twelve to thirty miles in width, stretching from the magnificent plain
of Leon with its cathedral city, in the north, to the rolling indigo
fields and the cacao plantations which surround the garden city of
Rivas, in the south.
[Illustration: LEON CATHEDRAL. _Julius Bien & Co._]
The lowest pass across the backbone of the New World, from Behring's
Strait to the Straits of Magellan, extends along the San Juan valley
and across the Lajas--Rio Grande "divide," between Lake Nicaragua and
the Pacific; the summit of this divide is only one hundred and
fifty-two feet above the sea and forty-two feet above the lake.
Nicaragua presents yet another unique physical feature. Lying between
the elevated mountain masses of Costa Rica on the south and Honduras on
the north, the average elevation of its own mountain backbone hardly
one thousand feet, it is the natural thoroughfare of the beneficent
northeast Trades. These winds sweep in from the Caribbean across the
Atlantic slopes, break the surface of the lakes into sparkling waves,
and then disappear over the Pacific, aerating, cooling and purifying
the country, destroying the germs of disease and making Nicaragua the
healthiest region in Central America.
The scenery of the eastern portion of the country is of the luxuriant
sameness peculiar to all tropical countries.
In the vicinity of the lakes and between them and the Pacific, the
isolated mountain peaks which bound the plain of Leon on the northeast;
the mountain islands of Madera and Ometepe; the towering turquoise
masses of the Costa Rican volcanoes; and the distant blue mountains of
Segovia and Matagalpa, visible beyond the sparkling waters of the
lakes, feast the eye with scenic beauties, unsurpassed elsewhere in
grandeur, variety and richness of coloring.
The products of the country are numerous despite the fact that its
resources are as yet almost entirely undeveloped.
Maize, plantains, bananas, oranges, limes, and indeed every tropical
fruit, thrive in abundance. Coffee is grown in large quantities in the
hilly region in the northwest; sugar, tobacco, cotton, rice, indigo and
cacao plantations abound between the lakes and the Pacific; potatoes
and wheat thrive in the uplands of Segovia; the Chontales region east
of Lake Nicaragua, a great grazing section, supports thousands of head
of cattle; and back of this are the gold and silver districts of La
Libertad, Javali and others.
Numerous trees and plants of medicinal and commercial value are found
in the forests. Game is plentiful and of numerous varieties; deer, wild
hog, wild turkey, manatee and tapir; and fish abound in the streams and
rivers. The temperature of Nicaragua is equable. The extreme variation,
recorded by Childs, was 23° observed near the head of the San Juan in
May, 1851.
The southeast wind predominates during the rainy season. Occasionally,
in June or October as a rule, the wind hauls round to southwest and a
_temporal_ results, heavy rain sometimes falling for a week or ten
days.
The equatorial cloud-belt, following the sun north in the spring, is
late reaching Nicaragua, and the wet season is shorter than in regions
farther south. The average rainfall, based on the records of nine
years, is 64.42 inches. The "trades" blow almost throughout the year.
Strong during the dry season and freshening during the day; the wind
comes from the east-northeast, and blows usually for four to five days,
when, hauling to the east or southeast for a day or two, it calms down,
then goes back to northeast and rises again.
The Spanish discoverers of the great Lake Nicaragua, coming upon it
from the Pacific, and noting the fluctuations of level caused by the
action of the wind upon its broad surface, mistook these fluctuations
for tides and felt assured that some broad strait connected it with the
North Sea. Later, when Machuca had discovered the grand river outlet of
the lake, and the restless searching of other explorers in every bay
and inlet along both sides of the American isthmus had extinguished
forever the ignis fatuus "Secret of the Strait," Gomara pointed this
out as one of the most favorable localities for an artificial
communication between the North and South Seas.
[Illustration: THE NICARAGUA CANAL. _Julius Bien & Co._]
It was not until 1851, however, that an accurate and scientific survey
of a ship canal route was made by Col. O. W. Childs.
This survey which showed the lake of Nicaragua to be only one hundred
and seven feet above the sea, and the maximum elevation between the
lake and the Pacific to be only forty-one feet, exhibited the
advantages of this route so clearly and in such an unanswerable manner
that it has never since been possible to ignore it.
In 1870, under the administration of General Grant and largely through
the unceasing efforts of Admiral Ammen, the United States began a
series of systematic surveys of all the routes across the American
isthmus from Tehuantepec to the head waters of the Rio Atrato; and six
years later, with the plans and results of all these surveys before it,
a commission composed of General Humphreys, Chief of Engineers, U. S.
Army; Hon. Carlile Patterson, Superintendent U. S. Coast Survey; and
Rear-Admiral Daniel Ammen, Chief of Bureau of Navigation, U. S. Navy;
gave its verdict in favor of the Nicaragua route.
The International Canal Congress at Paris, in 1879, had such convincing
information placed before it that it was forced, in spite of its
prejudices, to admit that in the advantages it offered for the
construction of a lock canal, the Nicaragua route was superior to any
other across the American isthmus.
In 1876, and again in 1880 Civil Engineer A. G. Menocal, U. S. N., the
chief engineer of previous governmental surveys, resurveyed and revised
portions of the route, and in 1885 the same engineer, assisted by
myself, surveyed an entirely new line on the Caribbean side, from
Greytown to the San Juan river, near the mouth of the San Carlos.
On the eastern side of Nicaragua, all these surveys (except the last),
were confined almost entirely to the San Juan river, and its immediate
banks; and the country on either side beyond these narrow limits was,
up to 1885, almost entirely unknown. Between Lake Nicaragua and the
Pacific, however, every pass from the Bay of Salinas to the Gulf of
Fonseca had been examined.
In 1885 the party of which I was a member pushed a nearly direct line
across the country from a point on the San Juan, about three miles
below the mouth of the Rio San Carlos, to Greytown, a distance of
thirty-one miles by our line, as compared with fifty-six miles by the
river and forty-two miles by the former proposed canal route.
In December, 1887, I went out in charge of a final surveying
expedition, consisting of some forty engineers and assistants and one
hundred and fifty laborers, to resurvey and stake out the line of the
canal preparatory to the work of construction.
The information and personal experience gained in previous surveys made
it possible, without loss of time, to locate the various sections of
the expedition in the most advantageous manner, and push the work with
the greatest speed consistent with accuracy.
The location lines of the previous surveys were taken as a preliminary
line and carefully re-measured and re-levelled. Preliminary offsets
were run; the location made, and staked off upon the ground; offsets
run in from three hundred to one hundred feet apart, extending beyond
the slope limits of the canal; borings made at frequent intervals; and
all streams gauged.
The result of this work was a series of detail charts and profiles,
based upon rigidly checked instrumental data, and covering the entire
line from Greytown to Brito, from which to estimate quantities and
cost.
As may be imagined by those familiar with tropical countries, the
prosecution of a survey in these regions is an arduous and difficult
work, and one demanding special qualifications in the engineer. His
days are filled with a succession of surprises, usually disagreeable,
and constant happenings of the unexpected. Probably in no other country
will the traveler, explorer, or engineer, find such an endless variety
of obstacles to his progress.
Every topographical feature of the country is shrouded and hidden under
a tropical growth of huge trees and tangled underbrush, so dense that
it is impossible for even a strong, active man, burdened with nothing
but a rifle, to force himself through it without a short, heavy sword
or _machéte_, with which to cut his way.
Under these circumstances the most observant engineer and expert
woodsman may pass within a hundred feet of the base of a considerable
hill and not have a suspicion of its existence, or he may be entirely
unaware of the proximity of a stream until he is on the point of
stepping over the edge of its precipitous banks.
The topography of the country has to be laboriously felt out, much as a
blind man familiarizes himself with his surroundings. In doing this
work the indispensable instrument, without which the transit, the
level, and indeed the engineer himself is of no use, is the national
weapon of Nicaragua, the _machéte_, a short, heavy sword.
As soon as he is able to walk, the son of the Nicaraguan _mozo_ or
_huléro_ takes as a plaything a piece of iron hoop or an old knife, and
imitates his father with his _machéte_. As he gets older a broken or
worn-down weapon is given him, and when he is able to handle it, a full
size _machéte_ is entrusted to him and he then considers himself a man.
From that day on, waking or sleeping, our Nicaraguan's _machéte_ is
always at his side. With it he cuts his way through the woods; with it
he builds his camp and his bed; with it he kills his game and fish;
with it at a pinch he shaves himself, or extracts the thorns from his
feet; with it he fights his duels, and with it, when he dies, his
comrades dig his grave.
When in the field the chief of a party, equipped with a pocket compass
and an aneroid barometer, is always skirmishing ahead of the line with
a _machétero_, or axeman, to cut a path for him. A pushing chief,
however, speedily dispenses with the _machétero_ and slashes a way for
himself much more rapidly.
As soon as he decides where the line is to go the engineer calls to the
_machéteros_ and the two best ones immediately begin cutting toward the
sound of his voice. They soon slash a narrow path to him, drive a stake
where he was standing and then turn back toward the other _machéteros_,
who have been following them, cutting a wider path and clearing away
all trees, vines and branches, so that the transit man can see the flag
at the stake. The moment the leading _machéteros_ reach him the chief
starts off again and by the time the main body of axemen have reached
his former position the head _machéteros_ are cutting toward the sound
of his voice in a new position.
As soon as the line is cleared the transit man takes his sight and
moves ahead to the stake, the chainmen follow and drive stakes every
hundred feet, and the leveller follows putting in elevations and cross
sections. In this way the work goes on from early morning until nearly
dark, stopping about an hour for lunch.
After the day's work comes the dinner, the table graced with wild hog,
or turkey, or venison, or all. After dinner the smoke, then the day's
notes are worked up and duplicated and all hands get into their nets.
For a moment the countless nocturnal noises of the great forest,
enlivened perhaps by the scream of a tiger, or the deep, muffled roar
of a puma, fall upon drowsy ears, then follows the sleep that always
accompanies hard work and good health, till the bull-voiced howling
monkeys set the forest echoing with their announcement of the breaking
dawn.
In reconnoissance and preliminary work the experienced engineer, is
able, in many cases, to avoid obstacles without vitiating the results
of his work, but in the final location, in staking out absolute curves
and driving tangents thousands of feet long across country, no dodging
is possible.
On the hills and elevated ground the engineer can, comparatively
speaking, get along quite comfortably, his principal annoyances being
the uneven character of the ground, which compels him to set his
instrument very frequently, and the necessity of felling some gigantic
tree every now and then.
In the valleys and lowlands there is an unceasing round of obstacles.
The line may run for some distance over level ground covered with a
comparatively open growth, then without warning it encounters the wreck
of a fallen tree, and hours are consumed hewing a passage through the
mass of broken limbs and shattered trunk, all matted and bound together
with vines and shrubbery. A little farther on a stream is crossed, and
the line may cross and recross four or five times in the next thousand
feet. The engineer must either climb down the steep banks, for the
streams burrow deep in the stiff clay of these valleys, ford the stream
and climb the opposite bank, or he must fall a tree from bank to bank
and cross on its slippery trunk twenty or twenty-five feet above the
water.
Either on the immediate bank or in its vicinity is almost certain to be
encountered a _"saccate"_ clearing. This may be only one or two hundred
feet across or it may be a half a mile. In the former case the
_"saccate"_ grass will be ten or fifteen feet in height and so matted
and interwoven with vines and briars that a tunnel may be cut through
it as through a hedge. If the clearing be large, the tough, wiry grass
is no higher than a man's head, and a path has to be mowed through it,
while the sun beats down into the furnace-like enclosure till the blade
of the _machéte_ becomes almost too hot to touch.
But worse than anything thus far mentioned are the _Silico_ or black
palm swamps. Some of these in the larger valleys and near the coast are
miles in extent.
Occupied exclusively by the low, thick _Silico_ palms, these swamps are
in the wet season absolutely impassable except for monkeys and
alligators, and even at the end of the dry season the engineer enters
upon one with sinking heart as well as feet, and emerges from it tired
and used up in every portion of his anatomy. It is with the utmost
difficulty that he finds a practicable place to locate his instrument,
generally utilizing the little hummocks formed by the trunks of the
clusters of palms, and in moving from point to point he is compelled to
wade from knee to shoulder deep in the black mud and water.
General reconnaissances from high trees in elevated localities, simple
enough in theory, are by no means easy in a country so miserly with its
secrets as this, nor are their results reliable without a great
expenditure of time, labor, and patience.
On level, undulating and moderately broken ground, the tops of the
trees, though they may be one hundred and fifty feet from the ground,
are level as the top of a hedge. Even an isolated hill if it be rounded
in shape presents hardly better facilities, the trees at the base and
on the sides, in their effort to reach the sunlight grow taller than
those on the summit, and there is no one tree that commands all the
others.
If however an isolated hill of several hundred feet in height be found,
its steep sides culminating in a sharp peak, one day's work by three or
four good axmen, in cutting neighboring trees, will prepare the way for
a study of the general relief and topography of the adjacent country.
If after these preliminaries have been completed the engineer imagines
that he has only to climb the tree and sketch what he sees, to obtain
reliable knowledge of the country, he is doomed to serious surprises in
the future. If he makes the ascent during the middle of the day, he
will, after he has cooled off and rested from his exhausting efforts,
see spread out before him a shimmering landscape in which the uniform
green carpet and the vertical sun combined, have obliterated all
outlines except the more prominent irregularities of the terrene, and
have blended different mountain ranges, one of which may be several
miles beyond the other, into one, of which only the sky profile is
distinct. Naturally under these conditions estimates of distance may be
half or double the truth.
There are two ways of extracting reliable information from these
tree-top reconnaissances. If it be in the rainy season the observer
must be prepared to make a day of it, and when he ascends the tree in
the morning he takes with him a long light line with which to pull up
his coffee and lunch.
Then aided by the successive showers which sweep across the landscape,
leaving fragments of mists in the ravines, and hanging grey screens
between the different ranges and mountains, bringing out the relief
first of this and then of that section, an accurate sketch may
gradually be made. The time of passage of a shower from one peak to
another, or to the observer, may also be utilized as a by no means to
be despised check upon distance estimates.
If it be the dry season, the observer may take his choice between
remaining on his perch in the tree from before sunrise to after sunset,
or making two ascents, one early in the morning and the other late in
the afternoon. In this case the slowly dispersing clouds of morning,
and the gradually gathering mists at sunset, together with the reversed
lights and shadows at dawn and sunset, bring out very clearly the
relief of the terrene, the overlapping of distant ranges, and the
course of the larger streams.
This kind of work cannot be delegated to anyone, and besides the
arduous labor involved in climbing the huge trees, there are other
serious annoyances connected with it. The climber is almost certain to
disturb some venomous insect which revenges itself by a savage sting
which has to be endured; or he may rend clothes and skin also, on some
thorny vine, or another, crushed by his efforts, may exude a juice
which will leave him tattooed for days; then, though there may not be a
mosquito or fly at the base of the tree, the top will be infested with
myriads of minute black flies, which cover hands and face, and with
extremely annoying results. On the other hand the explorer may as a
compensation have his nostrils filled with the perfume of some
brilliant orchid on a neighboring branch; and there is a breezy
enjoyment in watching the showers as they rush across the green carpet,
and in listening to the roar with which the big drops beat upon the
tree tops.
The special phase of field work which fell to my personal lot was
entirely reconnaissance, consisting of canoe examinations of all
streams in the vicinity of the line of the canal, to determine their
sources, character of valley, and approximate water shed; of rapid
air-line compass and aneroid trails, to connect one stream, or valley
head with another, or furnish a base line for a general sketch plan of
a valley; and of studies of the larger features of the terrene, from
elevated tree tops.
The last has been already described; in the second the experience was
very similar to that of the parties in running main lines. On these
occasions three or at most four hardy _huléros_ (rubber hunters)
comprised the party, two carrying the blankets, mosquito bars and
provisions for several days, and one or two cutting the lightest
possible practicable trail and marking prominent trees.
In a day's march of from five to eight miles, and this was the utmost
that even such a light, active and experienced party could cover in one
day, every possible and some almost impossible kinds of traveling was
encountered, and thoroughly exhausted men crept into their bars every
night.
The canoe reconnaissances were more agreeable, though some most
unpleasant as well as most enjoyable memories are connected with them.
The innumerable large fallen trees which obstruct the streams and over
or through which the canoe must be hauled bodily, the almost inevitable
capsizing of the canoe, the monotonous red clay banks on either side
and the frequent necessity of lying down at night in a bed of mud into
which the droves of wild pigs which inhabit these valleys have trampled
the clayey soil, are among the disagreeable incidents.
From the head of canoe navigation to their sources the character of
these streams is entirely different, and both in 1888 and in 1885 I
have followed them far up into mountain gorges, the beauty of which is
as fresh in my memory as if I had been there but yesterday.
The crew of the canoe on these reconnaissances usually consisted of
three picked men, and when the canoe had been pushed as far up stream
as it was possible for it to go, two of the men were left with it while
the third and best, slinging the blankets, bars, and a little coffee,
sugar, and milk, upon his back pushed on with me. Wading through the
shallow water up the bed of the stream, taking bearings and estimating
distances, while my _huléro_ followed, ever alert to strike some drowsy
beauty of a fish in the clear water; the source of the stream was
generally reached in a day, and never did we make preparations to sleep
on some bed of clean, yellow sand washed down by the stream in flood
times, but what I had a plump turkey hanging from my belt, and my
_huléro_ several fine fish.
Much has been written about the climate of Nicaragua and its effect
upon the inhabitants of more northerly countries when exposed to it.
It would seem that the experience of the numerous expeditions sent out
by the United States, and the reports of the surgeons attached to those
expeditions would have long since settled the matter. To those who
cannot understand how there can be such a difference in climate between
two localities so slightly removed as Panama and Nicaragua, and the
former possessing a notoriously deadly climate, the experience of the
recent surveying expedition must be conclusive.
Only five members of that expedition had ever been in tropical climates
before, and the rodmen and chainmen of the party were young men just
out of college who had never done a day's manual labor, nor slept on
the ground a night in their lives. Arriving at Greytown during the
rainy season, the first work that they encountered was the transporting
of their supplies and camp equipage to the sites of the various camps.
This had to be done by means of canoes along streams obstructed with
logs and fallen trees. Some parties were a week in reaching their
destination, wading and swimming by day, lifting and pushing their
canoes along, and at night lying down on the ground to sleep.
One party worked for six months in the swamps and lagoon region
directly back of Greytown, and several other parties worked for an
equal length of time in the equally disagreeable swamps of the valley
of the San Francisco. Several of these officers are down there yet, as
fresh as ever. In making tours of inspection of the different sections
I have repeatedly, for several days and nights in succession, passed
the days traveling in the woods through swamps and rain, and the nights
sleeping as best I could, curled up under a blanket in a small canoe,
while my men paddled from one camp to the next.
In spite of all this exposure not only were there no deaths in the
expedition but there was not a single case of serious illness, and the
officers who have returned up to this time, were in better health and
weight than when they went away.
Of course the men had the best of food that money could obtain and
previous experience suggest, and the chiefs of all parties were
required to strictly enforce certain sanitary regulations in regard to
coffee in the morning, a thorough bath and dose of spirits on returning
from work, and mosquito bars and dry sleeping suits at night; yet the
climate must be held principally responsible for a sanitary result
which I believe could not be excelled in any temperate zone city, with
the same number of men, doing the same arduous work under conditions of
equal exposure.
The forests everywhere abound in game and every party which included in
its personnel a good rifle-shot was sure of a constant supply of wild
pig, turkey, quail and grouse, varied by an occasional deer, all
obtained in the ordinary work of reconnoissance and surveying. For the
men's table there was abundance of monkey, iguana and macaw.