Catholic, ever on the alert for any phenomenon upon which to fasten the idea of a miraculous origin, should have bowed down before this matchless flower and named it "Flor del Espiritu Santo," or "the Flower of the Holy Ghost;" nor that the still more superstitious Indian should have accepted the imposing title, and ever after gazed upon it with awe and devotional reverence, ascribing a peculiar sanctity even to the ground upon which it blossoms, and to the very THE ESPIRITU SAN 0. BANANA IN BLOSSOM. air which it lades with its delicious fragrance. It is indigenous on the Isthmus of Panama, being found most frequently in low and marshy grounds, springing from decayed trees and crevices in the rocks. Some of the most vigorous plants attain a height of six or seven feet. The stalks are jointed and throw out broad lanceolate leaves by pairs. It is an annual, blooming in July, August, and September, and has, in several instances, been successfully cultivated in the conservatories of foreign lands. In former times bulbs of this plant could rarely be obtained, and only with much labor and difficulty; but since their localities have been discovered by the less reverential Anglo-Saxon, multitudes have been ruthlessly torn from their native morasses and distributed to the four quarters of the globe; though their habits and necessities have been so little appreciated that, except in rare instances, the efforts to bring them to flower have proved ineffectual. After a pleasant evening the agent kindly extended to me an invitation to pass at his domicile the few days I intended remaining on the Atlantic side of the Isthmus. I accepted the invitation with hearty satisfaction; and being shown to an airy chamber opening on the bay, wherein stood a capacious well-netted four-poster, I was soon rejoicing in a luxury that no one, unless fresh from the experience of a nautical couch, can appreciate. The freedom of a fair turn-over, without aid from old Neptune, and the ability to strike out in defiance of top-berths and bulk-heads, was a wondrous comfort. Then the music of divers and sundry penetrating little bailiffs, sounding their disappointed horns and gnashing their unreceipted bills through the interstices of the stout netting, gave a sum total of enjoyment so huge that it seemed almost ungrateful to sink the reality in sleep. But tired nature at last exerted her rights, and I became oblivious. which no one seemed to enjoy more than the delighted natives and Jamaica negresses that throve by peddling out these things to our travelers. The impatient engine at last rang out its final shriek, and away rattled the train with five hundred would-be Californians hurrahing and waving their adieus until the last car disappeared The sun was well up before I awoke, and the echoing whistle of the locomotive gave indication that the trains for Panama were about get-in the Isthmian wilderness. ting off. So I hastened down, and was just in time to witness the rush into a long train of as genuine American cars as ever rolled out of a Jersey City dépôt, On every side were countenances full of anxiety and arms full of shawls, oiled-silk clothing, lunch-baskets, water-bottles and other bottles, and small baggage; children with hands and faces full of tropical gingerbread; and the "independents" bringing up the rear with buckets of ice and black junk bottles-one and all jostling each other and crowding into the cars. Every thing had the appearance of a glorious spree in prospect; but, strange to relate, nothing of the kind was intended. The passengers supposed themselves simply carrying the absolute necessities for a three hours' ride in a railroad train; for it seems currently believed by Isthmus travelers, as well as many other people, that all water not drawn from their own wells is positively baneful unless corrected by a little schnapps or Otard-hence the innumerable junk bottles. The legends of starvation and exposure, undergone when the transit occupied a week or more, might, undoubtedly, be held accountable for the provisioning mania, After a substantial ten-o'clock breakfast, a tour of the town and its surroundings was determined upon, when, guarded by umbrellas from the fervent sun, we sallied forth along the quadruple track of the railway toward its Atlantic terminus, about half a mile distant. On our right the line of shops and hotels, which were visible from the entrance of the harbor, skirted the way. The shops, perhaps half a dozen in number, displayed a very respectable assortment of goods; and the hotels-of which there were, great and small, at least a dozenhad well-furnished bars and a universally accompanying billiard-table, while in high relief on the balconies were posted, "United States Hotel," "St. Charles Hotel," "Veranda," "St. Nicholas," and titles of like imposing sound; but, save a few loungers with sickly and uncustomer-like looks and an occasional straggling native, the street was clear of business. It had gone as it came-with our passengers-and the whole line seemed waiting, with calm resignation, for another invoice of Californians. At the end of the row stood the Panama Railroad Compary's office-a respectable, yel low, fire-proof, two-story, brick building, into laid. This huge building was the freight dépôt one of the upper windows of which the wires of of the Panama Railroad Company. On enterthe Isthmus telegraph converged. On the sea- ing it presented a sight which gave substantial side of the road things looked more stirring. proof of the accomplished results of the interSeveral permanent-looking wharves stretched oceanic railway. Bales of quina bark from the out, along whose sides quite a number of brigs interior were piled many tiers deep, and reached and schooners were unlading, and although too to the iron triangular-braced roof of the edifice. far off to interfere materially with the solemn Ceroons of indigo and cochineal from San Salvasilence of the street, yet gave assurance that dor and Guatimala; coffee from Costa Rica, and there was business being done. The vessels cacao from Equador; sarsaparilla from Nicarawere mostly laden with coals, brought here to gua and ivory-nuts from Porto Bello; copper be transferred by rail to the Pacific coast. A ore from Bolivia; silver bars from Chili; boxes little farther on stood a curious, high, corru- of hard dollars from Mexico, and gold ore from gated iron box, which I mistook for some sort California; hides from the whole range of the of patent water-works, but subsequently ascer- North and South Pacific Coast; hundreds of tained to be the office and wharf of an En- bushels of glistening pearl-oyster shells from glish steamship company. The wharf, just large the fisheries of Panama lay heaped along the enough to support the seven-by-nine corrugated floor, flanked by no end of North American office, was built, several years since, of the cel- beef, pork, flour, bread, and cheese, for the proebrated screw-piles, at a cost of forty or fifty visioning of the Pacific coast, and English and thousand dollars, and now served the admira- French goods for the same markets; while in ble purpose of keeping the office clear of a street a train of cattle-cars that stood on one of the which the railroad company have substituted for tracks were huddled about a hundred meekits original water privilege. It was a prime looking lamas from Peru, on their way to the wharf, as far as it went, and only lacked depth island of Cuba, among whose mountains they of water to be just what was wanted. However, are used for beasts of burden as well as for their it may be a satisfaction to "John" to have an wool. The interior of that immense freightiron screw-piled wharf, for he can claim squat- house, filled with rich merchandise, was a glowter privilege and anchor opposite-and then, ing commentary on the energy and enterprise there is "Jonathan," standing close at hand that had developed the vast resources from with his rude wooden piers stretched out into whence this wealth was drawn, and which, until six-fathom water, ready to do his wharf-work the completion of the inter-oceanic railway, was and pocket his sovereigns. almost useless to the world. Since its first discovery no one has ever doubted the riches of the Pacific coast; yet for more than three centuries, during which the matter was occasionally agitated both in the Old and in the New World, Situated in the same line, but few feet farther on, was a massive stone structure, three hundred feet long by eighty wide, through whose broad arched entrances a triple track was none could be found far-sighted and bold enough | down the coast. Rather under the medium to risk their millions in opening this door-way to stature, they were broad-shouldered and musthe richest countries on the globe. It remained cular, with the straight black hair and high for American men with American capital, and cheek-bones of the North American tribes. The in our own age, to fling wide open its portals; interest with which I observed them was greatto stir up the dry bones of Spanish-American ly enhanced by the information that they beimbecility, and inject into its veins the fervent longed to a tribe never subjugated by the Conblood of progress; and now, endued with new quistadores, but who had maintained an unwalife, it sends the rich currents back-feebly, it vering hostility to the Spaniard since the first is true, for the present, but with the earnest of discovery of the country, and cherished such a a richer harvest than the most sanguine specu- jealousy of their independence, that, to the lator ever conceived. present day, no white man has been permitted to land on their shores. Their dress consisted of a simple fold of cloth tied about their loins, and each, armed with a bow and a quiver full of arrows barbed with fish-bones, standing by their canoes, apathetic, yet with a conscious independence in their bearing, gave a fair idea of the races which Columbus and his followers found here in the days of old. A couple of dimes induced one of these aborigines to part with his bow and two or three bone-tipped arrows, but an ominous shake of the head was the invariable answer to all further attempts at improving his acquaintance. On emerging from the farther extremity of the freight-house, a couple of hundred paces directly onward brought us to the Mingillo, or native market-place. A few lusty, half-naked negroes, descended from the African slaves of the old Spanish dominion, who form a large proportion of the littoral population of the Isthmus, were supplying their customers with fish, cassawa, and the fruits and vegetables of the country, from out the bongoes which lay along side the wharf, or, grouped on the shore over smoking kettles of sancoche, ladled out that favorite compound to their native patrons. A little apart from these stood three or four native Indians from the region of San Blas, sixty miles Along the opposite side of the track from the Mingillo lay a broad lagoon, covering a couple of acres, and connected with the waters of the | ain extended its folds; while directly fronting harbor by a narrow opening under the road upon us stood the general domestic rendezvous of the which we stood. A line of low stores and ten- Railroad Company's officials. Its long, sloping ements, occupied principally by the native pop-roof just peeped above a heavy growth of cululation, skirted its farther shore, beyond which a dense swamp forest shut off the view. At about a cable's length from the marketplace a newly-arrived brig, of some four or five hundred tons, lay anchored. The mingled shouting of the natives and Yankee sailors that were distributed about her decks and in a huge barge alongside, directed my attention to her just as the first package of her cargo was being hoisted out of the hold. Expecting to see a bilge-stained cask or a weather-beaten box swinging from the tackles, what was my surprise at beholding, apparently, a mass of rockcrystal flashing in the sun! I turned to my friendly chaperon, in wonder, for an explanation of where this sparkling freight was quarried? what kingly palace it was destined to adorn? and was answered by a single quiet sentence-"Johnson's ice." It took but a moment for him to explain that this Johnson was an enterprising son of old Massachusetts, who carried on a brisk traffic in solidified Connecticut River-who imported New England winters into the very heart of the tropics, and dispensed them by the pound. And so it was; for after a while spent in watching block after block of the frigid freight as it passed down from the deck of the brig into the barge, and enjoying the mad antics of the gathered groups of the natives as a little piece was occasionally thrown to them, we entered the ice-dépôt hard by, and there found the identical Johnson, who made a business of dragging Jack Frost under the equator, and received from him divers marks of cool courtesy-among which is distinctly remembered a couple of prime juleps, packed to the brim with genuine home-made ice. In fine spirits after this refrigerating episode, we resumed our walk along the track, which, as we advanced, began to show something of the original state of the island. Broad, dank pools of stagnant water lay on either side of the track, crossed occasionally by embryotic streets of fresh earth, which told that the work of salubriating this quarter was in progress. Along the seabeach, which formed a semicircle a quarter of a mile beyond us, the driving surf of centuries had washed up a wide barrier of shells and coral, upon which the hospitals of the Railroad Company and the principal residences of its employés were situated. First, on the left, were the hospitals, a couple of large, airy buildings, surrounded by generous tiers of piazzas. A general air of tidiness and comfort prevailed around that spoke well for their management. Three or four neat little cottages came next on the line of the beach, the residences of the principal officers of the company, with little gardenplats in the rear, and an occasional cocoa-tree throwing pleasant shadows over them. Then came the English Consulate-a fine corrugated iron dwelling, over which the flag of Great Brit tivated foliage, among which the banana and palm trees preponderated. A little farther on, to the right, were the buildings of the terminus, with their many-arched fronts, and on either side of these, machine-shops, whose tall chimneys sent forth high curling columns of smoke, while the ring of many hammers broke cheerily upon the ear. The almost surrounding and far-extended swamp, covered with impenetrable chapparal, bid defiance to farther progress in this direction; but, wishing to continue our walk, we turned to the sea-beach, along which a nicelygraded road had been constructed, extending almost the entire circumference of the island. The Paseo Coral, as it is called, was the result not alone of a desire on the part of the citizens of Aspinwall for a public drive and promenade, but of a humane endeavor to afford employment to many destitute and starving filibusters, the miserable remnant of Walker's Nicaraguan forces, who had succeeded in getting thus far on their sad journey home. Its construction was evidently somewhat in advance of the times, for thus far in my peregrinations I had seen neither a vehicle of any description save the railroad cars, nor a beast of burden ranking above a donkey. After following the Paseo Coral along the beach for a third of a mile, it turned directly into the midst of the jungle and wound by gentle curves through a tangled mass of mangrove-bushes, prickly vines, and cacti. This pleasure-road projected into the solitude of a dank morass that, until its existence, had probably never before been invaded by human footsteps, and was of too recent construction not to afford a rich field for the lover of natural history. Parrots fluttered and screamed overhead, their harsh notes intermingled with the melodious whistle of the turpiale, and the deep cooing of the turtle-dove; while underfoot varieties of lizards darted across our path, and numberless land-crabs scampered into their holes by the roadside. The temptation to add to my stock of curios proved irresistible: seizing a stick I started in pursuit of a bevy of crabs that a turn in the road suddenly revealed to our view. Under the circumstances their speed was admirable, but I was upon them before they could reach the thicket, when, to my astonishment, instead of increased speed, three or four of the hipdermost turned sharp around for fight. I was almost convulsed by the jaunty and comically defiant air of the little beggars; their bodies-of a pale blue color, about the size of half a cocoanut-were furnished with eight legs and a pair of claws, one of which was of enormous size, which, as they whirled about for a set-to, they threw up in a genuine boxing attitude, and with an evident determination to resist to the last. Admiration for such gallant conduct did not de |