SURVEYING UNDER DIFFICULTIES.
"It was one of the most difficult roads to build that I ever heard of," said he, "and three times the work was suspended on account of the impossibility of getting enough laborers or bringing forward the necessary material. Everything had to be brought from New York or some other American or European city, as there was no labor worth having to be found on the Isthmus itself. Between Aspinwall and Monkey Hill the engineers had sometimes to wade up to their waists while laying out the line, and after the road was completed the track repeatedly sank down out of sight. It happened several times that two or three hundred feet of road would thus disappear in a single night, and then the whole force of the road was put to work to fill up the cavities. There are some places that were filled two or three times before the road-bed was solid enough to stay. Since the canal company began operations here it has built some new tracks, and occasionally meets with the same trouble, but the old part of the line is all right now.
NATIVE VILLAGE ON THE ISTHMUS.
"There is a good story of how the natives of the country around Gatun had their first view of a locomotive. The track was completed to that point, and a day was set for running an engine over it. People came for long distances; they had heard wonderful stories of the witchcraft of the strangers, and there was great curiosity to know about it. There was an immense crowd, and at the appointed time the locomotive came in sight, puffing vigorously, and emitting clouds of steam and smoke. There was great excitement, which reached the pitch of terror when the creature came into the midst of the crowd, and the whistle was blown. The whole crowd fled to the river, and many of them jumped in, expecting they would be pursued, and possibly devoured.
NATIVE IDEA OF THE LOCOMOTIVE.