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Prowling About Panama

<h3>THE INTERIOR</h3> We had reached the town of Anton the day before, and I had sent the guide back with the horses and purposed to make my way alone. The morning was fresh and balmy, as befitted the dry season, even if a night spent on an antiquated cot in a room next to that occupied by a man with a racking cough and a rooster with a clarion voice, were not a perfect repose. The rapport between the fowl and the afflicted was complete: when one of them broke the silence, the other immediately took up the refrain. At breakfast I suggested to the good wife of the host that I had heard that if a board were placed above a rooster's head so that he could not stretch upward, he would not crow. She was all solicitude at once at the suggestion that the noisy cock had disturbed my slumbers, and I had to protest my indifference to such serenades. Down the street I found a little store where the owner had a horse or two to hire upon occasion. Thirty minutes of bicker and I was astride a wiry little native pony to which a bridle was unknown, and out through the stately palms and luxurious bananas I made my way to the open [Pg 94] country eastward. The river was thronged with horses led to water, and women busy with their domestic laundry. It was quaint and picturesque. In some such manner might the ancient Egyptians have gone about their morning tasks. I have seen exactly the same procedure in the Philippines and by the rivers of southern China. A mile or two from the town the trail mounted a rolling hillock and I pinched myself to remember that I was not in New Mexico. Straight ahead rolled the almost level llanos for miles until they were lost in the hills by Chame, and the purples and pinks of the six-thousand-feet summits were like a frame for a picture whose southern limits were in the glint of the blue summer sea. It was a picture and a promise. For two hours the nervous little pony followed the trail across the smooth plains and frequent streams. If ever a land was spread out as a challenge to the plow and seeder, here it was. I sought a colonization site, where I had heard of a dozen plucky Americans who were undertaking a plantation on cooperative lines. At last I found it in the midst of as fine a tract of land as lies beneath the tropic skies. An old-fashioned farm dinner made life worth living after native "chow" for days. Modern tractors, plows, a ton of cotton seed, and other signs of enterprise did much to make the place seem like somewhere in the great Southwest. But the enterprising [Pg 95] Americans were harboring no delusions regarding the nature of their undertaking. They meant business and had counted the cost. <div class="imgcenter" style="width: 600px;"> <ANTIMG src="images/illus-093.jpg" width-obs="600" height-obs="224" alt="The Beautiful Savanas of Costa Rica" title="" /> THE BEAUTIFUL SAVANAS OF COSTA RICA</div> An American on the Canal Zone invested his savings in land in the interior, and during the vacation built a good wire fence. On his second visit the fence was totally destroyed by ax, fire, and wire-cutters. The owner appealed to the local alcalde, a brother of the provincial governor. He demanded redress for his wrongs. The judge heard his story, and then, striking a dramatic attitude, smote his breast, and exclaimed, "If these my friends had not done this thing, I should have done it myself." Which was to say, no foreigners need apply in those parts. It is probable that this outrage could not occur under present conditions. "The Panama politician thinks that all the republic begins in Las Bovedas and ends in Las Semanas," remarked a plantation owner of the interior country. [Pg 96] Whether this is true or not, few people realize or know anything of the splendid country that lies back of the Canal Zone and out of reach of the flitting traveler. To the average Canal Zone employee all Panama begins at dock seven and ends in the Administration Building. And for the tourist who comes to do the Canal in a day, of course, everything begins with the Washington Hotel and ends with the Tivoli. But Panama is something vastly more significant than a couple of slow-service, high-priced hotels. The Isthmian Republic is an empire in possibilities, entirely apart from the Canal Zone, though the development of the latent riches of the country is most vitally related to the Canal enterprise. And the rich belt of land that binds together two continents is something very much larger than the interesting little city that bears the name of Panama. Back of the ten-mile strip controlled by the United States stretches a land abounding in natural resources which make it potentially a factor of agricultural and economic importance. To the uninformed citizen of the United States and other countries the Republic of Panama is a mere shoestring tying together the two continents, lest the pair become separated and one of them lost. We look at the Isthmus in contrast with the two vast continents that lie to the northwest and southeast, and the connecting [Pg 97] link appears small. Panama suffers from comparison with its big neighbors. Compared with well-known and important insular holdings in the Caribbean group, Panama assumes entirely different proportions. Panama is two thirds as large as Cuba and has one third of Cuba's population. Panama is about the size of Portugal, is four times as large as Salvador, seven and one half times as large as Jamaica, and nine times the size of Porto Rico. Panama is as large as all New England except Maine, and nearly equals the combined area of New Jersey, Delaware, Maryland, and West Virginia. There are interior areas of well-watered, rich soil that equal whole States in size and yet are entirely unknown to many residents of the Canal Zone. The Chiriqui Province has a coast line of one hundred and thirty-three miles and contains as much land as Delaware, Rhode Island, and Long Island combined. The rich agricultural region in the provinces of Coclé, Veraguas, Los Santos, and Herrera is as large as the State of Connecticut. The region east of Panama City reaching out to Chepo is as large as Rhode Island, and in the Darien country is an area almost unknown, but abounding in rich resources which would cover the map of New Jersey with a good margin. It is supposed that no one lives in this large territory except the Americans on the Canal [Pg 98] Zone and inhabitants of the two cities of Panama and Colon. This is also indicative of ignorance. The Republic of Panama has two thirds as many people as Paraguay or Jamaica, and, as previously stated, one third as many as Cuba, as many as Montana, Wyoming, and Idaho combined, or is about equal to Utah, Nevada, and Arizona put together. On the basis of resources and soil and climate and accessibility to market, Panama can support a population many times her present numbers. Her capacity for supporting population from her own products is larger than that of most of the States of the Union, acre for acre. Panama's resources are as good as those of Jamaica or Porto Rico or Cuba. On the basis of Jamaican population there should be six and one half million people in Panama, and if the number of people per square mile were equal to that of precipitous Porto Rico, we would have a population in Panama of ten and one half million, which is more than live west of a north and south line drawn through Denver, Colorado. That no such population lives to-day in Panama is due to political causes more than any other factor. The population of Porto Rico has nearly doubled since American occupation exchanged the old regime for the new. The barren deserts of the great Southwest are becoming fertile and populous regions because the people [Pg 99] who are possessing the land have a fair chance, and know that they will be assured a market for their produce and security for their lives and property. Given political security, monetary stability, market accessibility, and assurance of economic cooperation on the part of the government, there are no immediate limits to the population that Panama may support in comfort. <div class="imgcenter" style="width: 500px;"> <ANTIMG src="images/illus-097.jpg" width-obs="500" height-obs="292" alt="Shipping Costa Rica Vegetables to Panama" title="" /> SHIPPING COSTA RICA VEGETABLES TO PANAMA</div> Political stability for the government of Panama is assured by the relations which exist between the United States and the Isthmian Republic, a condition which exists in no other Spanish-American republic. The proximity of the Canal assures a world market. The climate and soil and water supply nature has provided with lavish hand. Sanitation and hygiene have become exact sciences, and the matter of retaining [Pg 100] good health in the tropics is no longer a problem. There is still good land to be had on favorable terms, but the supply will soon be controlled by monopolists who are seizing the present opportunity to load up their future bank accounts, while war conditions produce a general depression of the world's development forces. The present interior population includes three distinct classes of people. The original Indian stock still exists, pure and often wild, in the high mountains and remote regions of the country. These Indians are beginning to emerge from their fastnesses and get acquainted with their neighbors, now that they are sure of police protection when they come out. But their number is small and they are a negligible factor in the totals. The West Indians are an importation, and while they are easily adapted to the climate and form the staple of labor supply for the Canal, they are not the Panamanians and never will be except as they mix with the native stock and shade off the colors that exist in such confusion. The Negroes and Panamanians are much more distinct in the interior than about the Zone with its terminal cities, where the remnants of humanity have been stirred together for four hundred years. West Indian populations exist in predominance only on the plantations of the United Fruit Company, where they supply the [Pg 101] labor for the operation of these vast enterprises. The Panamanian is the predominant man in the interior country. He is not black, nor is he entirely white, but he has straight hair and features that indicate that he is a descendant of the original Indian stock, mixed with the Spanish conquerors who overran the country in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. Probably the Panamanian has had less opportunity for advancement than the people of any other country in America. He has had no chance for national life or political self-expression. He has been the victim of the most vigorous and long-continued era of piracy and plunder that the New World has experienced. He has suffered from bad leadership when he has had any leadership at all. He has been exploited by everybody who came to the Isthmus. From the days of Morgan down to the formation of the present Republic, under American protection and guarantee of peace within and without, this native has been the outcast of the world and the national goat of the American flock of nations. He has been kept in ignorance and superstition by the exclusive control of a system of religious oppression and subjection, and if by chance he happened to acquire anything worth getting, somebody was always ready to take it away from him. This native supplies the labor for such enterprises [Pg 102] as have been launched in the fertile western regions of Panama. With anything like good treatment he gives a return for his wages, and if he has a chance to acquire sound health, an intelligent outlook on life, and a share in the results of his labors, he can be made over into a good citizen. He is not a bad citizen now, but he is very much undeveloped. The products of this great interior region are many and their proceeds in the world's markets are profitable. Present prices make large opportunities for investment, and a reorganization of marketing facilities will mark the beginning of an era of prosperity for Panama. The list of products now being raised in and exported from Panama is a surprisingly long one, and the total of returns from these commodities would give a western real estate promoter material for many prospectuses and promises. The chief products of the country at present are bananas, lumber, rice, sugar, cacao, meat, citrus fruits, corn, coffee, and coconuts. But there are a hundred other products, many of which indicate large returns if produced and marketed on a commercial scale. Rubber, ivory, nuts, hides, beans, pineapples, potatoes, yams, yucca, cotton, tobacco, plantain, a long list of fruits and vegetables of high value, and a number of minerals are but a few of the useful commodities now being supplied to the markets of the [Pg 103] Canal Zone and the world from the interior country of Panama. Nearly every vegetable that grows in the temperate climate does well in Panama. Some of the native fruits, such as papayas, mangoes, and alligator pears, are of delicious flavor and high value. The waters of Panama abound in vast quantities of fish, and there is supply for a number of fish canneries. Live stock thrives and is produced in considerable numbers in the provinces of Coclé and Chiriqui. The Canal Zone is now being used as a farming enterprise and stock grazing range by the administration of the Zone with the intention of making the Zone area self-supporting in meat and fruit and vegetables. <div class="imgcenter" style="width: 282px;"> <ANTIMG src="images/illus-101.jpg" width-obs="282" height-obs="600" alt="Good Pineapples Grow Here" title="" /> GOOD PINEAPPLES GROW HERE</div> With an average import trade of ten millions and an export of more than half that amount, Panama is even to-day a factor in the world's markets. It must be said that the largest item on the import list is that of goods shipped to the Zone, and that the chief export is bananas shipped from Almirante, but these items indicate large possibilities in further developments of territories as yet untouched. [Pg 104] The interior of Panama includes three general types of country, very different in climate and produce. The high mountains are a large area of country, much of which is fertile soil clear to the peaks, and all of which on the northern slopes is covered with jungle and forest. These wooded slopes are wet with abundant rainfall, and luxuriant foliage of tropical forms bewilders the traveler with illusions of fantastic creations of nature run mad over the earth. These mountainous parts are for the most part uninhabited, except by the more or less wild Indians, who live apart much as they were living four hundred years ago. No white men have tried to maintain themselves in these regions, and in some districts it is said that a white man's life is unsafe overnight. Tropical beasts and reptiles and birds abound among the weird forms of vegetation that seem to be perpetrating grotesque jokes on the bewildered visitor to the regions beyond the realm of civilized habitations. There are as yet no efforts made to establish towns or plantations in this country. Yet if cleared and cultivated, these regions are capable of supporting a population as dense as that of Porto Rico, where the steep hills and rocky peaks are covered with a population of over three hundred per square mile. The jungle lands of Panama are elsewhere described, and where there is a jungle there are always rich land and abundant water, sometimes [Pg 105] too much water and need of drainage. The Canal Zone is mainly jungle land, and where it has been cleared for cultivation excellent results are attained. The cost of clearing this jungle is not so great as would appear from the fact that for bananas and many other forms of crop the trees and brush are cut down and after a time burned, and no further effort is made to clear the land except about four cleanings per year with a machette. Anything like plowing is un-thought of for bananas and some other leading crops. Even sugar is often planted and left to shift for itself, under native methods, which are subject, of course, to improvement. <div class="imgcenter" style="width: 348px;"> <ANTIMG src="images/illus-103.jpg" width-obs="348" height-obs="550" alt="Dead Timber in Gatun Lake Now Covered With Orchids" title="" /> DEAD TIMBER IN GATUN LAKE NOW COVERED WITH ORCHIDS</div> The third class of land in Panama is the level or rolling prairie land known as savanas or llanos. These lands lie for the most part in the valleys back of Bocas del Toro and along the southern, or Pacific, coast of the country. From Chame to Cape Mala a belt of level country sweeps around [Pg 106] the Parita Bay. From ten to forty miles back of the coast rise the high mountains, and this fertile strip of country averages about thirty miles in width and is over a hundred miles long. Rolling country extends on west of this plain, but the plain itself contains enough good farming land to feed several millions of people. It is watered and drained by frequent rivers which cut across from the mountains to the sea every three or four miles and furnish every facility for cultivation. Most of this level country is first-grade soil and is adapted to the growing of almost any of the products of this tropical land. The general appearance of this open country suggests New Mexico or Southern California much more than any land below the tropic of Cancer. Its numerous towns and occasional good roads suggest a newly opened territory in the west, where there are abundant opportunities for growing up with the country. The newcomer is apt to be deceived into thinking that all things are now ready and all he has to do is to move in. In the extreme western part of Panama lies the great Chiriqui Province with its best-developed region in the entire Republic. Here are great cattle ranches, sugar fields, rice plantings, cotton farms, cornfields, and here are American companies working to develop modern civilized conditions. Here is the Chiriqui Railroad between Pedrogal and Boquette, with a branch running [Pg 107] westward. More interest has centered in this region than in any other part of Panama, and if the proposed railroad from Panama to David is ever built, the whole southern slope of western Panama will suddenly appear on the map of the world's granaries. Road-building presents no unusual difficulties in this region such as confronted the Americans in the Philippines when they built the Benguet road up from Dagupan. Rainfall is high, but the country is comparatively level and well drained, and in many of these western provinces a graded dirt road has kept in good condition for ten years without repairs. During the dry season it is now possible to travel by coche over much of this country. The climate of this interior country is dryer and cooler than that of Panama, which lies in the jungle area. In the dry season, which is also the windy season, and lasts in western Panama from mid-December to late in April, health conditions are excellent, and with proper precautions they are good all the year around. Needless to remark, the natives take no precautions whatever. Good drinking water can be secured by sinking properly located wells, and this water shows freedom from minerals of a deleterious nature. There are seaports for coast vessels at almost every river mouth, and roads lead back from these to the interior towns. [Pg 108] There is a fascination about travel through these interiors. But the trip must be made during the dry season. We left a large town one morning, paused on a hilltop to take a picture, which included a troop of cavalry out on a practice march. It was late, and the three of us departed at good speed, soon outdistancing the soldiers. Two days later a chance traveler informed us that the military men were anxious to interview travelers who had broken the rules with a camera and then vanished from sight. We passed the encampment on our way back, hung about town two hours, and proceeded. That night a solitary mounted soldier paused by our camp and remarked, "I'll bet you are the fellows they are hunting." We suggested that we were waiting to be found. Two weeks later, a secret service man called and inquired as to our business on that trip. Which is to say that Panama's interior is a roomy place in which a man might easily lose himself or find an empire. A good government, an infusion of energy, and a supply of capital will make a rich land of nature's great virgin farm. <hr /> [Pg 109] <h2>CHAPTER VIII</h2> <div style="break-after:column;"></div>

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