A YEAR OF COSTA RICAN 

 NATURAL HISTORY 



CHAPTER I 



PUERTO LIMON 



Limon, the Atlantic seaport of Costa Rica, is situated at 

 io° o' 30" North Latitude. It was not opened to foreign 

 commerce until 1867 and did not attain much importance 

 until work was begun on the railroad to the interior in the 

 early seventies. Previous to that time travelers entering 

 Costa Rica on the Atlantic side either ascended the San 

 Juan River from Greytown and then its tributary the Sara- 

 piqui for about twenty miles, thence on horseback through 

 the pass of Desengano, to San Jose, or they went up the Rio 

 Matina from its mouth, fourteen miles northwest of Limon, 

 and then overland and up the valley of the Reventazon 

 River, with considerable difficulty. We arrived at Limon 

 on the Hamburg-American steamer "Sarnia" from New 

 York on Saturday, May i, 1909, and left for the United 

 States by the "Prinz Joachim" of the same line, on Monday, 

 May 10, 1910. Between these two dates is comprised our 

 year of Costa Rican Natural History. 



The "Sarnia's " port of call before Limon was Greytown, 

 Nicaragua, where there is no pier. We watched the lighter 

 rising and falling as it came out to our steamer, a mile off 

 shore, and looked at the low-lying coast with interest in- 

 spired by the opening chapter of Thomas Belt's A Naturalist 

 in Nicaragua. Belt landed in Greytown and his fascinating 



