A TOUR TO THE ISTHMUS:
Filled in from the Pencillings of an English Artist.
BY A YANKEE DAUBER.
Painting is welcome;—
The painting is almost the natural man;
For since dishonor traffics with man's nature,
He is but outside. These pencilled figures are
Even such as they give out.
Timon of Athens.
III.
Chagres—The Castle—Mine Host—No English and no Spanish for two—Mule Riding—A Fit-out for Panama—Up in the World—The Stone Ladder—A Yarn.
It is now some weeks since I opened my note book, and I confess the cause to be pure idleness alone. However, my pencil meanwhile has not lain dormant, as my portfolio will convince you. After all, cui bono? Why should a fellow be expected to write a journal on shipboard? The record of one day upon a voyage is the record of all others. This day we see “a booby,” (an animal not rare, you will say, on shore) the next, perhaps, a turtle, and on the next we may be amused with a short skirmish between a whale and a sword-fish, or a more deadly one between contending shoals of hostile sharks: then we see “Cape Fly-away,” and after that we see——nothing!
Our voyage to Chagres, instead of five days, was extended to fifteen. The pilots live on board, and make a point of lying out for a wind or a tide, until they have laid in sustenance enough to last them while another ship shall demand their services, and then convoy their patient victims into port. But we got in at last, and were thankful.
The scenery here is surpassingly lovely, rich beyond any description of which my pen or pencil is capable. I found great delight in being once more on land, after my tedious passage—for I profess, without a blush, to be a determined land-lubber, you are aware—and began to look about me with as much greenness as a country boy on his first visit to the Metropolis. With the exception of the old Gothic castles of my own country, that at Chagres is the finest I have ever seen. It occupies a great space of ground, and is remarkable for its strong and massive walls, reaching to a great height, and commanding the whole town as well as the river and coast. The prospect from this castle's walls is full of the richest and most varied beauty.
Finding that our vessel was likely to be detained for some days at Chagres, I determined to cross the Isthmus, and visit Panama. Owing to the want of industry, or rather to the most consummate laziness, which is a characteristic of the natives, I was three whole days endeavoring to engage any one to carry me up the river. The consequence was that, the river, in the mean time, having risen prodigiously, I was four days and a half, including of course the four nights, on a route of about forty or fifty miles! During this time I went on shore at night, sleeping on the ground with a billet of wood for my pillow, and disturbed in my slumbers by droves of pigs, which as they rooted up the soil around me, paid no sort of attention to my convenience. Occasionally a horse would browse down to my couch, and reach his long neck over me as I lay, to nibble a cornhusk or a yam on the other side of my pillow—and as to the cows, they were perpetually snuffing at me. I say nothing, though I felt much, of the musquitoes!
With what delight did I behold the landing place, which, after my rough journey, was pointed out to me by my conductor. They who are accustomed to travel in Europe and America, can have no idea of it. Here I hastened to present my letters to Signor P——, a gentleman who was to be my host while I staid. Our conversation was rather limited, as you may readily conceive, when I mention that he could not speak a word of my language, nor I a syllable of his, which was Castillaña—(they never say ‘Spanish’ there.) But the language of actions is often more eloquent than that of words—at least so thought I, when my host ordered a comfortable repast to be placed before me, consisting of fricasseed fowl, and Vermicelli soup, with a magnum of generous claret. This was certainly a delightful exchange for my five days fast upon half boiled rice and plaintains, as were my soft pillow and quiet apartment a great improvement upon my nocturnal accommodations while on the route.