186 PORT CORTEZ AND ALVARADO LAGOON. Book I. 
Port Cortez and Alvarado Lagoon, taken together, con- 
stitute a most admirable situation for a maritime city. 
Nature has prepared here all the essential conditions for 
the existence even of a large commercial city, destined to 
become the centre of business for the whole eastern side of 
Central America ; and there is little doubt that, as soon as 
the railway is constructed, a considerable population will 
assemble at once at this spot. There is an almost unlimited 
space along the sea-shore as well as round the lagoon. 
The plain, which spreads towards the interior, is capable of 
an extensive and most productive cultivation. The climate 
is delightful, the heat being greatly tempered by the sea- 
breeze. The rise and fall of tide is scarcely perceptible on 
this coast, a fact which is calculated to contribute in an 
essential manner to the healthiness of the situation. There is 
no want of fresh water for the use of a large city, a fact which 
constitutes another essential condition of salubrity. Good 
building materials of every kind are to be found in any 
quantity in the immediate neighbourhood. But all these 
advantages, however important, are secondary to the excel- 
lence of the harbour, which is the only first-class seaport on 
the Atlantic coast of Central America. According to 
authorities perfectly competent in the matter, it offers all 
the necessary protection and accommodation. It is shut in 
on all sides except the west, but even in that direction the 
sea is broken by a reef which acts as a natural breakwater, 
without embarassing the entrance. But the general forma- 
tion and run of the coasts surrounding the Gulf of Hon- 
duras seem to keep off the high winds from that quarter. 
Near its northern shore it has a depth of from four to eight 
fathoms, even within a hundred yards of the land. 
On the strip of sand which separates the lagoon from the 
port, and which at the narrowest place scarcely reaches one 
