Two large hospitals are maintained by the Canal Commission at Colon and at Ancon, together with smaller ones for emergency cases at Culebra and other points along the line. The two principal hospitals will be kept open after the completion of the Canal, but not of course to their full capacity. Ancon alone has accommodations for more than 1500 patients, and when the army of labor has left the Zone there can be no possible demand for so great an infirmary. Both of these hospitals were inherited from the French, and the one at Colon has been left much in the condition they delivered it in, save for needed repairs and alterations. Its capacity has not been materially increased. The Ancon Hospital however has become one of the great institutions of its kind in the world. The French gave us a few buildings with over 300 patients sheltered in tents. The Americans developed this place until now more than fifty buildings are ranged along the side of Ancon Hill. When the French first established the hospital they installed as nurses a number of sisters of St. Vincent with Sister Rouleau as Sister Superior. The gentle sisters soon died. The yellow fever carried them off with heart-rending rapidity. Sister Marie however left a monument which will keep her fair fame alive for many years yet to come. She was a great lover of plants, and the luxuriance of the tropical foliage was to her a never-ending charm. To her early efforts is due the beauty of the grounds of the Ancon Hospital, where one looks between the stately trunks of the fronded royal palms past a hillside blazing with hibiscus, and cooled with the rustling of leaves of feather palms and plantains to where the blue Pacific lies smooth beneath the glowing tropic sun. Beside the beauty of its surroundings the hospital is eminently practical in its plan. The many separate buildings permit the segregation of cases, and the most complete and scientific ventilation. [Illustration: THE SANITARIUM AT TABOGA INHERITED FROM THE FRENCH] Making the hospital attractive was one of the points insisted upon by Col. Gorgas. Some of the doctors think that possibly it has been a wee bit overdone. Some of the folks along the Zone look on a brief space spent in the hospital as a pleasant interlude in an otherwise monotonous life. As they have thirty days’ sick leave with pay every year they are quite prone to turn to the pleasant slopes of Ancon Hill, with a week at the charming sanitarium on Taboga Island as a fitting close--a sort of café parfait to top off the feast. Surgery even seems to have lost its terrors there. “Why, they even bring their friends to be operated on”, said one of the surgeons laughingly when talking of the popularity of the hospital among the Zone dwellers. [Illustration: A FETE DAY AT TABOGA] [Illustration: FEATHER PALM AT ANCON]