August i, 1903] 



THE INDIA RUBBER WORLD 



365 



RUBBER PLANTING ON THE ISTHMUS OF TEHUANTEPEC. 



U Seen by th,- Edit ■ The India Rubber World." 



FOURTH LETTER. 

 Across the Isthmus. — Plantation ''San Francisco." — View ol 

 the " Ubero " and "La Crosse" Plantations. — The great Tehuante- 

 pec Plain. — At the El Globo. — Attacked by a Vampyre. — The 

 / ipotaco Women — Dogs and Fleas. — SalinaCruz. — Back to Santa 

 I.ucretia. — Mexican fustice.- Sleeping under Difficulties --A Ni;; 1 ' 1 

 at a Railroad Camp. — A Tapir Hunt. — The Persistent " Pinoleo." 

 — Achotalagain — Journeying Noi th. — Cattle Ranching. — Taxes.— 

 Cordoba and Orizaba. — Mexico City. — A Look Backward. — The 

 Cow Pea and Velvet Hean. 



THE last letter of this series left us just boarding the train 

 at Coatzacoalcos for the journey across the isthmus to 

 the city of Tehuantepec. The journey did nottakelhe 

 whole of the month that has intervened, but it took 



long enough in all conscience, yet it was not without interest. 



Almost at once I struck up an acquaintance with a German 



named De Verts, whom I soon learned owned the plantation 



"San Francisco "up in the Dos 



Rios region. His plantings were 



of coffee and ( 'astilloa, and of 



the latter he had some 60,000 



trees two and one-half years old. 



These were planted 7^ feet apart 



one way, and 15 feet apart the 



other, with coffee between. His 



trees averaged about 8 inches in 



diameter. From his description 



the stand appeared to be an ex- 

 cellent one. 



After his departure a friend 



promised to point out to me a 



man, who more than any other 



down that way, was making "easy 



money" — none other than a trav- 

 eling dentist who finds his pa- 

 tients only among the natives. 



He goes from village to village 



doing a rushing business at great 



profit. It is said that many who 



have no trouble at all with their 



teeth have them filled in order 



to show the gold, and that they 



never weary of grinning, with 



that end in view. I did not see 



the dentist, for at this juncture 



we stopped at a station, where 



on a siding was a private car, on 



the platform of which stood Sir 



S. Weetman Pearson, the famous 



English constructor of tropical 



railroads. We all wanted a sight of him. and were rewarded 



by a brief view of a thick set, determined looking Britisher. 



who had an air of meaning business all the time. He was said 



to be discharging men right and left, and generally upsetting 



the policy of procrastination and inefficiency that had been 



more or less characteristic of the management in the past. 

 The National Tehuantepec railroad is without doubt of great 



present and prospective value, both to the planters and to the 



owners. Its trains, which run every other day, are always well 



patronized, and it is wonderful how those children of nature, 



WILD RUBBKR TREE ON CO.VI / ACOALCOS RIVER. 



the Indians, enjoy crowding into thethird class cars, and riding 

 even a few miles. Many of the poorer ones save money for 

 months, ride fifty or a hundred miles, and contentedly walk 

 back. To them the trains are " flyers," and the cars palatial, 

 but to the white man the many delays, particularly at stations, 

 are very irritating. A resident of the country accounted for 

 the long waits by stating that an engineer is paid $2 an hour, 

 and therefore the longer the run, the more he gets. He fur- 

 ther intimated that if the train got on too fast, steam was 

 allowed to get low, or some of the machinery suddenly needed 

 repairs, for which a stop was necessary —but the narrator may 

 have been yarning. 



Shortly after noon we passed the handsome plantation house 

 of the Boston Ubero company, and had a good view of the 

 many acres of pineapples that they have under cultivation. We 

 also had a view of the land of the Isthmus Rubber Co., a little 



later, and still further on was the 

 La Crosse plantation company, 

 which showed many acres plant- 

 ed to sugar cane, and consider- 

 able rubber. 



Early in the afternoon we 

 passed over the Ijw mountainous 

 ridge that separates the Atlantic 

 side from the Pacific, and left 

 behind the hot moist atmosphere 

 that had become somewhat try- 

 ing, and were in a climate bone 

 dry, and seemingly much cooler. 

 We next had a fine view of Rin- 

 con Antonio, the new railroad 

 town that is rapidly assuming 

 shape, and that will give to the 

 workers in the shops a fine 

 healthy climate instead of a fever 

 ridden one. 



Continuing our journey, we 

 next came to the valley of the 

 San Geronimo, healthy, cool, free 

 from epidemics, and a little later 

 to the vast Tehuantepec plain. 

 Here are more than a million 

 acres of rich land as level as a 

 billiard table, covered with a 

 sparse growth of chapparel, and 

 awaiting only irrigation to turn 

 it into a paradise. Nor is the 

 water far off, for the mountains, 

 which are in plain sight from 

 the train, furnish abundant supply, and every opportunity for 

 huge reservoirs. 



After a stop of twenty minutes at a small station to watch a 

 man who was chopping wood — at least that was the only appar- 

 ent reason — we reached our journey's end, arriving at the city 

 of Tehuantepec two hours late. We had elected to stop at the 

 El Globo Hotel while in the city, and in that made no mistake, 

 for it is the best there. From the proprietor's own advertise- 

 ment I have it that there are " Rooms facington two different 

 street. Comodios and well ventiloted." Moreover, with the 



