[From the New York Herald, of 1849.]
CHAGRES, NEW GRANADA, Jan. 2, 1849.
_James Gordon Bennett_: We left New York amid the huzzas of friends,
who bade us a most affectionate adieu. The passengers are from every
section of the Union. There are men of talent and high integrity among
us. The emigrants in the Crescent City have never been excelled,
always excepting the Pilgrim Fathers. On leaving the Pier, I noticed
but two females, who waved their handkerchiefs most gracefully, and
imparted their sweetest smiles. The stewardess is the only female on
board, who is a legion, and has contributed much to make us happy.
Extraordinary harmony has prevailed. All are armed to the teeth, which
warns us to respect each other. I have not heard an unfriendly word
since I left New York, nor seen a wry face, save off Cape Hatteras
and while crossing the Gulf Stream in the trough of the sea, with
the wind blowing very hard. Christmas was the sickest and saddest
day of my life. Tho Crescent was a perfect hospital. All were sick,
including some of the boat’s officers, and extending even to the crew.
On the first day out, the knives and forks rattled like hail, but on
Christmas, hardly a man made his appearance at table. Such sighs and
groans, and anathemas of gold—such longing for friends, and home and
safety, and such contortions as on that unhappy Christmas, I have
never seen. A countryman staggered up and down the cabin, solemnly
vociferating that he had vomited a fragment of his liver, and that he
must soon die, and bade us all a most doleful farewell, and besought us
to kindly remember him to his wife and children. But the surgeon came
and analysed his apparently ejected liver, which proved to be a huge
junk of beef which he swallowed the day previous, without mastication.
The same verdant genius asked the Captain, during the awful gale,
what he would charge to turn round and take him back to New York. The
Captain screamed, and swallowed a large cud of tobacco, and seized a
handspike and threatened to dash the countryman’s brains upon the deck
if he didn’t go below. Amid the horrors of the hurricane, the gentle
and courageous stewardess gave us gruel, for which we rewarded her with
a purse of gold. The tempest was terrible. The ocean mountains smote
the frantic clouds, and the snowy spray of the ocean vales resembled
lakes of glittering silver. The Crescent’s stern was mutilated, the
bulwarks stove, the wheel-house injured, and a man washed into the
precarious sea, who was miraculously rescued by four daring men,
whom I trust the Humane Society will reward for their extraordinary
courage and humanity. His preservation caused much joy on board, and
those who saved him have been lions since. When 700 miles from Chagres,
the thermometer was 95 in the shade on deck, and in the sun or cabin
the heat was almost intolerable. The intense heat made us stare, and
wonder what was in store for us when we first mounted the fiery steed
of the equator. Some of the passengers were very languid, and gasped
for breath like Peytona when leading Fashion a span on the fourth heat.
Chagres is the Five Points in miniature, consisting of the very dregs
of filth, squalid penury and human degradation. I have been reading
Blunt’s Coast Pilot, and found on page 476 the following consolatory
narrative of Chagres and its fatal harbor, from the pen of Captain G.
Sidney Smith, of Her Majesty’s sloop Bastard: “Chagres is more sickly
than the same latitude on the coast of Africa. The bar of Chagres
harbor has two and a-half fathoms on it at low water. The entrance is
rather difficult, and at all times requires a fair wind, but when in
you are perfectly safe. (O, me! O, Jonah!) I would not recommend its
being entered if the measure could possibly be avoided, or suffer the
boats to be there at night. It is, perhaps, the most unhealthy place
known. The Bastard’s cutter was, by stress of weather, obliged to
stay at night in the harbor. The consequent loss was a Lieutenant and
seven men. Only one of the number attacked recovered. This happened
between the 27th and 30th of November, 1827.” We approached Chagres
this morning, amid torrents of rain. The land for 20 miles was high
and undulating, with occasional bluffs towering high above the general
elevation, and rocks some distance from the shore. The American Consul
arrived to-day, at Chagres, and in crossing the Isthmus sunk into the
mud nearly up to his hat, mule and all. There are about 50 huts at
Chagres, with a population of about 300. An alligator snapped at our
boat, near Moro Castle, while approaching the shore, and we learn that
the banks of the river are literally covered with hideous reptiles. The
Castle is very dilapidated, and about 200 years old, and has within its
dismal walls some 80 brass pieces, with no soldiers, and a family of
natives. A large sample of all the abominable reptiles with which these
fatal latitudes abound, lurk within and around it. Board at Chagres is
$5 per day, in a common hut. We are about to draw lots for the first
opportunity of ascending the river. I shall endeavor to be faithful in
my narratives, during my entire pilgrimage. Adieu.