December i, 1905.] 



THE INDIA RUBL.ER ^A^ORLD 



73 



EXPERIENCES IN COLOMBIA— RUBBER PROSPECTS. 



By the Editor of The India Rubber World." 



IT had been my fortune a number o( times to observe the pic- 

 turesque coast of Colombia from the sea, on both the At- 

 lantic and Pacific sides. but upto the time that the good ship 

 Sarnia landed me at Savanilla I had never set foot on its 

 sacred soil. It was. therefore, with much Interest that I stood on 

 deck and watched the approach of the vessel to the 300-foot 

 iron pier that is about, all there is of the " Port of Colombia." 

 There was. to be sure, a cluster of huts about the little rail- 

 way station ; huts that seemed to grow up out of the desolate 

 shore much as the cactus and mesquite did, without any human 

 intervention, but the result rather of a dry. creative impulse of 

 some arid desert god. 



We had been shouldered and bufTetted for several days by 

 the restless Carib- 

 bean, scorched by 

 the sun and wilted 

 by the heat, and 

 we were glad of 

 the prospect o f 

 getting ashore. 

 We. therefore, en- 

 tered in spirit into 

 the feelings of our 

 captain, who was 

 racing with a 

 French steamer 

 for a good moor- 

 ing, and whose 

 Teutonic oaths we 

 piously echoed 

 without knowing 

 exactly what they 

 meant. Whether 

 this helped in the 

 race is a question, but at all events we got the berth, and as we 

 were making fast the captain joined our group, his good na- 

 ture restored, and as we stood under the awning, sheltered from 

 a shower not much bigger than a pocket handkerchief, he 

 called attention to a man standing on the pier who was Gen- 

 eral Somebody, and a personage of 

 great importance. 



" You mean the chap in the macin- 

 tosh ? " asked an English shipmate. 



" No. the man in the rubber goat," 

 growled the captain. 



Both of them stood pat and the ar- 

 gument lasted long after we left them 

 and stepped upon the pier. 



It was crowded with freight cars, 

 natives, sailors, and the nondescript 

 Anglo-Saxons that become residents ol 

 such places and never get either money 

 or energy enough to get away. Did I 

 say that it was Sunday when we landed .•■ 

 Well, by the calendar it certainly was the holy Sabbath, but so 

 far as we could see, no one observed it but ourselves, which we 

 did by rigidly abstaining from work and preparing to journey 

 up to Barranquilla early Monday morning. This town, which 

 is some 19 miles away, is connected with the port by a jerk 



VIEW OF BARRANQUILLA. 



HOMES OF THE POOR, 



water railroad that has great difficulty in negotiating two trips 

 in 24 hours. We therefore made all preparations, and as I was 

 the only one who knew how to ask for three tickets in Spanish, 

 I was elected treasurer, and full of confidence approached the 

 ticket oHice with the demand, " Tres botia Barranquilla." 

 After much conversation and considerable sign language, I 

 discovered that single fare was $88, round trip being $74 ; so 

 I bought round trips, thus saving S42. The price seemed a 

 little high, but It gave us an added respect for a corporation 

 that could secure such prices. 



Taking our places in the passenger coach, which was about 

 15 feet long, with exceedingly narrow sides, we were bestowed 

 as comfortably as might be. We three were the only Ameri- 

 canos, and the Co- 

 ombians, particu- 

 arly those with 

 the store teeth, 

 which seemed to 

 be quite a fad, 

 smiled at us be- 

 nignly. We were 

 unable to sit to- 

 gether, and to one 

 fell the luck of 

 being seated by 

 the side of an ex- 

 c e e d I n g 1 y dark 

 complexioned 

 lady with much 

 adipose tissue, 

 who shook with 

 J the motion of the 

 train so that we 

 feared her calico 

 swathings would give way and she would run all over the 

 floor; while between her and our companion sat a perfectly 

 naked boy about six years old. I have forgotten .how the rest 

 of us were bestowed, I was so interested In watching the dis- 

 gusted look on the face of the crowded one. 



When the train was loaded and ev- 

 erything ready, we'had the usual South 

 American wait of about a half hour, 

 and then finally, after much protesting 

 on the part of the fussy little engine, 

 the train dragged slowly along the 

 wharf, around by the station, and fol- 

 lowing the shore took its way through 

 most uninteresting country until we 

 reached Barranquilla. This proved to 

 be quite a city, Spanish-American 

 throughout, and unspoiled by the tour- 

 ists. Around the station were two score 

 of rickety carriages, to which were at- 

 tached, by rusty and nondescript har- 

 nesses, a collection of horses, cadaverous and dispirited in 

 the extreme. Two of them succeeded, however, In getting 

 us and our luggage to the Hotel Anglais, run by an English 

 woman, where we secured a room. It contained four beds, a 

 passage way between them, a washstand, and a broad balcony 



