Narrative of the Circumnavigation of the Globe by the Austrian Frigate Novara Volume Iii Part 21

On 16th June we anch.o.r.ed in the beautiful and sheltered harbour of Payta.

The little town itself has about 4000 inhabitants, who carry on a pretty brisk trade with the interior and along the coast. The princ.i.p.al article of export is hides, especially goat-skins, chinchilla fur (_Eriomys Chinchilla_), cotton, fruit, oil, herb-archel (_Roccella tinctoria_--used occasionally as a medicine, but more commonly as a dye,--the well-known litmus, used for chemical test papers, being prepared from it), and straw hats. Forty-five miles distant from Payta, in a beautiful and fertile neighbourhood, lies the town of Piura with 10,000 inhabitants, which carries on an extensive trade in fruit and vegetables along the coast, and indeed supplies Lima with its excellent produce.

Payta harbour is visited annually by from fifty to sixty whalers, who take in fresh provisions here, do their repairs, and give their crews a little repose after long and heavy labours. The climate is very healthy and exceedingly dry. At the same time there is no lack of good water, which the Indians bring to the city from the river Chirar, 18 miles distant, in casks on mule-back. This mode of transport is so cheap, that the erection of a distilling apparatus in Payta would not pay. The cargo of one mule, about 12 gallons, would sell for about 2 reals (about 1_s._ 5-1/2_d._).

s.h.i.+ps take in their supplies of water at Tumbez, a little further north.

When I was at Payta, there were some twenty merchant s.h.i.+ps in the harbour.

The trade of the place was evidently increasing. This was indicated not alone by the energy of the inhabitants, but by a general well-to-do air.

Large, round, broad-brimmed straw hats are annually exported to the value of 400,000 dollars. Of goat-skins, the annual stock is about 1200 cwt.; of herb-archel from 1500 to 2000 cwt. There are also at Payta some very remunerative manufactures of castor oil (from the _Ricinus communis_), and its cognate from the pinon bean (_Jatropha curcas_), both of which are found in large quant.i.ties in the interior. By an iron machine worked by steam some 85 gallons of the oil are made daily, part of which is used in the country for lamps and in the preparation of soap; but by far the largest portion is exported to the United States.

A few weeks before I reached Payta, there had been accidentally found in a cave among the bare sand-hills which form the naked desolate environs of the town, a quant.i.ty of maize, which was supposed to have formed part of a stock which had been placed here by the Incas. It was of a smaller kind than that grown at the present day. The grains, notwithstanding the centuries they had lain interred, were in very tolerable preservation. All along the coast nothing was spoken of but this incident, as though some great treasure had been discovered, whereas it was but some 60 lbs. of maize that were found. Moreover, the interest felt by the Indians in this _trouvaille_ had nothing to do with its historic suggestiveness, but because their readily-inflamed imagination prefigured boundless stores of maize yet to be lighted upon and made available, without their having to labour for them!

In the course of the afternoon we left Payta, and next day sighted the island of La Plata, distant about 10 miles from the mainland. A tradition, constantly in the mouth of the people, to the effect that the ancient Incas buried here a large amount of treasure, has led to many formal expeditions having been dispatched to this island at various times, every one of which, however, proved abortive. We now began to find the temperature perceptibly rising; for a few hours it rose from 65 to 76 Fahr.

At 6 P.M. of the 20th, we reached the Taboga Islands, a group of lovely islets, about 11 miles from Panama, where are the warehouses and wharves of the Pacific Steam Navigation Company. Taboga Island, the most important of the group, is only one mile and a half long by half a mile broad, but with the adjacent islet of Taboquilla, forms a very convenient crescent-shaped harbour, which unites to a secure haven a tolerably healthy climate, so that during the unhealthy season, when the yellow fever sometimes commits fearful ravages in Panama, many of the inhabitants resort to this island, which, up to the year 1858, had remained entirely free of the scourge.

Late in the evening the English and American papers came on board, from which we got the first intelligence of the march of events at the seat of war in Italy, as also of another world-wide calamity,--the death of Alexander von Humboldt. Even here on the sh.o.r.es of the far Pacific, the intelligence of the greatest naturalist of our age having departed from among us, made a deep and powerful impression, which not even the tempests which impended over the political horizon, and threatened to envelope the entire world, could allay. Although the outbreak of hostilities between two such powers as France and Austria must inevitably react severely upon the condition of the inhabitants of North and South America, yet little was discussed respecting events in Italy; while the obituary notice of Humboldt was read aloud in the cabin, and many a fellow-traveller inscribed on a slip of paper for preservation those beautiful words which the n.o.ble and venerable old savant is said to have spoken, when on a lovely sunny May-day his spirit winged its flight from our planet, whose physical const.i.tution his mighty mind had more closely investigated and comprehended than any other mortal of our day. "How gloriously those sunbeams dart forth; they seem as though inviting the earth to the heavens!"

Thus it was forbidden to the members of the Expedition to find the great naturalist yet alive on their return to their common native land! How full of meaning did those touching words now prove, and how fall of mournful memories, with which Humboldt concluded his scientific suggestions to the _Novara_ voyagers, when he prayed to Almighty G.o.d, "That His Holy Spirit would be with this great and splendid undertaking to the honour of the common Fatherland!" The _Novara_ staff above all must doubly regret the death of the "Nestor of Science." The warm and active interest he took in their expedition contributed in no small degree to advance its scientific efficiency, and if it be the privilege of the _Novara_ to live in the memory of the scientific world, it will, as the Archduke Ferdinand Maximilian himself expressed it in a letter to the venerable philosopher, "redound in its honour to the latest ages, that it was permitted to a.s.sociate its name with that of Humboldt, who for three generations of men has been a.s.sociated with every triumph that has been achieved in the domain of science."

On the 21st, at 7 A.M., we anch.o.r.ed in the roads of Panama. Large s.h.i.+ps are obliged to lie to from two to three miles off sh.o.r.e, as the beach is nothing but "slike," and at ebb-tide presents an immense unsightly expanse.

The town of Panama (many fish), built on low green hills amid the most magnificent forms of tropical vegetation, presents when viewed from seaward a most lovely, enchanting aspect, especially to the traveller coming from the sterile sandy sh.o.r.es of the west coast of South America.

As soon, however, as he sets foot on the sh.o.r.e, and has entered the precincts of the city, his first pleasing impressions are rudely dispelled. The streets are everywhere narrow and filthy, the houses low and poverty-stricken in appearance; even upon their roofs the luxuriance of tropical vegetation bursts forth! Moreover the chief square with its cathedral leaves an impression of decay. Only a few of the houses situate near the beach, the property of strangers, and a few of the hotels, have anything of a respectable appearance. The whole population does not exceed 8000 to 9000 inhabitants, of whom about 500 are whites, the rest being negroes and mestizoes. At the time when the railroad was being made across the Isthmus, in the construction of which thousands of Irish and Chinese fell victims to the climate and the severity of the work, the experiment was made of introducing negroes from Jamaica, whose cosmopolitan nature a.s.serted itself by their having increased and multiplied even here. At present there are upwards of 100,000 negroes on and near the Isthmus.

The expense of living in Panama is no longer so exorbitant as it was ten years ago, at the period of the first emigration to the newly-discovered gold-fields of California, when there was no railroad, and the journey across the Isthmus was made partly on mules, partly in small canoes. For from three to four dollars a day, one gets very fair board and lodging at the best hotels. The most expensive item is was.h.i.+ng, the charge being 2 dollars (8_s._) a dozen!! In a climate where European cleanliness necessitates frequent change of apparel, this item alone amounts to some 25 dollars to 30 dollars per month for a single person! Accordingly, it is found to be more economical to fling away several articles of the toilette as soon as they have been soiled, and purchase a fresh supply, rather than pay this heavy tax on the purification of the old garments.

The North American Company, which maintains direct communication between California and New York, has made such excellent arrangements, that the pa.s.sengers on their arrival in Panama by the train are conveyed in a small steamer from the station, which is close to the sh.o.r.e, out to the large steamer lying in the roads, which is to convey them to California. The entire time occupied in convoying 700 or 800 pa.s.sengers with their usually rather heavy baggage from Colon across the Isthmus, and thence to their re-embarkation in the steamer upon the West Coast, does not exceed ten hours. The hotel-keepers of Panama, on the other hand, complain sorely of this arrangement, for whereas formerly no pa.s.senger ever crossed the Isthmus without spending one dollar at least, hundreds now pa.s.s through without ever setting a foot in the city.

When I was in Panama there existed an "Opposition Line" of steamers, a genuine American inst.i.tution, of which we have occasional examples in Europe, but which is only to be seen in its fall bloom in the United States. Formerly, the fare for a deck-pa.s.sage from New York to San Francisco was 160 dollars (33 10_s._). The "Opposition Line" lowered the fare to 35 dollars, and as out of this sum 25 dollars had to be paid to the railway, there remained only 10 dollars (2 2_s._) for the cost of transport and maintenance of pa.s.sengers on board large handsome steamers from New York to San Francisco! For the public at large this was undoubtedly a vast benefit, and in consequence of the unexampled lowness of fares, an immense number of persons had gone to California during the last preceding few months. Whereas formerly only adventurers, speculators, or persons of means, could turn their eyes on the land of gold, a poor but industrious labouring population now pressed eagerly thither. Of course, however, it was too good to last:--no enterprise could continue upon such ruinous principles. It was the war of large capital against small; whichever could longest stand the incessant drain, remained in possession of the field. Occasionally, however, a "compromise" is effected between the two parties, but in that case the public is usually the sufferer, since in order to make up for past extravagance, the two quondam foes combine to keep up exorbitant rates.

The salubrity of Panama, though still unhealthy enough during the wet season (May to September), is undoubtedly better than it ever was in former years. The doses of quinine pills with which people used to be presented in society, very much the same way as a pinch of snuff, have become infrequent, neither is it now the custom to drink sherry or brandy and water with quinine in it. Indeed, were foreign settlers to abstain from the practice of frequent meals, which even in more temperate climes cannot be continued in with impunity, the health of the inhabitants would benefit greatly. I repeatedly heard it maintained that the use of ice, which at present can be got in large quant.i.ties and at very low rates upon the whole Isthmus, and forms an ingredient of every beverage, and many dishes even, has materially improved the hygienic conditions of Panama.

About 360 tons of ice are imported into Panama annually, or about one ton per diem. The whole quant.i.ty is supplied from the North American lakes, chiefly from Boston, and is sold in gross at 7 dollars 50 cents (about 1 25_s._) per 100 lbs., the retail price being a trifle over a s.h.i.+lling per pound. In order to avoid a glut which might make ice importation unremunerative, and endanger the steadiness of the supply, the Government has kept in its own hands the monopoly of the ice-trade.

By Dr. Lebreton, a French physician long settled in Panama, who, together with an Austrian gentleman, Dr. Kratochwil from Saaz in Bohemia, placed me under the deepest obligation for their cordial hospitality, I was furnished with a variety of most interesting details of the sanitary statistics of the Isthmus, and some curious and valuable particulars respecting the poison with which the Indians arm their arrow-tips. In Panama is published a most ably-edited daily paper in English, the "_Panama Star and Herald_," conducted by two Americans, Messrs. Power and Boyd, which so fully and impartially treats of the political, social, and commercial condition of the Isthmus and the South American Republics, as makes it indispensable for every one to subscribe to it who takes any interest in the development of this remarkable country. It is chiefly due to these two large-minded, far-seeing gentlemen that we possess a statistical detail of the very important commerce of the Isthmus, as well as along the west coast of South America. These figures now lie before me, and give better than anything else a fair and complete estimate of its present activity, which, it may be remarked _en pa.s.sant_, has owed nothing to the natives, but is entirely due to the energy of foreigners.

No fewer than 64 powerful mail steamers, of the united burthen of 96,000 tons, and representing a money value of at least 4,000,000, ply, part on the Atlantic side (Southampton _via_ St. Thomas, and New York to Aspinwall), part on the Pacific side to the various harbours on the west coast of America, and keep up regular communication between Europe and that series of States, consisting of not less than 11,000,000 human beings. The value of the products and merchandise annually pa.s.sing to and fro across the Isthmus amounts to about 15,000,000, while the amount of precious metals is not very much less.

The pearl-fishery in the Gulf of Panama has of late years notably fallen off from its former importance. At present it lags far behind that of the Persian Gulf, from which there are annually about 300,000 worth brought up, whereas here, notwithstanding the enormous extent of the pearl-oyster-banks, the yearly take of pearls does not exceed 24,000.

Indeed the fishery is carried on less for its costly contents than for the sake of the mother-of-pearl itself, of which some 800 or 900 tons are s.h.i.+pped annually.

On 23rd June I went by rail from Panama to Aspinwall, on the Atlantic side. Except on the days when the steamers on either side bring their fortnightly quota of pa.s.sengers, the traffic of the line is very small.

When, however, the pa.s.senger steamer at either end has disembarked her living freight, the Isthmus is all alive, and the coffers of the Company are amply replenished. The number of pa.s.sengers both ways annually has been estimated at from 36,000 to 40,000, and the gross receipts of the Company at from 200,000 to 300,000.[155]

The fare for the somewhat short distance, 47 miles, is high. There is but one cla.s.s of carriage, and the charge is 5 5_s._, besides 10 cents (5_d._) for every pound of baggage above 30 lbs. But it must always be borne in mind that enormous difficulties had to be overcome in the construction of the line, and that the cost of maintaining the permanent way in anything like order is very great, in consequence of the climate and the rich tropical vegetation. Whoever has struggled through the almost impenetrable forests of the Isthmus, before the rail pa.s.sed through it, and bears in mind the immense physical difficulties of that laborious operation, would thankfully pay double the sum now charged for performing within a few hours a journey which often occupied a whole week.

The construction of the Panama Railroad was commenced in 1850, the first sod being cut on the Atlantic side. On 27th January, 1855, the locomotive first performed the journey from ocean to ocean. The cost of construction amounted to about 1,100,000.[156] This capital was speedily subscribed by the eager speculative Yankees, and, as the result proved, insured from the very first to the shareholders a handsome constantly-increasing dividend.

The concession enjoyed by the Company from the Government of New Granada only lasts for twenty years, from the day on which the entire line is opened; on the expiry of that period the New Granada Government must either pay down 5,000,000 dollars (the entire cost of construction), or extend the concession for ten years more. At the expiration of this second term, the Government may purchase for 4,000,000 dollars, or grant a third term of equal length, after which they are to be at liberty to purchase it for 2,000,000 dollars.

The traffic managers of the line, Messrs. Lewine and Dorsay, showed me the most polite attention. The resident director, Mr. Center, whose office is in Aspinwall, and to whom I had letters of introduction, invited me by telegraph to make free use of the line, as nothing would give him greater pleasure than to become of some service to a scientific traveller. I took with me fourteen goodly packages, chiefly collections of natural history.

Most of these required great care and attention, some on account of their fragile texture, others in consequence of being of a perishable nature.

All these were transported with as much care as though they had been charged the very highest rate of freight. The treatment of scientific travellers is to some extent a measure of the degree of civilization of a people. Hence it is that the North American States and the British colonies are the points of the globe where the efforts of scientific travellers elicit the heartiest sympathy, where he may count upon the most friendly reception, and the most cordial co-operation in carrying out the objects he has in view. And speaking now after ten years of the most varied experiences of travel, I look back thankfully to the conspicuous evidences of good-will which I have universally received from all Americans, from the banks of the St. Lawrence to the sh.o.r.es of the Gulf of Mexico, and recall with grat.i.tude how every cla.s.s of the community bestirred itself to promote and facilitate the scientific researches of a solitary traveller,--how, more particularly, the press, that great power of the intellect, lent the utmost a.s.sistance of its influential position to forward my wishes, and how its columns, thanks to the interest its conductors themselves felt, were always open in the most remote districts to welcome the stranger. And now, when for a second time I received from the sons of that same mighty republic the same cordiality of welcome, I recalled with redoubled vivacity the happiness of those long-vanished but most pleasant days, as I record this tribute with so much the more satisfaction, that I felt it was not the individual but his profession that was thus honoured, as is abundantly proved by the experience of many another scientific traveller.

The journey across the Isthmus, right through the heart of the primeval forest, which was decked out in its gayest attire, is one of the most exciting, soul-stirring scenes that the eye of the lover of nature ever rested upon. In no part of the world have I seen more luxuriant and abundant vegetation than is presented by the forests of Central America, and more especially upon the Isthmus. And, as if to heighten still further the sense of marvel and enchantment, one traverses this magnificent forest landscape behind a locomotive running on its iron track. What a contrast!

The wild ravel of creepers and the green feathery branches of the palms almost penetrate into the waggons, and tell with unmistakeable emphasis that the traveller is indeed surrounded by all the beauties of Nature in her tropic garb. Trees of the most varied description and of colossal dimensions flourish in the foreign garment of a borrowed adornment.

Between each solitary giant of a forest tree, parasites and _Lianae_ spread their delicate green coils, while many a gigantic stem, enveloped in thousands of beautiful shoots, or dead trunk choked in the embrace of a parasitic creeper, attracts the eye as the train speeds past. So quick and so strong is the process of vegetation here, that every section of this line has twice in each year to be freed from the encroachments of the forest-children; nay, were the line to be left unused but for one twelvemonth, it would be difficult to discover any trace of its existence, so completely within that time would the whole district become once more a wilderness!

The physico-geographical conditions of the Isthmus have only latterly been made the subject of profound and exhaustive study by a German naturalist, who has published the result of his researches. The justly-dreaded climate was the main cause of its having been so long left unexamined. To that keen indefatigable _savant_, Dr. Moritz Wagner, my whilom faithful travelling companion through Northern and Central America, is due the praise of having first accurately and a.n.a.lytically investigated the territory of the Isthmus,--that dam which separates two ocean worlds as it may be considered from one point of view,--that bridge which unites two immense continents as it may be regarded from another,--and who, in so doing, has contributed many new and important facts to our previous stock of statistics respecting the hypsometrical and geognostic features of the Isthmus, as well as to the geographical distribution of the forms of organic life which are found there.

In the course of constructing the railroad, the geological profile of the country was laid open through a length of 47 miles. This fortunate circ.u.mstance the German naturalist availed himself of as an excellent opportunity for carrying out his design, but his labours were none the less beset with difficulties, and only his indomitable perseverance could have carried him through the tropical intermittent fevers and mental anxiety, which at one time threatened to prostrate his physical strength, or even to lay him in his grave. Wagner had been first struck by the very remarkable evidence of an entire alteration in the form of the hills between Veragua and Obispo. This change in the vertical configuration, the decided depression of the Cordilleras, which is most apparent between Limon Bay (at the mouth of the Chagres river) and the Gulf of Panama, is just as much an important geological fact for physical geography, and for solving the important questions of the present and future commerce so intimately connected with the artificially cutting through of this neck of land, as the change in the horizontal configuration or the sudden compression of this part of the world in the north-west of the province of Choco, or the rugged steepness that characterizes the range of hills which forms the contour of the coast-line. The geological and botanical specimens, those most reliable of all data for physical generalization, with which Wagner ill.u.s.trates his interesting exposition of the natural character, the prevailing formations, and the most prominent representations of the vegetation of the Isthmus, form at present a valuable part of the collections of natural history in the Museum of Munich.

The journey across is not made at the speed one would expect on a line where the locomotive is in charge of a Yankee. It takes four hours to do the 47-1/2 English miles. The stations are very numerous, often situate in the heart of the forest, where there are only a few labourers' huts.

Moreover, halts are frequent at spots where there are no pa.s.sengers visible, either to take up or set down. One of the most beautiful of the stations is that at the little village of Paraiso, about nine miles distant from Panama, which lies in a kettle-shaped glade. At this point large clearings have been made, and the eye ranges over a rather more extended landscape, only bounded in fact by the contour of the neighbouring hills. The only inhabitants are negroes, mulattoes, and mestizoes, who for the most part are employed as labourers on the line. A few miles after leaving Paraiso, the train reaches the station of Culebra, or, as it is more generally called by the inhabitants, "the Summit," the narrow steep rise of which marks the water-shed between the Rio Grande, falling into the Pacific, and the Rio Chagres, which debouches into the Caribbean Sea. This is the highest point of the line. The actual height of the pa.s.s is 287 English feet, but it has been lowered by about 25 feet, so that Summit station is only 262 feet above the mean level of the ocean.

The most important village along the line is Matachin, a large straggling village, which, however, seems to be inhabited exclusively by negroes, mulattoes, and Zamboes. As I have previously remarked, the majority of the labourers on the line emigrated hither from the West Indies, especially Jamaica, attracted by the high wages of labour, and after it was completed, settled along its course in neat, clean, but small cottages.

And whereas the baleful tropical climate decimated every other cla.s.s of labourer employed during the construction of the lines, these latter have flourished here better than any other description of settler. They seem to be universally healthy and well fed, and their oceans of children, who impart life to the landscape, attest that the women have not lost their fertility. They all seemed to be well and were neatly clothed. However, when I crossed, it happened to be a holiday, and consequently every one wore his Sunday dress, clean white trowsers, white s.h.i.+rt, and a narrow-brimmed hat of fine straw.

Near Barbacoa station the eye of the traveller, that has. .h.i.therto revelled in the voluptuous beauties of nature, rests with pleasure on a splendid trophy of human industry, an iron bridge, 600 feet long, which spans the River Chagres at this point. It was on one of the Cerros, a little west of Barbacoa, that Vasco Nunez de Balboa first beheld both the Atlantic and the Pacific oceans at once, and, regarding his stand-point in the Isthmus as a mere handful of earth, may have imagined himself a conqueror, whose glance comprehended both worlds.

The last portion of the line, as we near the Atlantic side, pa.s.ses over vast swamps, which rendered the construction of this portion of the road exceedingly difficult and very expensive. Aspinwall itself moreover, the terminus of the Inter-oceanic Railway, lies on a small island, two-thirds of the surface of which is mora.s.s, and covered with tropical marsh vegetation. This station was selected, notwithstanding its very unwholesome climate, chiefly because the roadstead of Limon Bay furnishes a safe anchorage in all weathers for vessels of even the largest size.

This small island, only 7000 feet long by 5800 wide, which was first named from the immense quant.i.ty of _Hippomane mancinella_, a tree with a very powerful poison, that is found on it, and is now called "Isla de Manzanilla," was formally made over by the New Granada Government to the American Company at the beginning of the works in the year 1852, and was used by it for the new city, as also for the erection of warehouses, &c.

Aspinwall, or Colon, as it is sometimes called, numbers at present some 1500 inhabitants, of whom 150 are North Americans and English, the rest negroes and mulattoes. The little town, with its neat frame-houses and clean cottages, involuntarily reminds one of the new settlements in the North American States. Here, besides the residences of the officials, are the warehouses and workshops of the Company. In the latter about 700 workmen are employed, while four schooners maintain uninterrupted communication between Aspinwall and New York, for the purpose of providing for the various wants of the crowded establishment. Even the very provisions are imported from North America. The resident director, Mr. A.

J. Center, received me with the most hearty welcome, and during my entire stay continued to display the same kindness and interest, which he manifested from the moment he received my letter of introduction.

In Aspinwall the climate has within the last few years become more salubrious than at the period of the first colonization, when "Chagres fever" acquired a gruesome reputation, and no resident who stayed above two months in the place escaped the attack of the fever. Even mules and dogs could not escape the universal malaria. However, to this day a lengthened residence on this marshy soil is not unattended with danger, although the miasmatic poison has undoubtedly lost much of its virulence.

The negroes longest resist its dangerous effect, after whom come the coolies, then the Europeans, while the Chinese are invariably the earliest attacked.[157]

On 23rd June, about midnight, I left Limon Bay in the steamer _Medway_.

Having been committed to the charge of her captain by the kind attention of Mr. B. Cowan, the English Consul in Aspinwall, I found myself more comfortable and better attended to on board this small filthy old tub than I could possibly have expected. The Company avowedly employ in the Intercolonial lines the worst and most uncomfortable of their vessels, and the traveller who has to make any short pa.s.sage, for instance, among the West India islands, is exposed to the doubly disagreeable feeling of paying a very much higher rate of fare, for very inferior accommodation.

The _Medway_ was an old acquaintance of mine in my previous West Indian rambles, as in former years she performed the mail service between Belize, Jamaica, Hayti, Porto Rico, St. Thomas, and Havanna, and this opportunity of renewing my acquaintance with her I hailed with anything but a sentiment of satisfaction.

Early on the 25th June we ran into the extensive and beautiful bay of Carthagena, which now-a-days is only accessible on one side, the second entrance having been destroyed by the Spaniards during their supremacy, and never reopened. This seaport contains about 11,000 inhabitants, many churches and monasteries, as also large fortifications, but of trade and commerce there is next to nothing. In the roads there lay but three small coasting crafts. For the naturalist, and especially for the zoologist, Carthagena is on the other hand cla.s.sic soil.

Our steamer was fairly beleaguered by shoals of small canoes with natives on board, who offered for sale any quant.i.ty of the most various and beautiful little denizens of the surrounding country. Any naturalist who should spend a short time here, might, with the a.s.sistance of the Indians, who seem to be both zealous and apt collectors, get together an extensive and most valuable zoological and botanical collection. Carthagena indeed presents in particular great advantages for the s.h.i.+pment to Europe alive of the more interesting animals. These steamers do not take much above a fortnight hence to England, and if dispatched about May or June, the animals would sustain but little detriment from the change to a European climate at that season. Thus on the present voyage of the _Medway_ there were numbers of animals and chests of plants in full bloom, consigned to various museums and private collections in England.

On 30th June we anch.o.r.ed in the small but delightful harbour of St.

Thomas, with bright green hills forming a picturesque back-ground, relieved by the white houses of the inhabitants picturesquely grouped along their slopes.

St. Thomas had changed little from what I remembered it at my previous visit in 1855. At the last census it had 15,000 inhabitants, and its trade is visibly increasing. It is, however, extremely difficult to get at the statistics of the annual amount of s.h.i.+pping here, as there is no toll-house, and the Danish Government publishes no official information as to the general trade. According to a German merchant long resident here, the number of foreign s.h.i.+ps of all nations entering and leaving the port amounts to 860 annually, of coasters about 3500, while the annual value of merchandise so transs.h.i.+pped is about 6,000,000 dollars. One very remarkable trade is that in ice, which reaches the enormous amount of 1000 tons annually, chiefly for distribution among the adjoining islands, by far the largest proportion of which comes from Boston, where it is worth 20 dollars per ton, and at St. Thomas 80 dollars per ton, or 3-1/2 cents per lb. One may conceive that the entire ice-trade to the West Indies, South America, China, the Malay Archipelago, and the East Indies is in the hands of the keen North Americans, who evince a capacity for making a genial use of a natural phenomenon, which a less speculative race of men a.s.sociate with the idea of cold, discomfort, and stagnation of intercourse.

M. A. Ruse, a wealthy chemist and zealous naturalist, by whom as by other German residents I was most kindly received, has acquired much distinction from his profound acquaintance with the lower animals of the West Indies, of which he possesses a small but valuable collection, chiefly of the Fauna of the islands of St. Thomas, Ste. Croix and Trinidad, and was so exceedingly courteous as to present me with duplicates of several of the most interesting. M. Krebs, merchant, and M. Kjaer harbour-master, also in their hours of relaxation gave me much valuable information on kindred topics, the latter gentleman farther presenting me with specimens from an excellent collection he had formed of petrifactions.

What, however, afforded me the sincerest satisfaction on the occasion of my present visit to St. Thomas, was the striking examples of industry, intelligence, and social comfort of the negro population. Of all nations among whom this curse of slavery has been implanted, the Danes have best comprehended how practically to solve the difficult problem of emanc.i.p.ation. The number of slaves in Danish colonies was at all times very small, and their manumission consequently more easy. Nevertheless the mode adopted in getting rid of the evil is deserving of attention and imitation. The duty of labouring does not cease with the means of compelling it. Slaves emanc.i.p.ated by the Danish Government may spend the wages they receive for their labour at their own discretion, and are permitted to change masters at pleasure, but they cannot quit their former employer till they have found a fresh one. The rate of wages at St. Thomas is pretty high, and the black population, who form the largest contingent of the labouring population, not only finds constant occupation, but is remarkably well paid besides. The negroes on this island are, however, very handy and quick, thanks to the constant intercourse with foreign nations. Many of them speak several languages fluently, and a German traveller who visits the island for the first time is apt to be not a little surprised at finding himself addressed in his mother-tongue by a swarthy son of Africa.

Our departure was fixed for 1st July. The various mail steamers which had been expected from the different ports of the West Indies and the eastern coast of Central America, had all arrived. The fine and comfortable but old and slow steamer _Magdalena_ was to leave for Europe at noon. Suddenly a sailing vessel came in like a Job's comforter, with the intelligence that the splendid new steamer _Paramatta_, which was about due with the mails from England, had on her first voyage gone ash.o.r.e on the Anegada shoal near the island of Virgin Gorda, 60 nautical miles from St. Thomas, and with her 40 pa.s.sengers, and a valuable cargo, was in need of instant relief. This intelligence again delayed our departure. It was at first determined to send off every disposable steamer to the scene of the disaster, and to detain the _Magdalena_, till full particulars of the mischance had been obtained, for transmission to the directors in London.

Afterwards it was arranged that the _Magdalena_ should proceed to the spot where the _Paramatta_ was lying nearly high and dry, to a.s.sist if possible in floating the s.h.i.+p off the reef.