26 JUNGLE ISLAND 



Zone workers. Negroes usually take another 

 car on which they do not pay so much for their 

 tickets. 



We pulled out of the station promptly on time, 

 swinging round a half-circle that brings the train 

 to the Balboa station near the Pacific end of the 

 Canal. After that the railway line keeps fairly 

 close to the Canal as it runs north to the Atlantic 

 Ocean. Already the ships were moving through 

 Miraflores Locks. Beyond the locks we looked 

 anxiously down at Miraflores Lake to see if the 

 wind was up yet. If the wind were blowing 

 strongly, we knew we should get well drenched 

 going across the much bigger Gatun Lake to our 

 island. 



vSoon came Pedro Miguel Locks — Americans 

 call them Peter M 'Gill — then Culebra Cut, which 

 still shows the red and yellow clay and the rocks 

 that told their stories to the geologist. Empire 

 was next. Once it was the Canal headquarters 

 and the busiest town on the Canal Zone, but now 

 that the Canal is finished and the engineers have 

 moved away it is sleepy and weatherbeaten. 

 Farther along at Gamboa we crossed the pretty 

 Chagres River where it joins the lake it helped 

 make. In the dry season it is a quiet-looking 

 stream, but at its times of high flood it brings 

 down whole tree trunks, which must not be 

 allowed to drift out into the Canal in the way of 

 the big ships. 



