Page:The autobiography of a Pennsylvanian.djvu/257

 sentry. The Spaniards throw the offal from the cattle killed into the sea and consequently the harbor was full of sharks. The town was dirty and dilapidated. Boys and girls, ten or twelve years of age, ran around stark naked. Women were uncovered above the waist. Countrymen rode into town astride of horses, mules, asses, bulls, cows, or anything mountable that they could find. A man would load his mule with lumber, the ends of the boards dragging behind, then throw two huge bags of merchandise over the mule's back, then get on top of the bags and ride to the mountains. Every step was attended by a flock of buzzards patiently awaiting the time when the man or the mule would topple over. Everything was open. I saw one man ride a cow into a store and up to the counter to make a purchase, and the storekeeper treated it as a matter of course until she dunged on the floor and then he complained. The sky would be perfectly clear, a few minutes later it would rain in torrents, and a few minutes later still it would be as clear as before. For amusement the Spaniards drank a sweet native wine and fought game cocks. An American named Matthew Craig had the only industry in the town, a factory where he employed a number of men and women and made oil from the nut of the cocoanut palm. He had acquired a small fortune, during the Spanish-American war a few years later, he lost it all and he died in Kensington, Philadelphia, in absolute poverty. Bananas and pineapples seemed to be the only products to be sold. The United States Government sent a cultivated young South Carolinian, recently married, to Barraçoa to act as consul. It was a sad and solitary place, and the consul and his wife seemed glad enough to see an American face. When the war came along, they were overlooked and forgotten and had a most uncomfortable experience. It was an interesting and novel sight to see the steamer being loaded with bananas. They were brought in little rowboats to the side of the vessel and the negroes formed in line tossing the bunches from one to another, Rh