flour, a little lard and a few cases of shoes. And yet whilst the ports of Barranquilla and Carthagena are fully three weeks' sail from most of the European markets, they are less than five days' sail from some of our Atlantic and Gulf coast cities. But there is no direct line of steamers between these Colombian ports and our own; the only available communication being by "tramp" steamers or by small chartered schooners. A cargo is usually reshipped two or three times before reaching its destination, and at a total cost of nearly double the freight rates to the European markets. And the strangest feature of all is, the apparent indifference of our national Congress to the obviously necessary means for increasing this trade; for hitherto every time a proposition has been made to put our ocean carrying trade in a condition to successfully compete with that of England and other European countries, it has been either quietly pigeon-holed in the Committee room or else thoughtlessly voted down in the Committee of the Whole. The other Caribbean ports on the coast of Colombia are Rio Hache, Santa Marta, and San José de Cúcuta. The two first named are now, and have been for some time, practically "dead towns," in so far at least as exterior commerce is concerned. In the early colonial days, Santa Marta was a place of considerable importance; and some years ago an effort was made to revive it by connecting it by railroad with the Magdalena river, in the hope of diverting a portion of the interior trade from Barranquilla and Carthagena. But the enterprise failed for want of capital, and was never revived. Rio Hache has a fine harbor, but little or no exterior trade. Cúcuta has a fertile and productive region at the back of it, accessible for some distance by water navigation. But in 1876, the city was nearly destroyed by an earthquake, from the effects of which it has never entirely recovered. It is, however, a place of considerable business importance, and seems likely to become, some day in the future, one of the principal commercial marts of the Republic. T CHAPTER IV THE VALLEY OF THE MAGDALENA \HE river Magdalena and its numerous tribu- tends from the coast, where it is over 100 miles wide, due southward to an apex in the heart of the central range of the Andes. The drainage basin branches off at various points, after the first 150 miles from the coast, into a number of smaller valleys and coves, the largest of which is the Cauca, between the western and central cordilleras. The coast region of the valley is subject to periodical overflows, and no serious attempt has ever been made to reclaim it for agricultural purposes. This, however, might be easily accomplished, and doubtless will be some day when agricultural lands become more valuable, by a system of dykes similar to those on the lower Mississippi. It is certainly a more promising region for such an enterprise than was the lower Schelde, in the Netherlands, before the Dutch successfully reclaimed it from the floods many centuries ago; or than were the Demerara and Essequibo deltas in Guayana, which the same pertinacious people brought under successful cultivation in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. As it is, the lower portion of the Magdalena valley is alternated by half-submerged swamp and low grassy plain, and is seldom utilized for anything more than grazing purposes. Higher up, where the river banks are firmer and better defined, the soil is still of aluminum formation of immense depth and inexhaustible fertility; but for the most part it is yet very much as nature made it. A little farther up, it does not so much present the appearance of a "new country," as it does of a country that has been allowed to relapse into the bush and forest. And this merely accords with the facts of its history. For quite early in Spanish colonial times, when negro slavery was in vogue, this was a cultivated and productive region. It is now inhabited, where it is inhabited at all, by the negro and his mixed descendants, who, for the most part, live an aimless, idle, and shiftless life. Neither this middle region nor that of the coast is necessarily unhealthful, though both have a bad reputation abroad. There is, of course, an abundance of malaria at certain seasons; but this would soon disappear under proper drainage and cultivation. What the country needs, therefore, is an industrious and enterprising population. Even as it is, its climate is not much worse than that in some portions of Mississippi and Louisiana; and with proper attention to the laws of health, the foreigner need not be alarmed about fever, which is generally of a mild type and yields readily to medical treatment. But here, as elsewhere in the tropics, one must live with constant care. There must be an adaptation to environment. There must be temperance in all things, regularity of habit, careful avoidance of exposure to sun and rain, and to night dews and draughts. If these conditions are strictly observed, the foreign tourist or sojourner need have no apprehensions about his health. Some two hundred miles up from the coast, the valley branches off into that of the Cauca, - one of the most picturesque and beautiful regions on the continent. The upper part of this valley, near the town of Cali, has an elevation of some three thousand feet above sealevel, and the climate is therefore delightful. The temperature is rarely above 75° or below 65° the year round. The soil is singularly productive and well adapted to both sugar and cotton, though very little cotton is now raised there; and that little is generally of a very inferior quality, owing to want of proper cultivation. The foothills on either side are well adapted to wheat and maize, and indeed to most of the cereals of the north temperate zone. The river Cauca is a beautiful stream, navigable at all seasons by small steamers. In the old colonial days, this little valley was an Arcadia of wealth and luxury; possibly the most desirable spot for country residence in New Granada. It is now, for the most part, practically abandoned to the descendants of former negro slaves, and is, therefore, anything but a desirable place of residence for white families. But to return to the Magdalena. As we ascend the river beyond the mouth of the Cauca, we observe that the banks are firmer and better defined; there are fewer swamps and bayous, and a greater number and a better class of houses. This was once a region of vast estates, now fallen into partial or complete decadence. Indeed, one somehow gets the impression that the country is gradually but surely relapsing into its primitive state. Occasionally you see the rudiments of an old plantation, the relic of a former civilization; and sometimes the pleasing evidences of a newer and better condition of society. But for the most part the houses are mere sheds with straw roofs, or rude mud huts with dirt floors, inhabited by negroes and their mixed descendants. Occasionally one sees what appears to be a new town or settlement, with neat tiled roof houses. These |