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Vol, XXIII, No. 7 



WASHINGTON 



July, 1912 



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MAT»NAIL 

 ©(SMAIPIHIffi 

 A(SAEII 



LITTLE-KNOWN PARTS OF PANAMA 



By Henry Pittier 



Author of "Costa Rica — Vulcan's Smithy^' in the; Nationai. Geographic 



Magazine; 



THE usual tourist, fresh from a 

 visit to the gigantic work now 

 nearing completion between the 

 cities of Colon and Panama, will tell of 

 his occasional glimpses of the virgin 

 forest and of his experiences with the 

 natives, supplementing his narrative per- 

 haps with pictures of the jungle and of 

 what he took for aboriginal Indians. 



In fact if our friend has followed the 

 customary route, limiting his itinerary 

 to a train ride from Colon across to 

 Panama, with stops at Gatun and Pedro 

 Miguel, to inspect the locks, and at Cule- 

 bra to see the big cut, he knows very 

 little of the real country, and in ninety- 

 nine cases out of a hundred his native 

 Indians are likely to have had kinky 

 hair and African features. 



There is, undeniably, plenty of jungle 

 and thicket along the future canal, but 

 it is almost wholly second growth ; and 

 in those places where the primeval vege- 

 tation has been spared, as in the swampy 

 lowlands between Gatun and Bohio and 

 on the steeper declivities of the hills, it 

 is and has always been more or less 

 stunted and scarce and so does not give 

 an adequate idea of the majestic forests 

 that still cover about two-thirds of the 

 territory of the Republic of Panama. 



If, however, our tourist is a man of 

 leisurely habits, a stranger to the hurried 



derer's stock, and go tramping over the 

 excellent roads built parallel to the rail- 

 road and the canal by the government 

 of the Canal Zone. He will then meet 

 occasionally some last vestiges of the 

 aboriginal vegetation and examples of 

 the wonderful rankness of tropical plant 

 life. 



Not far from Pedro Miguel, on the 

 way to Panama, stands a cluster of 

 Cavanillesia trees, once part of the for- 

 est, but today shading a pasture (see pic- 

 ture, page 632). Apart from the strik- 

 ing effect of their huge straight trunks, 

 which are out of proportion with their 

 insignificant flat crowns, these particular 

 specimens are of especial interest on ac- 

 count of the fact that they grow nearly 

 at the extreme northwestern areal limit 

 of the species. Eastward, in Colombia, 

 it seems to reach the Magdalena River, 

 and southward it can be followed along 

 the coastal plains as far as Peru. 



It may be interesting to add that the 

 fruit affords a good example of the won- 

 derful contrivances by means of which 

 nature insures the propagation of the 

 species. The fruit is an elongate spin- 

 dle, provided with five broad wings and 

 very light, so that it travels easily far 

 away from the parent tree. The small 

 seeds are imbedded in the woody tissue 

 of the spindle, and the surrounding cells 



ways of the present generation, he jnay — ^^e filled with a gum which readily ab 

 leave the beaten track, pick up-^cwii-^-'sa^li^^vailable moisture and swells to a 



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