Such is the country as nature has made it,-picturesque, beautiful, and exceedingly rich and varied in undeveloped resources. As yet, man has done very little for it, the greater part being still unbroken wilderness. Even in its most populous and civilized districts, as, for instance, on the great plateaux of Bogotá and Tunja, agriculture is still in a very primitive state, the chief rural industry being cattle-breeding. The immense coal and iron beds have hardly been disturbed at all; and although there is an abundance of exceptionally fine water-power, there are almost no manufactories. With gold and silver mines, richer and more numerous than those of California or New Mexico, the average annual product of gold has been little more than $2,500,000 during the past twenty-five years, while the average annual product of silver, during the same time, has been less than $1,200,000. The richest mines are in the remote interior, difficult of access, and without means of transportation; consequently few or none of them have as yet been worked by modern machinery. But, despite these disadvantages, less than half a century ago, before the gold discoveries on our Pacific slope, Colombia was the first but one of all the gold-producing countries on the continent; and it has been said, perhaps a little metaphorically, by a native writer, that "in Colombia one walks on gold, lives without effort on the indigenous products of the soil, and is never anxious about a place in which to sleep." Be this as it may, there is only wanting labor and capital, a stable government, scientific appliances, and facilities for rapid and cheap inland transportation, to make Colombia one of the most productive countries, as well as one of the most desirable for residence, on the continent.

The commercial possibilities of the country are almost incalculable; and the time is probably not very remote

when this fact will be more fully realized by the great commercial powers of the world. As it is, Colombia's highest aggregate of exports, during any one of the ten years from 1881 to 1891, never exceeded $16,500,000 in our currency, while the highest aggregate of imports, during any one year of the same period, was not more than $15,000,000. The reason of this is obvious. There are almost no means of interior transportation. Indeed, aside from what is afforded by the navigation of a few of the principal rivers, there are absolutely none. There are not more than a hundred miles of regularly operated railway in the whole Republic, even including the fortyseven miles across the isthmus. The entire transportation in the interior is by pack mules and peones, just as it was three centuries ago. The people have been too much absorbed in local politics, and too generally occupied in civil wars, to pay much attention to internal improvements.

As an illustration of the difficulties with which the commerce of the country has to contend, take, for example, a single bale of goods, shipped from New York to Bogotá. In the first place, it must not be over 125 pounds weight; otherwise its transportation may be indefinitely delayed after reaching the Colombian coast. This condition complied with, the bale, after a round-about voyage of twelve or fifteen days, arrives, say, at the port of Savanilla, where it is discharged into a clumsy barge, towed ashore 1and placed in a warehouse. After waiting its turn, it is shipped thence by rail to Barranquilla, where it passes through the custom house, and is carted across the city to another warehouse near the river wharf. Here it awaits its turn for It then makes a ten days'

shipment by river steamer.

1 The recent extension of the Bolívar Railway, and the construction of an iron pier have obviated this particular difficulty.

1

voyage of about 600 miles up the river to Las Yaguas, where it is discharged into another warehouse to await its turn for shipment by rail to Honda. At Honda it is again discharged into a warehouse to await its turn for shipment by railway some five or six miles to Arranca-Plumas. Here it is taken from the car and portaged on the backs of peons down a steep bank of the river, placed on a ferry barge, and rowed across to the opposite side. It is then portaged on the backs of peons up another steep bank and placed in another warehouse, where it awaits its turn (some days, or possibly as many weeks) to begin the tedious and toilsome journey on muleback to Las Manzanas, on the western edge of the great plateau. Here it finds still another warehouse, and has another resting spell before it is transported in ox-carts1 across the plain to Bogotá. It has been perhaps three months or more in making the transit from the port of original departure to the place of final destination, and the freight, insurance, storage, and commissions of middlemen and forwarding agents, and the mountain road-tax, amount in the aggregate to more than its original cost in New York.

1 Quite recently by railroad.

O

CHAPTER XV

THE ISLAND OF CURAÇÃO

NE of the commercial outposts of the old
Spanish main is the little Dutch island of

Curação. It is situated just off the Venezuelan coast, a few leagues from Puerto Cabello and Maracaybo, less than twelve hours' sail from La Guayra, and about eighteen from Carthagena and Savanilla. Being so near these ports, and in constant communication with them for nearly three centuries, one would naturally suppose that the Curaçäons and Spanish-Americans would have become more or less indentified in character, language, and habits of life; but so far from this being the case, the two peoples are about as dissimilar as those of Holland and Spain. In the one, we have the rudiments of the old Spanish civilization, with much of its mediæval romance, sentimental chivalry, stilted pride, and visionary conceptions of life. In the other, we have a mere fragment of old Amsterdam transplanted on a barren island of the Caribbean; a dull, plain, and prosy, but practical people, who retain much of the stolid conservatism and "wooden-shoe-oddities" of the Fatherland.

The chief port and political capital of the island is Willemstad, more generally known abroad by the name of the island itself. The city, as Mr. William E. Curtis has somewhere said, "has all the appearances of a finished town, though none of the evidences of dilapida