THE HARBOUR: WILLEMSTAD.
Curaçao is, of course, Dutch territory, but the relations of the island with Venezuela are very close—too close, in fact, from the point of view of the Government. The legitimate and registered trade between the two is small, but an enormous amount of smuggling is carried on, while Willemstad has more than once proved a convenient base for intending revolutionaries.
The town is a strange mixture both in people and language, and in character a strong contrast to those of the Venezuelan coast. If one is up betimes on board, watching for the entrance to the harbour, one wonders if it is not really a confused dream of Flushing and a desert island, so much does the port resemble a homely Dutch town transported bodily into the heat of the West Indies, and set down on a barren rock. When the steamer has entered the harbour, and the pontoon bridge has swung back behind her, one can hardly believe that the land of mañana and dolce far niente is only a few miles away across the sea.
Harbour police, in plain but good blue uniforms and helmets, in place of dirty white ducks adorned with much gold braid, pronounce us, after some conversation in very guttural Spanish, fit and proper persons to enter her Majesty’s colony of Curaçao, and we go on shore to examine this fragment of Holland.
The very cleanliness of the town seems the cause of the only discomfort experienced as one lands, for the dry soil will not support avenues of trees, and the glare from the white stone pavements and walls is almost painful. The names over the shops are sometimes Dutch, sometimes Portuguese and Spanish, often combinations of these, while the people who fill the streets are largely negroes of a strong, healthy type, talking a language which sounds like Dutch as far as accent is concerned, but on fuller acquaintance develops a likeness to Spanish. Those who know it say that all languages contribute to genuine Curaçao, and I am almost certain that I heard a Russian word used by one dusky Dutch subject. The notice on the end of the bridge tells us alternately to “Langzaam rijden” and “Kore poko poko,” the latter being the genuine Curaçao “as she is wrote,” practically Spanish spelt phonetically.
On the east side of the harbour are the Government buildings, Post Office, &c., together with the large business houses and the Dutch Reformed Church. As it was August when I visited the island, most of the comfortable-looking mansions were empty, the owners being away on home visits.
The prosperity of Willemstad, it is evident, does not depend upon natural products, of which there are none; even the oranges with which the famous liqueur was made are not grown in Curaçao now, but the building of small sloops and supplies for these, with the custom of visitors who come to buy in a free-trade market and avoid the all but prohibitive prices behind Venezuela’s tariff wall, provide work for the numerous warehouses, not to mention the illicit trade with the mainland. The official returns show straw hats as the most considerable export, although formerly a fair amount of guano and phosphate of lime was shipped away. With a water supply dependent upon casual rains and a few shallow wells, there can be no drainage system, but the dryness of the climate and the stringent sanitary regulations combine to give Curaçao absolute freedom from epidemics and a deserved reputation as a health resort.
The smaller islands of the Las Aves, Los Roques, and other groups used, like Curaçao, to export a considerable quantity of guano, and phosphate produced by atmospheric action from coral limestones under the guano. Now, however, the few small settlements are mere fishing villages, whose catch is sold on the mainland.