THE ISTHMUS OF PANAMA. 165 



remain, consequently I improved the first opportuni- 

 ty to come down the river to Navy Bay and remain 

 until the time should come on which I was to em- 

 bark on my homeward voyage. When the time 

 w r as once set on which I was to leave the Isthmus, 

 how wearily, oh ! how wearily did those days pass 

 on which I waited the arrival of the steamer that 

 was to bear me away to the old familiar scenes of 

 other days, that a tropic sun had brightened on my 

 memory — so for, far away in the North. It seemed 

 as though swift-winged time had stayed her progress, 

 and was determined not to go on, without the slight- 

 est regard for my wishes. 



After a few of the days so anxiously to be dispos- 

 ed of were passed, I availed myself of an opportuni- 

 ty by the Gorgona to once more visit Chagres. The 

 morning was clear and beautiful, and as we moved 

 out from the harbor, the sun, which had just risen 

 from his golden-fringed hammock in the east, ~shed 

 down such a flood of light upon the little settlement 

 of Navy Bay, that, with its white houses and scat- 

 tered cocoanut trees, it looked more than ever like 

 a fairy scene just opening to the view, contrasting 

 widely with the opposite shore, skirted by the almost 

 impenetrable forest, the dark emerald green foliage 

 of which gently fluttered in the morning air, reveal- 

 ing the dew-drops as they glittered in the sunbeams. 



Being fairly under way, Capt. Chapman, who had 

 the temporary charge of the Gorgona, seated him- 

 self on the hurricane deck, at his usual look-out, and 

 commenced turning over to me the pages of his large 



