours cloth, clothes or shoes which have been worn in England look as if they were covered with hoar frost. The rosy colour on the Saxon cheek is soon blanched, and replaced by a dingy yellow hue; but so imperceptibly is this change wrought in the majority, that it is only by comparison with fresh arrivals one can comprehend the difference which the climate has made in their appearance.

At the period of my visit a heavy frigate could cross the bar of the San Juan, and anchor under the lee of the sandy spit which formed the harbour; but there was at that time indications of the doubtful nature of its permanent existence, by the changes* which a heavy Norther would make in the contour of Punta Arenas and other parts. It is not my intention to write a history of Grey Town. One could not by land go beyond it. I ventured into the woods, but was attacked in such a blood-thirsty manner by musquitoes that I was compelled to seek safety in a hasty retreat. While effecting this, I stumbled over a bush and disturbed a colony of wasps which had built their nest of clay in the fork of the branches. These insects are more than an inch long, and their sting in such a climate must be very troublesome. The bushes along the sea-beach appear to be their favourite haunt, as I never saw them on the banks of the San Juan.

The city of Grey Town is built on a swamp backed with lagoons, and I one day sat at the door of a house and shot snipe. On shipboard we were frequently uneasy by discovering that snakes (among them the deadly blood-snake) would swarm up by the cable or a slack

* The manner in which this point has gradually grown out is shown on the Admiralty plan.