Isthmus of Panama

“ Thousands died in the awful trip across the continent, and thousands more, who thought to make an easier journey by sea, died of fevers contracted in crossing the unhealthy Isthmus of Panama, the strip of land that divides North and South America, separating the Atlantic from the Pacific Ocean. ”

“ M. Garella is convinced, as much by his own observations, as by the information that he has been able to obtain upon the spot, that all that has been said of the unhealthiness of the Isthmus has been exaggerated. Panama is, of all the towns upon the coast of America which are situated between the Tropics, the most healthy, and perhaps the only town where the yellow fever has never appeared. ”

“ The story of the destruction of the old city is one of shocking cruelty and lust, and merely furnishes the last chapter of the same tale of crime that marks the history of the Isthmus from the finding of the Peruvian gold to the days when the murderous pillages of rival pirates finally destroyed the commerce of the Isthmus and left Panama little more than a memory of former glories. ”

“ The Isthmus of Panama, from Quibo Island in Montijo Bay, on the west, to the confines of the valley of the Atrato River at the edge of the Columbia, on the east, is deviously, here with a regular movement of depression, in another place with violent shock, sinking beneath the waters of the opposite encroaching oceans that swings backward and forward on either side in awful tidal deluges. ”

“ I occasionally saw a sad-faced woman, carefully wrapped in a black shawl, on her way to the Cathedral to pray; an occasional Sister of Charity and negro workmen. The Panamanian ladies were in their camps in the country and at Taboga Island, and if there were any in the city they were timid about going into the streets, as Panama was filled to overflowing with adventurers from all over the world, for it was the reconstruction period, and the Isthmus was in a state of chaos. I had never seen such a variety of men. There were men who rode fine horses, looking like cavaliers of olden times. ”

“ In dread of the thousand nameless terrors of the tropics, they hasten to Panama, eat one breakfast of eggs in their omelet stage of existence, and are off up the coast in the steamer.
From the moment of their arrival at Aspinwall an Isthmus fever floats before them, tangibly in the air. It bangs a yellow veil before every object. Their sight is jaundiced. They hurry over a railroad, laid, as they have been told, on human sleepers. The rich luxuriance of the forest along its course, now first opened to the eye of man, seems only rank, unwholesome vegetation. ”

“ Thus over Gatun Lake they flew, over the Chagres River; along the course of Culebra Cut, with its high banks, across the Pedro Miguel and Miraflores locks on the other side of the isthmus; over Ancon; and finally below them lay clustered the white-robed buildings of Panama itself, with the swelling blue reaches of the big Pacific to the southward and westward, and the bold shore-line of South America to the southeastward. ”

“ Poverty is the only protection of the people. For nearly two centuries pillage, plunder, piracy, and murder were the record of the Isthmus. Every buccaneer who sailed the Spanish main seems to have made a business of taking a chance at the Isthmus. It was open season for every kind of crook work that the minds of men could invent. Most of this activity was confined to the trade route in the middle of the Isthmus, but the influence and terror of this bloody age extended both ways as far as the country was inhabited. ”

“ HALL OF EMPLOYEES' CLUB, CULEBRA.
The reputation of the Isthmus of Panama as a death-trap is due to the sickness which (previous to 1906) has always been prevalent among white strangers, and most other visitors, and particularly to the high percentage of death from yellow fever. ”

“ It would be idle to describe, even to enumerate, all the revolutions which have disquieted the Isthmus since it first joined Colombia in repudiating the Spanish rule. They have been as thick as insects in the jungle. No physical, social or commercial ties bound Panama to Colombia at any time during their long association. ”

“ When it became evident that the treaty was hopelessly lost, the people of Panama rose literally as one man. Not a shot was fired by a single man on the Isthmus in the interest of the Colombian Government. Not a life was lost in the accomplishment of the revolution. The Colombian troops stationed on the Isthmus, who had long been unpaid, made common cause with the people of Panama, and with astonishing unanimity the new republic was started. ”

“ In view of the fact that the Isthmus of Panamá may before many years become much more than it has heretofore been, a great highway of nations, and that the great interests which will be constantly at stake on the route will demand an effectual protection, it is self-evident that measures of a permanent character must in time be adopted to secure that end. Panamá, as an appendage of Colombia, and at the mercy of an irresponsible population, cannot afford that protection ”

“ Although the plan, so long and so fondly cherished in Europe, and now revived in France, must, for the reasons here assigned, be abandoned, on this account we ought not to be deterred from availing ourselves of such facilities as the locality affords. The geographical position of the isthmus of Panama is too interesting to be any longer disregarded. ”

“ They are solid, substantial, and will last for centuries yet; but the natural movement of population, especially in view of the enormous rents demanded in Panama, will be to seek the new city which will grow up as a frame town with elements of stability. Much business is certain to drift to the Canal mouth, some of it in American hands. The mercantile community in the days when Colombia controlled the Isthmus was anything but Colombian. It was West Indian, Italian, Chinese, German, French, American, and English. ”

“ Some day humanity may become sufficiently civilized to establish universal peace. But until then, we must not forget that Panama has always been seized and held by the strong hand. The Isthmus to-day is a thousand times richer and more tempting a prize than it was in the time of Drake or Morgan, and though piracy has gone out of fashion, war has not. When we can turn the regular army into a police force, sell the navy for old iron, and take the big guns from Sandy Hook and the Golden Gate, we can leave the Panama Canal to be protected by the Zone Police,—but not before then. ”

“ The Isthmian Indians are very skilful boatmen and fishermen. Their canoes are often seen in Colon harbor, where they come to sell their catch. These Indians belong to the Tule or San Blas tribe, that occupy and rule the Atlantic side of the Isthmus, from about forty miles east of Colon to South America. The Pacific side of this part of Panama is held by another tribe of Indians, the Chucunaques. Both pride themselves on keeping their race pure, despise the mongrel, half-breed Panamanians, and forbid white men to settle in their country. ”

“ The agreeableness of the Isthmian climate as a whole and in various localities, if to some extent indicated by figures, is largely a matter of individual temperament. With little difference in temperature Colon has double the rainfall of Panama with a corresponding excess of humidity. Yet happily for the welfare of the great work and the workers, it has been the fashion on the Isthmus for every one to have local pride ”

“ The dominant and decisive features of the isthmus at this point are the Chagres River and the Culebra Mountains. The Chagres enters the Caribbean a little west of Colon. Its valley runs right across the isthmus south-south-eastwardly towards Panama for about twenty-six miles, then, at a place called Bas Opisbo, suddenly swerves away to the north-east into the trackless and jungle-clad hill country. This valley is the only transverse trench which the isthmus affords at this stretch, and it has always fixed the attention of surveyors looking out for a canal site. ”

“ Many studies of the Panama Indians as a body, or of isolated tribes, have been made by explorers or scientists, and mainly by French or Spanish students. The Smithsonian Institution catalogues forty-seven publications dealing with the subject. But there is an immense mine of anthropological information yet to be worked in the Isthmus. It is not to be acquired readily or without heavy expenditure of energy, patience and money. ”

“ The local idea of government was to put yourself in power and then squeeze all the taxes you could out of everybody else. Nobody ever became president of New Granada or Colombia except by violence, and no president was strong enough to keep peace in Panama.
Revolutions, like every other industry, were revived on the Isthmus by the coming of the forty-niners and the building of the railroad. The Spaniards there have always been predatory by choice, and as they had lived off the Indians in the old days, they now lived off the Americans and other travelers. ”

“ The same methods which converted the island of Cuba from a pest hole, which menaced the health of the world, into a healthful place of abode, have been applied on the Isthmus with satisfactory results. There is no reason to doubt that when the plans for water supply, paving, and sewerage of Panama and Colon and the large labor camps have been fully carried out, the Isthmus will be, for the tropics, an unusually healthy place of abode. The work is so far advanced now that the health of all those employed in canal work is as well guarded as it is on similar work in this country and elsewhere. ”

“ So will it be with Panama. The people of the Isthmus, and as I firmly believe of the adjacent parts of Central and South America, will be greatly benefited by the building of the canal and the guarantee of peace and order along its line; and hand in hand with the benefit to them will go the benefit to us and to mankind. By our prompt and decisive action, not only have our interests and those of the world at large been conserved, but we have forestalled complications which were likely to be fruitful in loss to ourselves, and in bloodshed and suffering to the people of the Isthmus. ”

“ In 1873, a law was enacted to compel the wild Indians to adopt the usages of civilized life, and prompt action was recommended by the executive of Panamá in 1874, but nothing came of it. [XXVII-69]
There are but few families of the higher class in Panamá, and time is required to establish a footing of intimacy with them. Considerable has been said in Europe against the character of the women of Panamá, which is not borne out by fact. Much real worth exists among them. Indeed, the native women of the Isthmus generally, possess the best qualifications. ”

“ Following the example of Havana other centres were attacked, at Vera Cruz and in Brazil, with the same success, and it is safe to say that now, thanks to the researches of Reed and his colleagues, with proper measures, no country need fear a paralyzing outbreak of this once dreaded disease.
The scientific researches in the last two decades of the nineteenth century made possible the completion of the Panama Canal. The narrow isthmus separating the two great oceans and joining the two great continents, has borne for four centuries an evil repute as the White Man's Grave. ”

“ Left to itself, the Isthmus would have been anything but peaceful. In the fifty-seven years between the treaty of 1846 and the final revolution in 1903, there were at least fifty-three disturbances and outbreaks, beginning with a riot in which two Americans were killed, and ending with a civil war nearly three years long. Six times our warships had to clear for action and land sailors and marines to protect life and property, and at four other times the government at Bogotắ begged that United States troops be sent to Panama. ”

“ The present prosperity of Panama is due to its large transit trade, which was recently estimated at £15,000,000 a year. The pearl-fisheries, famous at the time of Balboa's visit, have now little value. The narrowest breadth of the isthmus being only thirty miles, there have naturally been many engineering proposals to connect the Pacific and Atlantic oceans by a canal. ”

“ Chinese coolies might have been imported from Canton or Amoy, but Panama is a long way from southern China and still further from India, and no intelligent man ever seriously proposed importing Hindus. If enough Panamanian Indians could have been found, they might have done the work, but the native Indian is a very uncertain and fragmentary factor of life on the Isthmus. ”

“ The country is small, but the work is a great one, and that little spot on the map is of vastly greater interest to-day than many a land of larger area.
The history of the country is a romantic one. The names of Balboa, Pizarro, and other famous Spanish discoverers are closely linked to Panama, and readers of history as well as lovers of adventure are not likely to forget the part the notorious Morgan and his men played on the Isthmus. ”

“ Now that the world has once more had to fight out the old battle of free institutions, it is worth while to remember that the oldest independent nation of the modern world is Panama; and that the first of the Spanish colonies to achieve freedom from the misgovernment of the old country was this same little nation on the Isthmus. ”