[Illustration] IX THE NATIVE VILLAGE This lithograph was made on the new line, which discovered to the visitor primitive Panama, its swamps, jungles and native villages; but, owing to Colonel Gorgas, native no longer, as they are odorless and clean; but the natives, with their transformation, seem to prefer to the palm-leaf roof, corrugated iron and tin, and abandoned freight cars to live in. The huts are mostly built on piles near the rivers. In the background can be seen the strange-shaped mountains and strange-shaped trees. The white tree--I don't know its name--with the bushy top has no bark, and is not dead, but puts out leaves, Mrs. Colonel Gaillard tells me, in summer; and she also tells me the jungle is full of the most wonderful orchids, birds, snakes, monkeys and natives, and offered to take me to see them. I saw her splendid collection of orchids at Culebra, through the luxuriance of which Colonel Gaillard says he has to hew his way with a machete every morning to breakfast, so fast do plants grow on the Isthmus. Advantage of this rapidity of jungle growth has been taken to bind together the completed parts of the surface of the dam, which are covered with so much vegetation that I could not tell Nature's work from that of the engineers. [Illustration] X THE AMERICAN VILLAGE These are scattered all across the Continent, hemmed in by the tropical jungle or placed on the high, cool hill. In all there is, first, the news-stand at the station; then, the hotel--really restaurants--where on one side the Americans "gold employees" dine for thirty cents, better than they could for a dollar at home--and more decently; men, women and children. On the other, in a separate building, usually, the "silver employees" foreigners; and there are separate dining and sleeping places and cars for negroes, even on workmen's trains. The Indian has the sense and pride to live his own life down there, apart, as at home in India. There are many in the Zone. The head men in each of these towns have their own houses; the lesser lights share double ones; and I believe the least of all, bunks; but these matters didn't interest me, nor did sanitary conditions or social evils or advantages. There are also clubs, I believe, social centres, mothers' meetings, churches, art galleries and museums on the Isthmus, but I never saw them. I was after picturesqueness. Still, it is no wonder, under present conditions, that I never found a man who wanted to "go home"--and some hadn't been home for seven years, and dreaded going--and rightly. The Canal Zone is the best governed section of the United States. [Illustration] XI THE CUT AT BAS OBISPO