OP ATAOA1IA AND OOQUIMBO. 



share whose value should be $50,000 if he would direct tin- work to completion. A* at times 

 tin- old port nl' ( 'n|iia|M'i, I.eside- l.i-in- "pen to northerly \vindn, is dillieiilt of aC06M, and not ft 

 little da: from tie , it was unlit for the ocean terminii* of the- 



load, and heiire the visit of reooniuuMUuioe tn the neighboring porto. Though m.t until after 

 \\arm opposition hy those who held property at the old port, Cahlcra eventually bore oil' the 



palm. 



Landing alter night, it was not easy to gather an idea of the place ; but the sound of English 

 - in many directions, and the quick, nervous movements of those who passed me between 

 the wharf and the rooms of Mr. Wheelwright, were sufficient evidences that we were in an 

 emluyo settlement surely destined to reverse the order of things among the descendants of 

 Spain, and to "go ahead." When morning came, the aspect of the colony was by no means 

 charming. Two or three long'rows of board huildings facing the bay and hastily put up, 

 scores ..f rudely constructed ranches, piles of lumher, coal, and iron rails, the skeleton of a 

 and 1 tetter edifice intended as a custom-house, and a few tents, these were results of the 

 lirst year, with untiring industry, of the party brought from the United States to build the 

 road. Six ships laden with locomotives, cars, and other materials for the company, were at 

 anchor in the bay, and a large number of launches passed to and from the temporary mole with 

 parts of the cargoes. To the eastward the track was visible, winding through a low swell in 

 the ground, with working cars already rattling over it, piled with materials for the party 

 above ; and in another direction the mechanical engineers were busy in putting together some 

 of the locomotives just landed. Activity and life were apparent even among some of the peons 

 who had been brought here to do the heavy labor, and who had already profited by example. 



A town had been laid out by government officers, and the custom-house commenced bade fair 

 to be a large and handsome building, though at that time there were no others coming under 

 the latter designation, all the rest being the one-story, unpainted, plank tenements before men- 

 tioned. Foreseeing its necessity and value, Mr. Wheelwright had erected a large house for his 

 own use some months previously : but it was scarcely completed before it was burned to the 

 ground; and as fire was communicated to the building occupied by the resident engineer a few 

 weeks subsequently, there is every reason to believe that both fires were the work of incendiaries. 

 That any of the buildings occupied by the engineers and subalterns escaped when the latter fire 

 took place, was almost miraculous. They are of thin pine boards, on which rain had fallen only 

 two or three times since their erection. The fire was at the dead of night, and the only water at 

 command was that of the bay, more than a hundred yards distant. Most fortunately, the stifling 

 smoke in his room roused the engineer ; and his assistants promptly rallying to the scene of com- 

 mon threatened danger, the portions in flame were actually cut out with axes. Whether the 

 incendiary was a native or one of the drunken and worthless foreigners constantly flocking hither, 

 and whose idle and dissolute habits the company had refused to foster, none will be likely to 

 know, though suspicion most naturally attached to the latter. 



With the facilities offered by its bay, the convenience for landing goods possessed by a long 

 mole which was at once projected and was then in progress, and the extensive and wealthy back 

 mining district to supply, it was evident that Caldera, as the terminus of the railroad, must in a 

 few years become a large town, in spite of its arid locality. What another year effected may be 

 seen in the plate opposite Caldera just two years after the American engineers landed there in 

 1850 ! If speculation had not already been quite so extravagant as at some of the paper towns 

 of California, at least all of the most valuable town-lots had been taken at fair prices ; and there 

 wanted but the completion of the road to bring many of the Copiapinos here as permaneut 

 residents. As an offset to the loss inevitable from abandoning the old port, government gave a 

 site in fee at Caldera to each former property-holder; and already they had begun to pull down 

 and transport houses for re-erection. In July, 1851, its population numbered only 800 souls, 

 one half of whom were in the employ of the company; and about 150 of the remainder were 

 u union. A year later, more than 2,000 hud gathered within its precinct-. 



