Page:California Inter Pocula.djvu/214



erns, where  passengers  feed,  and  swing  their  hammocks for the  night. During the  day  one  may  bathe  here in safety,  as  it  is  said  the  aUigators  frequent  this  por- tion of the  lake  only  during  the  night. Very kind  of the  allig-ators.

Across the  narrow  strip  of  land,  the  only  bar  to  un- interrupted water communication  between  the  two  i|i oceans, travellers  proceed  on  mules  and  donkeys,  '" women  riding  some  side-ways  and  some  astride.  The ride  is  delightful.  Half  the  way  the  road  is  level and  straight,  covered  by  a  dark  forest  so  dense  in places  that  there  seems  scarcely  standing  room  for the  trees ;  and  the  interstices  are  so  filled  with  matted branches,  leaves,  coppice,  parasites,  and  other  vines, as  in  places  to  prevent  the  sun's  rays  from  ever  touch- ing the  ground.  The  remainder  of  the  road  winds through  rolling  hills,  then  scales  a  lofty  mountain,  and descends  to  the  sea.  Thirty  board  houses,  shingled and  painted,  stretched  along  the  shore  of  a  small  bay^ constitutes  the  town  of  San  Juan  del  Sur,  which seems  to  be  a  cross  between  Chagres  and  Aspinwall. As  at  Panamd.,  the  shelving  beach  does  not  permit the small  boats  to  approach  nearer  than  about  twen- ty-five yards from  the  water's  edge,  and  passengers must be  carried  aboard  on  the  backs  of  the  boatmen. Here steamers  anchor  about  one  hundred  and  fifty yards from  land.

A hundred  miles  north  we  pass  Realejo,  one  of  the coal stations  of  the  Nicaraguan  line. The harbor  is a  good  one,  being  an  indentation  of  the  shore  line with an  island  at  the  entrance. Three miles  from  the town, which  consists  of  one-story  tiled  adobe  houses, and contains  a  squalid  population  of  about  four  hun- dred persons, a  dock  has  been  built,  to  which  ocean vessels may  be  made  fast.

Thus the  Central  American  coast  is  passed;  and thus racing  with  the  sun,  down  toward  the  equator, and up  toward  the  pole,  round  by  the  southern  cross.