106 THE ISTHMUS OF PANAMA. 



in some way by the completion of this important 

 undertaking. 



The ultimate effect of this line of railroad on the 

 Province of New Grenada can scarcely yet be con- 

 ceived. In opening the doors, however, to her 

 commerce — that greatest of all channels through 

 which flows the wealth, prosperity and progress of 

 every country — it cannot help stimulating the dor- 

 mant energies and awakening a new life in that 

 people, and urging them in some degree to reclaim 

 themselves from the comparatively low position they 

 hold in relation to almost every enlightened nation, 

 in all that pertains to agriculture, arts, or manufac- 

 tures. The social condition of New Grenada must 

 rapidly undergo a radical change ; for, except in a 

 few of their principal towns, such as Bogota, Car- 

 thagena and Panama, it is in a most degraded state, 

 and it is not possible for any people to resist long 

 the power of the simplest arts of civilized life, when 

 they are cultivated under the life-giving influences 

 of an active and remunerating trade. 



A country like this, with almost unbounded na- 

 tural resources — known to possess great mineral 

 wealth — with a soil so rich, and under a climate so 

 fertilizing and genial, that the greatest possible va- 

 riety of natural products are found upon its surface 

 springing up without the planting or care of the 

 husbandman — with but one season, and that season 

 an almost unvarying and eternal summer — with all 

 these advantages, I ask how is it possible that it can 

 be travelled over by from fifty to a hundred thou- 



