Page:Panama-past-present-Bishop.djvu/216

196 furniture, silverware, bed linen, coal for the kitchen range, all are provided by the United States Government, to say nothing of free electric light, and a free government telephone. The wide veranda is screened with copper netting (iron would rust too quickly) to keep out the few mosquitos that have escaped Colonel Gorgas. The garden is planted with flowers provided by the quartermaster's department, and a cement walk leads to the macadamized and electric-lighted street that eight years ago was covered with primeval jungle.

They dine well at the Smiths', though virtually every mouthful of their food has to be brought by sea from New York or New Orleans, in ships fitted with cold-storage. From the great storehouse at Mount Hope, every morning a long train of refrigerator-cars crosses the Isthmus, and brings fresh supplies to the hotels and local commissaries in all the camps and towns. A bachelor, quartered in a hotel, comes down from his comfortably furnished room that costs him nothing, to a meal that costs him thirty cents, and which he would be lucky to get in New York for less than a dollar. Mrs. Smith buys her meat and groceries at the commissary store at wholesale prices. But in neither case is anything sold for money. Everything is paid for with checks torn out of booklets issued to employees and charged against their salaries, and with these you can buy anything from a pair of khaki trousers to an ice-cream soda. For Uncle Sam began by supplying frontier necessities, and ended by providing every luxury that you would expect to find in a thriving community of ten thousand Americans.