From the bay the village with its red-tiled roofs and yellow-white walls looks substantial, a bit like Villefranche, the port of Nice, but this impression is speedily dispelled when one lands in one of the boats, propelled by the oarsman standing and facing the bow--a fashion seldom seen save in Italian waters. For seen near at hand the houses are discovered to be of the flimsiest frame construction, save for a few clustering about the little church and sharing with it a general decrepitude and down-at-the-heels air that makes us think they have seen better days. As indeed they have and worse days too, for Taboga once shared in the prosperity of the early Spanish rule, and enjoyed the honor of having entertained for a few weeks Sir Henry Morgan, that murderous pirate, who later became a baronet and a colonial governor, as a fine finish after his deeds of piracy and rapine. Taboga must have treated the buccaneer well, for not only did he forbear to sack the town, but so deep was the devotion paid by him and his men to certain tuns of excellent wine there discovered that they let a Spanish galleon, deep-laden with gold and silver, slip through their fingers rather than interrupt their drinking bout. Tradition has it that the galleon was sunk nearby to save it and its cargo from the pirates, and treasure seekers have been hunting it ever since with the luck that ordinarily attends aspirants for dead men’s gold. [Illustration: BURDEN BEARERS ON THE SAVANNA] Just now the wine and wassail of Taboga is limited to about six grog shops, which seems an oversupply for the handful of fishermen who inhabit its tumble-down hovels. Each bar, too, has its billiard table and one is reminded of Mark Twain’s islands in the South Sea where the people earned an honest living by taking in each other’s washing. One wonders if the sole industry of the Tabogans is playing billiards. There is indeed little to support the town save fishing, and that, if one may judge from specimens carried through the lanes, must be good. Some of the boats at anchor or drawn up on the beach attest to some prosperity amongst them that go down to the sea in ships. One that I saw rigged with a fore-and-aft sail and a jigger was hewn out of a single log like a river cayuca and had a beam exceeding four feet. Before many of the houses were lines hung with long strips of fish hanging out to dry, for it is a curious property of this atmosphere that despite its humidity it will cure animal tissues, both fish and flesh, quickly and without taint. [Illustration: HOTEL AT BOUQUETTE, CHIRIQUI The only point in Panama at which Canal employees may spend their vacations]