quite modern, but in others two centuries behind the times. It is built
chiefly with adobe houses that have a very unprepossessing appearance on
the exterior. But the interiors of many of the houses are elegantly
furnished. It costs one thousand dollars to pay the freight on a piano
to the city, yet nearly all the well-to-do people have them. From Honda
to Bogota they have to be carried on the backs of mules. There are few
carriages, because the roads will not allow of them; but there is an
extensive system of street-car lines, every bit of material used in
their construction being brought in the same manner over the mountains.
The cars were shipped in sections not too heavy for a man to carry, and
the rails were borne upon the shoulders of a dozen persons. Yet,
notwithstanding this enormous expense, the roads, which are owned by New
York capitalists, are very profitable investments, the fare charged
being twelve and a half cents in Colombian coin, which is equivalent to
ten cents in our currency. The street-car drivers carry horns, which
they blow constantly, so as to notify the people in the houses of their
approach. The streets are narrow, paved with stone, and in the centre of
each is a gutter, through which a stream of water is constantly flowing.
[Illustration: MONUMENT IN THE PLAZA OF LOS MARTIRS.]
The streets, as in other Spanish-American cities, are named after the
saints, battle-fields, and famous generals; but the houses are not
numbered, and it is difficult for a stranger to find one that he happens
to want to visit.
[Illustration: PLAZA, AND STATUE OF BOLIVAR.]
The police do duty only at night. During the day the citizens take care
of themselves. Four policemen are stationed at the four corners of a
plaza. Every fifteen minutes a bell rings, which causes the guardians of
the city to blow their whistles and change posts. By this system it is
impossible for them to sleep on their beats. They are armed with lassos,
and by the dexterous use of this formidable weapon they pinion the
prowling thief when he is trying to escape. They also have a short
bayonet as an additional weapon. Petty thefts are the thief crimes. The
natives are not quarrelsome nor dishonest. They will steal a little
thing; but as messengers you can easily trust them with three thousand
or twenty thousand dollars. When they work they go at it in earnest, but
they are not fond of exertion. It is a curious sight to see cargadors
going about with loads. They generally go in pairs, one behind the
other, with a stretcher. The natives of the lower class are fond of
drinking and gambling. They have a beverage called chica, which has a
vile smell. It does not intoxicate as quickly as whiskey, but it
stupefies.
Society is very exclusive, and strangers call first. If the visit is
returned the doors of society are opened. The predominating language is
Spanish, but all the upper classes speak French. They get everything
from France, too, in the way of dress and luxuries. It is absolutely
necessary to speak French to get along. The city is a city of
paradoxes--of great wealth, of great poverty, and a peculiar mixture of
customs that often puzzle the stranger. The foremost men in the
mercantile, political, and literary circles are from the old Castilian
families, but so changed by intermarriage that all bloods run in their
veins.
The ruling class are the politicians, but they are more under the
control of the military than is generally the case elsewhere. Out of
thirty-three Presidents that have ruled the republic seventeen have been
generals in the army. Among the leading minds are highly educated men
who can converse and write fluently in several languages, who can
demonstrate the most difficult problems in astronomical or mathematical
formulas, who can dictate a learned philosophical discourse, or dispute
with any the influence of intricate history. Their constitution, laws,
and government are modelled after those of the United States; their
financial policies after England; their fashions, manners, and customs
after the French; their literature, verbosity, and suavity after the
Spaniards. Patriotic eloquence is their ideal, and well it is realized
in some of their orators.
Until the ratification of the “concordat” with the Pope, in 1888,
education was free and compulsory, sectarian schools were prohibited,
and all orders of religious seclusion suppressed; but under that
document the ancient relations between the Church and State were
restored, the school laws
[Illustration: GOING TO THE MARKET.]
were repealed, the education of the children was intrusted again to the
priests, and the monks and nuns were permitted to return to the country
and reoccupy the cloisters from which they were expelled by the Liberal
party several years before. The monasteries, convents, and valuable
productive estates which had been confiscated by the Government from
time to time since 1825 were restored to the religious orders; and all
the educational institutions, including the university, themedical, law,
and other scientific schools, the learned societies, the observatory,
the libraries, and museums, were removed from the charge of the civil
minister of education, placed under the care of the archbishop, with a
liberal subsidy from the public treasury for their maintenance, and by
the terms of the “concordat” devoted forever “to the glorification and
advancement of the Holy Catholic Church.” In one or two of the seaports
Protestant missionaries are getting a foothold, but very slowly, as
everything is against them. The unconquered Indian tribes retain their
peculiar religious rites.
[Illustration: A CABALLERO.]
Lately banks and bankers have multiplied to a great extent. Paper-money,
heretofore almost unknown, is fast supplanting the coin of the country.
This places a great power in the hands of the bankers. They are allowed
to issue bills far above their specie reserve, charging from
three-fourths to one and a half per cent. a month for loans. The profits
are very large, some banks paying dividends as high as thirty per cent.
per annum. The wholesale and commission merchants comprise a large
class. They buy from the lowest-selling market giving the largest
credits, and sell to the small tradesmen of their individual section,
often supplying these individuals with goods in advance on the coming
crop. This gives them control of the produce a long time ahead.
The non-producers are the gamblers and beggars. The people are given to
games of chance. Lotteries and raffles find many devotees. Beggars are
very plentiful, owing to the peculiar diseases that scourge the country.
Saturday is their day; then every merchant places on his table a
quantity of small change, and delivers it as the mendicants call. There
are a number of hospitals, cared for by the Sisters of Charity.
[Illustration: AN ORCHID.]
The Colombians are musicians, and spend a great amount of time and money
in gaining this accomplishment. The German piano is found in almost
every house, and many young people gain their living teaching this art,
while extravagant figures are paid to foreign professors. There are few
actors or actresses. The taste of the people is favorable to the growth
of this art, and when a really good artist passes through the country he
reaps a rich harvest.
Collectors of orchids are often sent out by European houses. They
establish themselves at the most convenient place, and send out native
runners, paying them from one to thirty cents a plant, according to the
kind and condition of the parasites. They are worth from £5 to £100 in
Europe. All the lower classes work indiscriminately. Indeed, the women
do the heaviest part of the work, carrying over the mountains burdens
equal to those of the men, and one or two children besides. Travellers
are carried over the mountain-passes in “sillas” upon the backs of
natives. These carriers are sure-footed, and capable of great endurance,
usually making better time than mules. The sillas are nothing more than
rude bamboo chairs, fastened to the backs of the silleros by two belts
crossing over the chest and a third passing over the forehead. On a
level road these silleros have a gentle trot that does not jar the
rider, keeping a pace of four miles an hour for half a day. When they
are climbing in the mountains they seldom slip or fall, and very few
accidents ever occur unless they happen to get too much agendiente
(rum). But it requires time and patience to accustom one to human-back
riding, although the natives of the country prefer the silla to the
saddle.
Bogota is half a mile nearer the stars than the summit of Mount
Washington and at this elevation the climate is delightful, although it
is only a few degrees from the equator. The tropical fruits are here
found in abundance, as well as the products of the temperate zones.
The streams are full of fish, and the mountains are full of game; but
nevertheless the people prefer bacon and codfish to the natural luxuries
of their country, and even these cannot be found cooked in any palatable
way. Indians will walk for three days--men and women together, and each
woman usually carrying a child besides--having heavy loads of produce or
long strings of fish upon their backs. The woman will sit all day in the
marketplace peddling off her stuff to customers, while the man is
patronizing the gambling booths; and at night, if there is any money
left, they will both get drunk together, and then spend two or three
more days on the road, walking home with empty pockets.
[Illustration: OVER THE MOUNTAINS IN A “SILLA.”]
There are no hotels worth mentioning in Bogota, only a few _fondas_ (or
restaurants) and _tambos_, at which the peons stop. There are very few
strangers travelling in the country, and they generally carry letters of
introduction, and usually packages, to the acquaintances of their
friends, who entertain them hospitably. The few who visit the county
from the United States stop at a boarding-house kept by a lady from New
Hampshire, whose late husband was engaged in business at Bogota. There
are probably half a dozen other citizens of the United States at the
capital.
The original name of the city was Santa Fé de Bogota (Bogota of the Holy
Faith). The plan of the city is irregular, and it lies upon sloping
ground, with three or four streams running through it. The houses are
never more than two stories in height, built of adobe and whitewashed.
The ground-floor has no windows, and the rooms fronting the streets are
usually occupied as shops, the proprietors living up-stairs. There is
never more than one entrance, which is through a passage into the patio,
or court, upon which all the rooms open. The second story is furnished
with balconies, upon which the women spend most of their lives.
The cathedral stands, as in all Spanish-American cities, upon the main
plaza, and is quite large and imposing as to its exterior; but the
interior is bare, damp, and cold, and barren of decoration, except a few
tawdry wax or wooden images of the saints. The pulpit is quite an
elegant affair, being handsomely inlaid with tortoise-shell and embossed
silver. There are two rows of seats, one on either side, which are
occupied exclusively by men. The women all kneel through the entire
service, or squat upon little pieces of carpet which they bring with
them.
A half-century or more ago the erection of a very beautiful capitol of
white marble, and of the pure Grecian order of architecture, was
commenced, but the building still stands unfinished and unoccupied, a
monument to procrastination. There have been several spasmodic attempts
to complete it, but they have been interrupted by revolutions, and the
money diverted or stolen. The President resides in a dilapidated
structure, and the several executive departments of the Government
occupy confiscated monasteries and convents, which, under the recent
“concordat” with Rome, must be restored to the monks and nuns. There is
a fine university, a museum containing many valuable and venerated
historical relics, a national library which is composed mostly of
ancient tomes, eighty or ninety thousand in number, an observatory,
said to be nearer the stars than any other in the world, and a military
academy, organized by Lieutenant Lemly, of the United States army, and
considered the best on the Southern Continent.
[Illustration: NATURAL BRIDGE OF PANDI, COLOMBIA.]
Bogota was once a city famous for its learned societies and literary
culture, but during the last decade the entire population have been
devoting themselves to politics and war. The revolution of 1884-5 was
prolonged and disastrous, and there has been little, if any, improvement
in political or commercial conditions since. The Liberal party,
representing the young and progressive element, elected as President in
1884 Dr. Rafael Nuñez, and then attempted to overthrow him because of
his reactionary tendencies. Nuñez was sustained by the clerical, or
Bourbon element; and having a well-organized army behind him, succeeded
not only in maintaining his power, but in re-electing himself for a
second term with a Congress unanimously in sympathy with his policy. The
Constitution was so amended as to transform the Federation into an
inseparable union of States like our own, the name was changed from “The
United States of Colombia” to “The Republic of Colombia,” and the
President was endowed with most extraordinary powers, little short of
those exercised by the Shah of Persia or the Czar of Russia. Then a
treaty, or “concordat,” was entered into with the Vatican, under which
the civil as well as the ecclesiastical authority of the Pope is
recognized, and all that the Liberal party had accomplished during its
struggles for thirty years was wiped out by a single stroke of the pen.
[Illustration: DON RAFAEL NUÑEZ, EX-PRESIDENT.]
The extreme ultramontanism of Dr. Nuñez awakened a series of
revolutions, and resulted in his abdication of the Presidency; his
successor being Dr. Holguin, one of the most prominent and learned
leaders of the Clerical party, who has spent his life in Congress, in
the executive departments of the Government, and in the diplomatic
service.
CARACAS.
THE CAPITAL OF VENEZUELA.
The voyage from New York to Venezuela is one of the most delightful in
the world, and gives the traveller not only a nine days’ taste of the
sea, but shows him a glimpse of tropical America, and affords him an
opportunity to study the peculiar life and customs of our
Spanish-American neighbors. A splendid fleet of steamers--the “Red D”
line, owned by Messrs. Boulton, Bliss & Dallett, of New York, and
sailing under the American flag--furnish as comfortable transportation
facilities as can be found on any ocean, and the journey can be made in
thirty days, eighteen of which will be spent at sea and at the ports of
the Antilles, and the remainder at the capital and chief cities of
Venezuela.
If the whole coast of South America had been explored for the worst
place in twenty thousand miles to build a city, there could not have
been found one with greater natural disadvantages, which human ingenuity
cannot overcome, than La Guayra, the seaport of Caracas, capital of
Venezuela. It is a town of about six thousand inhabitants, stretched
along a rocky beach for about two miles. Five hundred feet from the
water the Venezuelan range of the Andes Mountains begins, and rises
almost perpendicularly to the height of five and six thousand feet. One
hundred feet from the houses the bottom of the sea slopes off into a
hundred fathoms of water, and a mile out it is said to be two thousand
feet deep. There is not the slightest excuse for a harbor, nor the
slightest protection for vessels, which always lift their anchors and
get out of the way when indications of a storm are seen. The anchor lies
on the sloping rock at the bottom of the sea, but it has to be lifted
every few hours, or the shifting sand will bury it beyond recovery. The
surf always runs very high when a strong breeze is blowing, and under
these circumstances vessels are expected to load and unload. Two
wharves, or moles, have been built at an acute angle, with the narrow
point open, and into this the lighters are steered, where they are
comparatively easy while shifting cargoes. The vessels always stay out
far enough to avoid the surf, but rise and fall, tip and rock with the
swells that go under them with the motion that the billows of the ocean
give.
Clinging to the little ledge between the surf and the foot of the rocks
the town stands. There is only one street along which the warehouses are
situated, with a rather imposing custom-house and the invariable plaza,
or park, in which stands an equestrian statue of Guzman Blanco, the
“boss” of Venezuela. There is said to be a statue of Guzman in every
town in the republic, erected by his orders, but at the expense of the
Government, while he was President. There are three of them at the
capital.
The guide-books and geographies say that La Guayra is the hottest and
most unhealthy place in the world; that it is hotter than Cairo, or
Madras, or Abushar, or Aden, or Yuma; but the United States consul says
that this is an absurd and inexcusable falsehood, and represents the
city as being a most attractive summer resort. Humboldt says
yellow-fever is born there, and that it is the chief distributing point
for the plague; the consul says that there is only occasionally a case
of fever of a mild type, which is often mistaken for genuine
yellow-jack, and people ordinarily recover from it. Humboldt says, too,
that in his time this was a famous place for tidal waves; that a lookout
was always stationed at the fort, which sits in a crevice in the
mountains above the town, to watch for them, and when one was seen
coming a gun was fired to warn the vessels, which pulled in their
anchors and put out to sea to escape being dashed against the mountains.
He also says that it was the worst place for barnacles (_teredo
navalis_) in the world, and that vessels were totally ruined by lying
at anchor there; but Mr. Bird says these stories are all humbug, and
while it might have been so in Humboldt’s time, the conditions are
totally different now.
[Illustration: WAITING FOR THE NEW YORK STEAMER.]
Above the city, among the rocks, are the ruins of old Spanish forts
which have been the scenes of the most terrific conflicts, and the
ravines have run with blood from the carnage until the sea has been as
red as a sunset. In the days of the buccaneers La Guayra was a favorite
place for fighting, and there being no harbor, the pirate kings were
always cruising after the galleons which came there to load with
treasures for the King of Spain. Upon the top of a high bluff
overlooking the town is an immense castle, which was at one time the
residence of the Captain-general of the Spanish colonies, and is
haunted by all sorts of legends and romantic traditions. It is now in
ruins, and the underground tunnel which formerly connected it with the
Military Barracks, four miles away, has caved in at many places.
To readers of that remarkable novel, “Westward, Ho!” by Charles
Kingsley, this castle has a romantic interest, as it was here where the
Rose of Devon was carried by her Spanish lover, and where she was sought
and found by Aymas and Frank Leigh. But things are different nowadays.
The great American house of Boulton, Bliss & Dallett have their
headquarters there, control the trade, send vessels to New York every
ten days without molestation laden with coffee, and the only blood that
flows is shed by the fleas.
I have thus far neglected to give due credit to the tropical flea, to
whose industry, enterprise, and assiduous solicitude all travellers in
Spanish-America are indebted for a great deal of diversion. At first his
attentions are somewhat annoying, and there is a general disposition to
conceal acquaintance with him; but when every man, woman, and child in a
company is constantly scratching, it becomes difficult to ignore
conditions that are common and conspicuous, and everybody admits, first
with blushes and then with brazen shamelessness, that he’s got ’em.
There is no use of trying to conceal the fact. They are as common and as
plenty as flies in the basement kitchen of a city boarding-house, and
the Venezuela coat-of-arms would more truly represent the condition of
the country if it showed a man vainly trying to scratch in seven places
at once instead of a wild horse dashing over the pampas. They are little
black insects, which will get into your clothing in the most
unaccountable manner. You find them in your shoes and under your
shirt-collar; you wake up in the night and think you have somehow
wandered into a plantation of nettles; or, when you become a little more
accustomed to it, dream regularly that you are lying on the prickly side
of a cactus. To rub the flesh with brandy does some good, but the better
way is to grin and bear it. The pests are bad enough in Mexico; they
are worse in the West Indies; but in Venezuela--the less said the
better.
[Illustration: IN THE SUBURBS OF LA GUAYRA.]
Between La Guayra and Caracas rises a mountain called La Silla (The
Saddle), from the shape of its summit, eight thousand six hundred feet
above the sea, and there are three roads between the two cities. The
shortest is a trail nine miles long, through a ravine, which was used by
the Indians at the time of the discovery by Columbus, but it is
impassable for quadrupeds, and dangerous for any but expert and
experienced mountaineers. Then there is an old wagon-road, steep and
rough, for twenty-two miles, which was constructed by the Spaniards
after the Conquest. The third is a tramway, narrow gauge, built along
shelves which have been excavated in the side of the mountains by
English engineers and English capital. The train goes slowly, and there
is almost always a track-walker with a spade upon his shoulder in sight.
It would not do to run up or down the grades in the night, or at a speed
greater than ten miles an hour; hence it requires two hours and a half
to make the journey, than which there is no more interesting in the
world. The grade averages one hundred and ninety-seven feet to the mile,
the highest altitude passed being four thousand six hundred feet; and
one does not know which to admire the most--the difficulties nature has
placed in the way of man, or the manner in which man has overcome them.
Humboldt, who came up the wagon-road, which runs almost parallel with
the tramway for most of the distance, said that the only mountain
scenery which equals it is that of the Island of Teneriffe, where a
fragment of the alpine grandeur rises from the bosom of the sea. But one
can scarcely imagine a picture more imposing or impressive than is
represented here. Almost under the equator, with the ocean continually
in view, and the mountains rising into the clouds all around you, the
little engine puffs and pants like a restless stallion as it climbs
around in the crevice that has been dug for the track. The road is
solidly constructed, as English railways always are, has all the modern
appliances for safety, and has been running so far without an accident;
but if anything should break, if the engineer should lose control of the
train for an instant, there would be no need of an inquest--there would
be nothing for a coroner’s jury to sit upon.
Two hundred and fifty years ago that king of buccaneers, Sir Francis
Drake, paid a visit to Caracas under circumstances worthy of notice. It
was before the forts had been built around La Guayra; in fact, it was
owing to the adventure of Sir Francis that the Spaniards put them there.
This Mr. Drake, as all know who are familiar with the doings of Queen
Elizabeth’s time, was a Britain bold, and had a little affair with the
Spanish Armada. Having disposed of the enemies of the virgin Queen in
the waters around home, he started
[Illustration: STILL MORE SUBURBAN.]
out on a cruise for gold and glory, with “Westward, Ho!” inscribed upon
the pennant that flew at the royal top-gallant of his main-mast. Mr.
Drake was a gentleman of great valor, and his antipathy to the Spaniards
and Catholics was pronounced. He started out from Plymouth with a
gallant fleet, and when he came across a Spanish galleon or a Spanish
town in the colonies he “went for it then and there.” The Rev. Charles
Kingsley has described the voyage, which continued around the globe, in
a most fascinating manner. He followed in the wake of Sir Francis two
hundred years after, and his descriptions of South American scenes and
scenery are unsurpassed.