[Illustration: FLUVIOGRAPH AT BOHIO, NOW SUBMERGED] [Illustration: AUTOMATIC FLUVIOGRAPH ON GATUN LAKE] Every land comes to be judged largely by its rivers. Speak of Egypt and you think of the Nile; India suggests the Ganges; England the Thames; and France the Seine. The Chagres is as truly Panamanian as the Rhine is German and there have been watches on the Chagres, too, when buccaneers and revolutionists urged their cayucas along its tortuous highway. It was the highway by which the despoilers of Peru carried their loot to the Atlantic on the way to Spain, and along its tide drifted the later argonauts who sought the golden fleece in California in the days of ’49. The poet too has sung it, but not in words of praise. Listen to its most famous lyric from the pen of James Henry Gilbert, Panama’s most famous bard and most cruel critic. “Beyond the Chagres River Are the paths that lead to death-- To the fever’s deadly breezes, To malaria’s poisonous breath! Beyond the tropic foliage, Where the alligator waits, Are the mansions of the Devil-- His original estates. “Beyond the Chagres River Are the paths fore’er unknown, With a spider ’neath each pebble A scorpion ’neath each stone. ’Tis here the boa-constrictor His fatal banquet holds, And to his slimy bosom His hapless guest enfolds! “Beyond the Chagres River ’Tis said--the story’s old-- Are paths that lead to mountains Of purest virgin gold; But ’tis my firm conviction, Whatever tales they tell, That beyond the Chagres River All paths lead straight to Hell”! [Illustration: _Photo by Underwood & Underwood_ THE VILLAGE OF BOHIO, NOW SUBMERGED] A much maligned stream is the River Chagres. Pioneers, pirates, prospectors and poets have vied with each other in applying the vocabulary of contumely and abuse to it, and the practitioners of medicine have attached its name to a peculiarly depressing and virulent type of tropical fever. But the humble native loves it dearly and his homes, either villages of from ten to forty family huts, or mere isolated cabins cling to its shores all the way from Fort Lorenzo to the head waters far beyond the boundary of the Canal Zone. The native too has something of an eye for the picturesque. Always his huts are erected on a bluff of from 15 to 40 feet rise from the river, with the ground cleared before them to give an unblocked view of the stream. Whether by accident or because of a real art instinct he is very apt to choose a point at a bend in the river with a view both up and down the stream. Possibly however art had less to do with his choice than an instinct of self-defense, for in the days of Isthmian turbulence, or for that matter today, the rivers were the chief highways and it was well to be on guard for hostile forces coming from either direction. [Illustration: STEPS LEADING TO FLUVIOGRAPH STATION AT ALHAJUELA