Show ON SOUTHERN SEAS The Gulf of Guayaquil and the Rio Guayas FAIR WEATHER AND STILL WATER Some Seasons Why the United Stoics Has So Little Commerce With South AmericaS o America-S SJsnnxo Feb 281SnOSpecial correspondence of THI HCKJLLD You may search the world over for pl asant sea traveling without finding anything more agreeable than down the western coast of South America where one is always sure of fair weather still waters and fine steamers steam-ers Especially is this the case during the season of our northern winter tho summer sum-mer time in these latidueswhen breezes blow cool and invigorating even directly over the equator without the damp chilli ntss that pierces ones marrow on the At latiic Strange to say not an American keel plows the Pacific from Panama to Cape Horn yet not altogether unaccountable when wo censidcr the reasons that have left the America of the north almost without with-out commercial dealings with her southern sister The shortsighted policy of the TJT itcd i States Congress in refusing to aid ak amship lines even by payment of a mod rte sum for carrying the mails has much 1 to do with it for tho venturesome capitalist capital-ist who might Invest money in such an enterprise en-terprise would have to compete with the v l dubsidized companies of Europe At present there are two lines of steam ers plying regularly between Panama and Chili one Chilian the other English The latter which is by far tho best was pn jeoted as an American company by Mr William Wheelright of New York city More than forty years ago this trout oman tec ared a concession for its establish meut in these waters and then ho hurried Lowe to the United States expecting to i udil3r raise the necessary funds for carry ing out his plans But neither tho mer cLant princes capitalists nor Congress CL uld be induced to offer him any sort of uki or encouragement and Lnally he took himself and his project to Eugland where a wiser government SNAPPED AT THE CHAXCE of securing rich emoluments for all time to come Suosequently Mr Wheelright obtained ob-tained subsides also from several of the South American republics whose ports ho eaters The natural consequence is that the whole passenger traffic of the soutncrn Pacific together with nearly all its commerce I com-merce has passed irrevocably into British hands whose vessels sail every week from Panama to Liverpool via the straits of Magellan The Chilian line sends a vessel every second week and carries mostly local freight Several smaller steamers belong ing to French and German companies ply I between arious west coast ports and there used to be two other lines Spanish and Italian but both the latter have recently re-cently withdrawn their boats The Pacific Steam Navigation company which Mr Whee right organized is today the largest enterprise of its kind in the world owniug more than sixty firstclass steamers and carrying every bit of cargo between Europe and South America For this trade it maintains two sets of steamers those for tho still waters between Panama aud Valparaiso being large and beautiful with open decks and airy staterooms while those designed for tile rougher passage pas-sage through the straits and across the stormy Atlantic were especially constructed for heavy seas The headquarters of the Pacific Steam Navigation company is now in Liverpool It was first established in London but did not prove a brilliant success until after its removal sinc which time the trade has been constantly increasing Mr Wheel right also built the first railroad in South America in Chili and the grateful natives na-tives have very properly honored him by a huge statue m the city of Valparaiso The distance from Panama to Valparaiso is iYJlo miles and the trip woud become avery a-very tedious one occupying twentyfive days Aere it not for the fact that hardly half the time is spent at sea there being no fewer than TniUTVEIGHT POUTS to be visited on the way Through the many years that the British company enjoyed en-joyed undisputed monopoly its charges were enormousnot less than 40 per ton for freight and 297 per capita passenger rate for a distance about the same as that bit ween New York and Liverpool The Chilian line however has lately made competition com-petition so brisk that when rivalry runs high either company will recklessly reduce their fare offering to carry people for almost I al-most nothing at all rather than let them fall into the hands of tho other Wishing to take advantage rf this convenient con-venient state of affairs a couple of young Englislunen who were bound for up south as they say hereabouts made a careful canvass in Panama among the tray ecrs booked for various points along the western shores of South America and finding a goodly number of them who agreed to stick together and go by the line that would come downinost handsomely they managed the matter so well between the rival companies that everybodys fare was reduced to an absurdly small sum ours for the whole 3315 miles being less than thitrytwo dollars each American gold with no charge for extra luggage and stopovers of indefinite length allowed And we were given extraordinary attentions atten-tions and courtesies withal afternoon tea in the captains cabin nice little lunches sent up before bedtimc and everybody had a stateroom all to himself mother and daughter or husband and wife being given two large communicating rooms with plenty of extra space for trunks anc steamer chairs These British steamers have their an chi rage in Panama some seven miles out from shore near the island of Toboga while the Pacific mail steamers of the Ameican line bound for San Francisco ho at points equally distant for the alleged 1 pruor though lovely to look at is shallow roy and dangerous inshore with long blacK reefs showing their ugly heads above the water As the tide on this side of the isuimus rises from eighteen to twentytwo feet setting in and running out with a remarkably re-markably strong current the matter of embarking and disembarking is by no means childs play and can be accompishei with comparative safety only at what is called HALFTIDE and thero must be no delay about it for this is emphatically the time and tide that waits for no man If you and your be longings are not on the spot at the proper meat i ready to be hustled pellmell over the lurching gangplank the instant it is thrown out from the little tender when it bobs up alongside the wharf you will inevitably find yourself in the unpleasant predicament of the damsel whom the poet left behind him The tender is altogether too small for the or wd of passengers and the hastily loaded 1 urcrace is everywhere piled high in wildest i wild-est confusion The fierce Isthmain heat I can hardly be endured in the tiny cabin ana there are not a dozen available seats j on deck so you finding standing room outside with your hat bumping the awning and your pedal extremities at the mercy of I I rolling trunks aud boxes and the footprints foot-prints of your equally unsteady fellow voyagers If it rains as it generally does j I during half of the yoar your discomforts are not diminished for no umbrella even could you iind space to raise one would be the slightest protection against a tropic shower But if getting aboard the tender was bad enough getting off again is INFINITELY WORSE over the narrow bridge spanning tho I sea between the little craft that hobbles ahout likcan eClr shell and the lanrer Yes II sel that rocks and rolls ivith a stately mo tion of her own straining and tugging at her hawser and occasionally succeeding iu pulling so far away that the connecting plank falls short of its destination You are hauled across somehow though ia mortal mor-tal terror and your luggage pitched after you unless as it not infrequently happens the latter drops instead down into the sea These big English steamers are three storied affairs and the lower deck into which one is ushered from the tender is far from prepossessing at first sight There arc long lines of stalled sheep and cattle most of them to be slaughtered for food during the voyage and groups of shockheaded saddlecolored Peruvian and Chilian deckhands who look as if they would like to slaughter us So perfectly do they personateones idea of pirates as gained from opera choruses that one momentarily mo-mentarily expects to hear them burst out into singing And the resemblance to wellremembered opera scenes does not cease with these lower regions Ascending a ladderlike stairway to the main deck you find that the Sereno and Her Majestys ship Pinafore Pina-fore are in many respects as like as two peas in a pod There may be no Dick Deadcyes nor Little Buttercups onboard on-board hut the gallant captain is as typical a Briton as was never never sick at sea and on all sides one hears a deal of selfcon gratulation that inspite of all temptations to tho contrary everybody REMAINS AN ENGLISHMAN Though far from being the finest ship of the lino the Sereno is quite good enough for anybody withits blaze of electric light immense salon wido cabins all opening outward on the second deck rind the whole iiwiuugsimaea upper story given over iu the passengers for lounging promenading and amusements Tho island of Toboga in front of which our steamer is anchored a few miles from Panama City is covered by a cheerful looking little town though no doubt distance dis-tance lends enchantment to the view of its roofs Hat and red tiled or very steep and thatched with straw all overshadowed by drooping palms or half hidden behind broadleaved banana trees Everybody is anxious to get away and chafes and fumes at an hours delaybeingabsurdly afraid of Yellow Jack and other bugaboos indigen ous te the locality We being southward bound sail almost immediately with tho I turn of tho tide but our ncighoors on the American steamer en route to San Francisco Fran-cisco must wait hero two or three days By the waythough most travelers do not know it those going north must first sail duo south more than one hundred miles in order to round the peninsula of Aguero which stretches forth a long arm slightly curved eastward enclosing in its embrace the bay of Panama It seems a paradoxical paradoxi-cal statement but is nevertheless absolutely abso-lutely true that Aspinwall on the eastern side of the isthmus is in reality farther west than Panama City on its western coast By consulting the map and getting the crook ofthe isthmus well in mind you will see that the Panama railroad instead of westwardhoing form Aspinwall as its passengers fondly imagine runs southeast In this connection it may be mentioned that the port of Guayaquil in Ecuador the very westernmost town in all South Amcr lea lies almost in a direct line south from Washington D C Panama bay which is 110 miles long and nearly one hundred and fifty miles wide at its mouth is swarming with sharks espec ally in the neighborhood of tho port The sailors delight in spinning GRUESOME TARNS I in tho hearing of land lubbers regarding persons vho have been snapped overboard from canoes or who have lest a leg or an arm by some act of carelessness or have i tumbled into the sea in the perilous transit tran-sit between dock and tender or from tender to steamer their horrible fate being told by a brief rcddcnir g of the surface of the water If you desire to test the likelihood likeli-hood of such a catastrophe just toss overboard over-board anything at hand from a biscuit to a gripsack and note how quickly a dozen pairs of wideopened jaws will show themselves them-selves To the last moment that thcvessel waits she is surrounded by a crowd of canoes and itpaus bringing from shore cargoes of Bananas pineapples cocoanuts oranges mangoes figs paltas parrots and monkeys some for sale on the spot to whoever will buy but mostly loaded below for transportation transpor-tation to other ports By judiciously interviewing the ships officials from time to time without allow nig them to suspect the presence of a chiel among them takin notes I have elicited the following data relative to westcoast commerce Wo have now on board about one thousand threehundred tonsof freight but that is considered a small cargo 2500 tonsjieing the limit It consists chiefly of cattle wool metals sugar rice and tobacco and all of it goes to Europ except the cattle to be eaten on the way and a little fruit for 10cal1 orts largo quantity of rice will be taken on at Callao it being the great staple of Peru where the finest rice in the world is grown a single grain being sometimes half an Inch long There is also a lot of cliancacha aboard a native preparation from su arc ar-c ne used in the making of tlulccs sweetmeats sweet-meats and at Pisco one of the ports of Northern Peru a good deal of the brandy manufactured there will be loaded The average valuation of the cargo Is about three hundred pounds sterling per annum The exports from Chili alone are from fifteen to twenty millions a year and Peru is but little behind those figures As to imports the Argentine Republic receives over a million dollars worth per annum about seven and threefourths of which come from the United States Brazil imports an average of 105000000 worth to which the United States contributes only about eight per cent Taken together the imports at all Central and South America reach a total of at least FOUR HUNDRED AND FIFTY BULLION DOLLARS every year toward which vast sum the United States the nearest sister republic contributes less than fifty million dollars I Nor is there good reason for this lamentable lamenta-ble state of things except high tariff lack of transit and a few other obstacles which might easily be removed wero our legislators legisla-tors less inconceivably stupid any more than for the fact that the United States merchants are compelled to send the few goods they can now dispose of in Brazil etc away around by Havre Hamburg and Liverpool We crossed the equatorial line in the night soon after leaving the coast of Colombia Col-ombia and contrary to all expectations the weather grew perceptibly cooler instead in-stead of giving increase of heat The steamer reaches Guayaquil on the evening of the fourth day out from Panama Dur ing most of the time we arc beyond sight of land the blue and placid waters of the Pacific filling the horizon on all sides but sometimes to the eastward when the mists of morning aro dispel d and before tho evening shadows fall the lofty Cordilleras that form the northernmost spur of the Andean chain suddenly stand out full in view smoke issuing from the tops of some of them proving that we are fast approaching approach-ing the region of earthquakes and volcanic eruptions On the morning of the third day some I thing that looks like a gigantic corpse float ing on the water is dimly visible through a yellow haze which we know to be the Isla del Muerto or Dead Mans Islandan unmistakable land mark for seamen mark ing the entrance to the Gulf of Guayaquil In order to make for the port of Ecuador our course is now sharply changed due eastward and though tho mainland is not discernible through the fog its proximity I is unmistakably announced by a complete change of odors the salty and fishy smells of the sea being overpowered by a mixture of malarial dampness and the fragrance of tropical fruits and flowers Presently we pass THE ISLAND OF GORGONA famous as the site of Pizarros desperate deed of devotion and tho capo of sat s-at the mouth of the Guayaquil where he first landed and whence the towering summits sum-mits of Cotopaxi and Chimborazo are for the first time plainly seen in all their maj esty To the left lies Puna Island on which the stern conqueror bolo up so long against open foes and treacherous friends 1 and organized that small hut desperate I force with which he subdued the richest and most powerful of Americas ancient empires The Gulf of Guayaquil is very large hut its channel is narrow and tortuous At times we steam close to the low slimy Shores which aro lined with mangrove trees among whose gnarled roots num bers of alligators and yatersnakes find I oonirenial homes whilefarther out in the safety of deep water huge porpoises show their shining black sides in uncouth gambols gam-bols Our attention was called to a tiny island green as an emerald IIsot in the ring pf the waver close by which a Spanish treasure ship is said to have sunk acentury and hall ago with several million doubloons onboard on-board To this day divers occasionally bring up golden coinand we were informed that the chance was open toilfl as to every body of possessing half that submerged wealth the other half of all that is recovered recov-ered to go to the Ecuadorian government Since golden oppportunities are rare in these days it seems a pity to decline this one and I hasten to mention it for the benefit bene-fit of my needy countrymen They assure us that in many places off the coasts of Chili and Peru ships laden with treasure were purposely sunk during the war and all the world is welcome to recover the money providing only that half is given to the government I I should have mentioned in its proper I place that Puna Island is now the Saratoga I of Ecuador An English gentleman Cap I tain Chambers owns the finest house in the town an immense bluepainted structure circular in shape with verandas all around which in the distance looks about as much like a residence as the grand stand of a racecourse race-course The Guayas river empties into the gulf of Guayaquil and sixty miles up its narrow nar-row and winding course is Ecuadors only seaport called Santiago Guayaquil nearly a hundred miles from the ocean 1 And just as twilight shades shut off tho view we find ourselves anchored opposite the port which we will proceed to explore FANNIE B WARD |