" This is forty-nine
miles in length from Panama to Colon, and is single track only, as
freight traffic especially is expected, very naturally, to be
lighter after the canal is opened. Already that portion from the
Chagres to the Atlantic had been put in use--on February
fifteenth, to be exact; and the time was not far off when the
section within our district--from Gamboa to Pedro Miguel--would
also be in operation.
That portion runs through the wilderness a mile or more back from
the canal, through jungled hills so dense with vegetation one
could only make one's way through it with the ubiquitous machete
of the native jungle-dweller, except where tiny trails appear that
lead to squatters' thatched huts thrown together of tin, dynamite
and dry-goods boxes and jungle reeds in little scattered patches
of clearing. Some of these hills have been cut half away for the
new line--great generous "cuts," for to the giant 90-ton steam-
shovels a few hundred cubic yards of earth more or less is of
slight importance. All else is virtually impenetrable jungle.
Travelers by rail across the Isthmus, as no doubt many ships'
passengers will be in the years to come while their steamer is
being slowly raised and lowered to and from the eighty-five-foot
lake, will see little of the canal,--a glimpse of the Bas Obispo
"cut" at Gamboa and little else from the time they leave Gatun
till they return to the present line at Pedro Miguel station.
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