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Show I American Grit Necessary I 7 6 W7n Oil i Columbia S Traveling 2,500 miles over mnuit jR tulh ranges, through rough valleys B iind across rougher sens with t lirok- en collar bono Just in process of Unit- ting and therefore weak, palntul and m Irrltntlng, Charles J, Kiler h.is arrived H In Now York -to tell the. people hero B what wldenwako Yankees can do In . '"Colombia, where ho came from. Mr. 'jKPSSfKder, who Is manager-of I .an Mamie-M Mamie-M llta Plantation, in tho heart of the M Andes, near the town of I'almlra, has lived In Colombia practically all his life, though tho son of American parents, par-ents, and Is .therefore well qualified to speak on tho subject nearest hie heart and his pocketbook. Ho Is visiting vis-iting his parentB, Mr. and Mrs. .Tnmra M. Kder, at No. 251 West Ninety-fifth street, nnd his brother Phanor J. Kder, a lawyer nt No. 80 William street, who is -also pr6sidcnt of the plantation company. Mr. Kder was on his way homo to his sugar and coffee plantation when the pole of his buckbonrd broke and tho frightened horses ran away. Tho driver wns unable to hold them and ' tho Vehicle upset. Mr. Kder was I thrown to the ground and tho driver S fell on him, breaking tho collar-bono. j "With the team righted he had to ride i four hours before' the broken bono j could bo set by a native surgeon. J Then, as ho was coming to Now York, f bo had to wait till tho bono had be lli gun to lmlt, and be started on his long 2,500 mile Journey with his broken brok-en bono still- weak; Most of tho way to Colon, on the Isthmus of Panama, was covered on hummocky roads, by liorsoback a part of the distance. Mr. Eder's father was American Consul to Colombia when tho son was born, and after his term as tho repro 8 scntatlve of his country established the La Manuellta Plantation. Hauling Machinery Dfflcult.. "In establishing our sugar mills at Palmira," said Mr. Eder yesterday, "wo found that the most serious obstacle ob-stacle wns the transporting of tho machinery from the coast Into the Interior. In-terior. It took us two and n half years to' take tho heavy machinery over the mule trains from Hucnaventurn to Palmira among the mountains. That j "was twenty-one miles by railroad and aoF ninety miles on mulo back. That was yifi In" 1899. Today tho distance Is leas. In carting the heavy pieces- of machinery over the mountnji ranges wo had tho greatest difficulty. Tho trail led up zigzag fashion, very steep and narrow, and when wo camo to a turn In the tinll it was necessary to tunnel into the side of the mountains and drive tho yokes of oxen with which the loads were pulled Into these tunnels till tho trucks had reached tho turn nnd then Llock them, take the cattle out of tho tunnels and haul tho loads on up tho other Inclines. It was slow, laborious work, and somo of our ox teams had a dozen or more yokes of oxen and men drivers for each yoke. Wo shall never forget our experiences In going over the passes of tho Western West-ern rango of the Andes around To-cota To-cota from the coast to Palmira. The cattle of Colombia, from which stock our oxen were drawn, aro very fair kine, but not big llko our American stock here In tho states. "Colombia Is a 'wonderful country In many ways and Is well worth tho attention of Amorlcan investors, though native Colombians aro not friendly to North Americans. Almost on tho equator, many of tho vegetables vege-tables and fruits of temperato climates clim-ates grow to maturity. Apples and pears ripen along with sapodlllas, bananas and oranges; wheat, barley, Indian corn and potntoes aro pro-I pro-I duced; beef, lamb and poultry aro of good quality. "In Palmira wo havo a composlto type of white people, verging on the Spanish, but, llko the people of the United States, having tho blood of many races In their veins. The lower classes nro a mixture of Indian nnd negro, with a llttlo whlto blood In them. They dross In tatters, go about barefooted, and aro fair workers' for n country whoro tlmo Is of small account. ac-count. Wo pay1 them 40 cents a day, nnd on that amount of money they . not only live well but nro enabled to tp S!vo Bmnothlng for their old ago nnd for rainy days, Fine Chance for Americans, "The Government has a monopoly of tho liquor business, which Is a Rood thng. Tho prices are kept very hlch and tho poor peons cannot nffoid to become drunkards. It Is naturally a very rich country, and under tho good Influences of the opening of the Panama Cannl It Is destined to be come a very prosperous country. It would seem. There aro Immense deposits de-posits of ralnernls, and In tho mining regions there aro many Americans, also somo scattered around on tho plantations, Any smart American who to wants to go down there nnd mnko a fortuno can do so If ho will work as hard as ho would In his own country. The native people are naturally lazy, having no reason to work hard, since the country supplies everything thai they need with little offort. Hut tho American going there and working as hard, as he would hero gets rich quickly. "Colombia comi-rlscs a little loss than 500,000 square miles, or about twice tho size of Texas, and Is tremendously tre-mendously fertile. Take the Cauc.i Valley for Instance; everything will grow there that one In a temperate climate, or a semi-tropical climate, could wish, nnd the temperature all the year around averages "G. The average av-erage highest is 84, and the average lowest is 0.4. Our plantation Is 3,700 feet nbove the sea. The principal products pro-ducts of the valley are sugar, coffee, cattlo and cocoa. It would be a good thing for tho country, nnd for Americans, Ameri-cans, It the latter would go down there and develop tho land with American capital. "The people do not like Americans Kvory day they like them less. They are frightened nt them first on ac count of the Panama steal, and perhaps per-haps on that account nrore than on any other. Also the hnbits and customs cus-toms of the Americans are very different. dif-ferent. The natives do not llko to bo hustled. They like to go on peacefully, making their living as they have always al-ways done, and as their fathers have doiic, and they nro tremendously patriotic pa-triotic and have tho Idea, rightly or wrongly, that there Is a fixed Intention Inten-tion on tho part of tho United States to sometime annex The. country. Also the majority of the Americans who go there uro of the rougher, adventurous sort, and they know very little of our better people here. "Tho natives are pretty Intelligent and can sec as far Into a mile post as the Americans can. They aro a kindly, hospitable, honest people who can bo trusted. Since I have been there, which Is Blnce I was born, there have been three or four revolutions, revolu-tions, but Americans nnd foreigners In general are never molested in these was. oreign property Is sacred. "A great deal of the business of tho country Is in the hands of tho Germans, Ger-mans, but contrary to tho" belief of many people I do not think that Germany Ger-many has any Idea of colonizing there. The United States, howover, has almost half of tho business of tho country. In 1909 tho United States had over ten million dollars of tho twenty-six million total foreign trade. Of tho coffeo exports of the republic about C7 per cent, went to the United States, and nearly all tho bananas, hides, rubber and Ivory nuts wore divided di-vided between the United States and Europe Most of the tobacco wont to Germany. Tho principal Imports arc flour, lard, petroleum, cotton goods, hardware from the United States; potatoes and sugar from Germany; cotton textiles from Great Drllaln. Tho country needs railroads moro than anything else Just now, and roads of any kind. "The present government Is all right. There are good, honest men at tlie head of it, and there Is nlways money In the treasury. Tho outlook for tho future Is good, and with tho building of tho canal wo shall know, tho country bettor. Ono of the things that keep tho country peaceful Is the fear that if there wns fighting thero would bo a splitting up of the country coun-try and tho United States would Intervene." In-tervene." New York World. |