I IO 
RUBBER PLANTING ON THE 
that I had done a good turn for a dark-skinned, downtrodden brother. 
I was not to rest long, however, for I was awakened by the reentrance 
of the Swede, who came to inquire politely if the strangeness of my 
surroundings kept me from sleeping. I assured him they did not, and 
he departed satisfied, and I dropped off to sleep again. Suddenly, how- 
ever, I was awakened by the feeling that some one was looking me in 
the face, and opening my eyes I saw the mo so with his face about three 
inches from mine and his hand outstretched toward my breast pocket. 
I have forgotten just what I said to him, but it was most emphatic, and 
he went back and lay down, while I, wrapping my blanket tightly about 
me, dropped into another doze, but not for long. Back came the Swede, 
with more of a "jag” than ever, and sat on the side of my cot, and wished 
aloud that he had a place to lie down, so I got up. and gave him my cot, 
and went and sat in the doorway, and smoked and thought. 
At five o’clock I succeeded in getting some coffee, which greatly 
refreshed me, and at nine o’clock 1 boarded the construction train, which 
was made up of a wood burning engine, a boxcar for passengers, and 
two flat cars loaded with railroad ties, mosos, and negroes. We crept 
along at a snail’s pace over the temporary track which was not ballasted 
and which had sunk almost out of sight, sometimes, in the clayey mud, 
and sometimes it slid a foot or two to right or left, threatening to over- 
turn the car. That this latter was no idle dream was indicated by several 
boxcars which we saw that had been tipped off into ditches along the 
side. We finallv reached Santa Rosa and disembarked — that is, I did, 
and my cheerful planter friend, Adams, while all the rest went on. Santa 
Rosa station is not a large one, the only building there being a ruined hut 
of native build that had been in use when the pioneer railway camp 
was there. 
On the opposite side of the track, however, the land had been 
cleared and planted to Castilloa , a part of the Demarest estate, my first 
sight of the cultivated trees. They were growing on a well drained 
hillside, in a rich, loamy soil, with a substratum of clay, and although 
shedding their leaves, as they always do at the beginning of the dry 
season, they looked thrifty and healthy. My companion sent one of his 
men off through the forest to secure horses, and while he did that I 
drank in the beauties of that tropical scene. It was a glorious morning, 
and everything possessed the charm of novelty. The huge forest trees, 
studded with orchids and epiphytes, the marvelously dense growth where 
no clearing had been made — a growth of trees, vines, and climbers so 
thick that it would have been impossible to go, ten feet through it with- 
