18 
THE PAN AMERICAN UNION. 
tram facilities. Pack and tram animals are employed on some 
farms, while on others small locomotives are used on the trams 
instead of animals on account of the long heavy hauls. 
TRANSPORTING THE FRUIT TO THE LOADING PORT. 
Upon arrival at the railroad two methods are employed in load¬ 
ing the fruit on railway cars, depending on the quantity of fruit 
assembled at one point, the location, and the track facilities. Where 
possible, the trams are run to sidings or spurs of the main line, and 
the fruit is passed from the tramcars to the waiting railway cars as 
fast as it comes out from the farm. In other cases the bunches are 
placed alongside the track on turf or wooden platforms and covered 
with leaves, to be loaded subsequently on fruit trains by loading 
gangs who travel with them. 
Definite loading orders are received in advance of the arrival of 
the steamship. In due course cutting orders are transmitted to the 
district headquarters, based on the carrying capacity of the ship, and 
the estimated quantity of fruit of the required grade and quality 
ready for cutting in each district. District headquarters distributes 
orders for the required amount among the farms and each farm over¬ 
seer in turn makes his allotment to the individual sections and to the 
cutters, and sees that everything is in order to start the cutting at 
daylight the following day. Rigid inspection is enforced by the farm 
overseer, foremen, selectors, and traveling inspectors, from the time 
the cutting commences until the fruit is loaded on railway cars. 
Special trains of empty banana cars are started out from the termi¬ 
nals as soon as cutting is well under way, each with its inspector and 
loading gang. These trains travel over the banana lines, receiving 
the fruit which has been placed alongside the track, picking up the 
cars loaded at sidings and assembling them at central points. As fast 
as sufficient loads are assembled they are forwarded to the port in 
trainloads of from twenty to forty cars. 
LOADING THE BANANA CARGO. 
The loading of the steamer begins immediately upon the arrival of 
the first fruit train at the port. The cutting orders and the schedule 
of the fruit trains are so arranged that a continuous flow of fruit to the 
loading port is insured. The loading of the steamship continues day 
and night without interruption until completed, cargoes of 75,000 
bunches being loaded in twelve to fifteen hours. 
At all the principal banana-loading ports, the cars of fruit are 
switched to the dock and the bananas carried to conveyors or loading 
machines, which take the bunches into the holds of the steamship. 
The fruit on its way from the cars to these loading machines is 
