were killed a short time after the men died. As bushmasters kill a great many cattle and horses, a bounty of a colone (25 cents) per meter is paid for them on some farms. The writer saw one coral snake, about one foot long, but he saw several house snakes that resemble the coral snake and are mistaken for it by the natives. One or two species of rattlesnakes have been reported but none was encountered. Most of the residents consider all snakes poisonous. They are in great fear of the “Tomaga” but all snakes are tomagas to them. The bushmaster is called terciopello, meaning velvet. FISHES The inland streams contain few fish and none that will take a hook. They are taken by seining or shooting. Sea fishes are abundant along the coast. INSECTS One expects the tropics to be infested with insects and one of the writer's many surprises was the almost entire absence of house flies and the relative scarcity of mosquitoes. The houses in Limon do not need screens against house flies. Where decaying refuse is so abundant that vultures feast few flies are present. A resident of San Jose said that she preferred to live in Limon to be away from flies. One encounters few mosquitoes unless he gets back into the swamps. Malarial mosquitoes are common enough to infect every one who lives in the country a few months, and ordinarily within a few weeks of the time that he arrives, but they are not abundant enough to be annoying. Should one be forced to spend the night in a swampy area he would find mosquitoes both numerous and hungry. The insects that attracted the writer's attention most were large blue butterflies of great beauty, and large fireflies or fire beetles that were a source of wonder and delight. The writer has seen the mention of fireflies by no one, except Ridgway,12 who says they "emit a light so brilliant that one or two imprisoned within an inverted tumbler produce sufficient light to fairly illumine a room of moderate size." The natives call the fireflies carbuncles. The fireflies are beetles about three-fourths of an inch in length that have two luminous spots on the antero-dorso thorax. The light emitted is almost white (Ridgway says yellow, green, and occasionally ruby red) and is constant. Seen at a short distance the pair of lights resembles lights of an automobile at a distance of a mile. The light from one beetle is strong enough to illuminate an area two inches square so that common print may be read. The beetles have also a single colored light that flashes intermittently. On some occasions the beetles appear in thousands and seem to change darkness to light near the ground where they fly. The writer found insect pests much less troublesome in Costa Rico than in many places where he has camped in the United States. HUNTING Nearly all hunting is done at night. The hunter uses a brilliant carbide lamp on his cap and shoots at the eyes of the animal as they reflect the light. The inexperienced hunter can tell nothing about the size or kind of animal from the flash of the eyes. The eyes of a small owl may lead him to think that the animal is a 12 Ridgway, Robert, Some observations on the natural history of Costa Rica: Ann. Rept. Smithsonian Inst., pp. 320-321, 1921. jaguar or a tapir. Hunting is forbidden on most farms, as the hunter is likely to shoot mules or cattle. If the native hunter encounters a snake on his way to the hunting ground he turns back, as that means bad luck. PLANT LIFE The real glory of the tropics is not the animal life but the plant life. A person from temperate regions finds it difficult to visualize tropical vegetation. The writer's first serious question as he went from Limon to San Jose by train was, "Will there be any place to pitch a tent?" Our parties went around a field of grass rather than through. The grass was higher than our heads and so close together that it seemed impossible to go through. A person can go through the forests with only a small amount of cutting but outside of the forests the lower vegetation grows so close together that he must cut his way. Figure 2 pictures the density of vegetation in a place in the forest where there are few large trees and figure 7 shows the dense jungle. Darwin's description of forests of Bahia, Brazil, characterizes tropical forests in general: When quietly walking along the shady pathways and admiring each successive view I wished to find language to express my ideas. Epithet after epithet was found too weak to convey to those who have not visited the intertropical regions the sensation of delight which the mind experiences. I have said that the plants in a hothouse fail to communicate a just idea of the vegetation, yet I must recur to it. The land is one great wild, untidy, luxuriant hothouse, made by nature for herself, but taken possession of by man, who has studded it with gay houses and formal gardens. How great would be the desire of every admirer of nature to behold, if such were possible, the scenery of another planet; yet to every person in Europe it may be truly said that, at the distance of only a few degrees from his native soil, the glories of another world are open to him. In my last walk I stopped again and again to gaze on these beauties, and endeavored to fix in my mind forever an impression which at the time I knew sooner or later must fail. The form of the orange tree, the coconut, the palm, the mango, the tree fern, the banana will remain clear and separate; but the thousand beauties which unite these into one perfect scene must fade away; yet they will leave, like a tale heard in childhood, a picture full of indistinct, but most beautiful figures.13 Darwin's appreciation was beyond that of most naturalists, and his description may be applied appropriately to Costa Rican forests. However, in most of eastern Costa Rica man has not taken possession. GEOGRAPHIC INTERPRETATION The preceding notes on geographic factors are far from exhaustive but lead up to certain geographic interpretations. Costa Rica presents some striking examples of relationships of man to his physical environment. In the first place marked differences in topography and climate within short distances are natural bases for striking geographic differences. The first of these apparent to the casual observer is the difference in race between the lowland dwellers and the upland dwellers. In Siquirres, at the base of the mountains where the Reventazon River emerges, most of the inhabitants are black, and at Turrialba, 25 miles away and nearly 2,000 feet 13 Darwin, Chas., Voyage of H. M. S. Beagle. higher, there are very few blacks. Along the railroad between the two towns are four or five small villages and the entire population does not exceed 1,000. Most of the inhabitants of these intervening villages are black but there is a gradual change so that in the village nearest Turrialba more than half are white. All of the inhabitants between the two places live in the valley of the Reventazon River. In the alluvial lands seaward from Siquirres more than 90 per cent of the inhabitants are black, whereas in the highlands west of Turrialba more than 95 per cent are white. This is a condition that promises to be permanent, though probably not in the present ratios. The condition was brought about artificially. The lowlands were taken up to become banana plantations, and Jamaican negroes were brought in to do the work of growing and marketing the fruit. The lowlands had been inhabited by a few Indians, and a few whites in the small coast towns, before banana growing began. The outlet for San Jose and the interior region had been to the west through the more healthful country. The eastern lowlands had been considered one of the worst regions in the world for malaria and yellow fever and the Spaniards of the interior are still loath to go to the eastern lowlands. The railroad from Limon to Siquirres is said to have cost a man for each tie when it was built. The residents of the high interior had become confirmed coffee growers before the lowlands began to be considered as a fit place for white men to live, and few of the highlanders have become banana growers. The technique of farming in the interior is strikingly different from that of the lowlands and none but the most progressive of the interior residents would dare go into business in the lowlands. Some of the hardier and more venturesome have become farm managers or professional men in the lowlands, but common laborers from the interior are exceedingly rare. On the other hand the Jamaican negroes do not understand the types of agriculture carried on in the interior and on that account do not become efficient laborers there. They are accustomed to a hot climate and the climate of the highlands does not attract them. If they should take up residence in the interior they would not be welcome and would find it difficult to get impartial verdicts in the courts. There is little evidence of color line among the laborers in the lowlands, but the negroes are treated with scant courtesy by the natives who are just above the common laborers and by the whites from the United States and other countries. The factor of importance in determining the use of the lands in the lowland region is the United Fruit Company. Under present conditions, with railroad connections to various places, other crops than bananas may be cultivated with profit, but without the railroad many districts could not be kept up, and it is doubtful if any other crop than bananas could keep up a railroad. Mass production is required to keep transportation ways open. The laws of Costa Rica allow a squatter to take up land that is not in use and use it as long as the owner does not require it. If the owner wishes to take it back he must make use of it and must pay the squatter for improvements that he may have put on it, but notwithstanding the squatter's privilege a great deal of valuable land within two miles of the railroad is left uncropped. As soon as a railroad line is abandoned agriculture ceases along the line and the inhabitants move elsewhere. The line northwest from Guacimo may be taken as an example. Trains ceased to run over it about 1915 and in 1920 few or no people lived along the line. The old line to San Jose used to run from Guapiles westward but the line was abandoned about 1910 and in 1920 even the site of the track was lost for long distances and no people were living along it. The old track was used for a trail over which to drive cattle for about eight miles west of Guacimo, but from there on its site was indistinguishable from the original forest. Almost as striking as the line between whites and blacks is the line between. upland crops and lowland. Turrialba, a little over 2,000 feet in elevation, is on the boundary line. Bananas, sugar cane, and coffee thrive at this elevation but higher almost no bananas are grown for market and sugar cane and coffee take their place. Coffee and sugar land are cultivated and banana land is not, so that the boundary between bananas and coffee also marks the line between cultivation and merely keeping the vegetation cleared out. The change in climate is much less sharp than in inhabitants and crops. The change in altitude is fairly rapid; the change in wild plant life is quite gradual; and the change in wild animal life not as marked as in the plants. Man, influenced by artificial factors, is more sharply different in race and occupation than is usual under such differences in environmental conditions. GEOLOGY OF MIDDLE-EASTERN COSTA RICA DIFFICULTIES IN MAKING INVESTIGATIONS Geological work in middle-eastern Costa Rica is even more difficult than geographical, owing to the scarcity of exposures and to the deep covering of vegetation. The lack of maps with any areal geology listed on them forces one to begin with no guide. Our party selected a wrong area in the beginning and worked for more than a month along the Guapiles branch of the railroad before finding any sedimentary rocks older than Recent. Our second selection was better, for we worked along the Reventazon Valley, where the best section of sedimentary rocks in Costa Rica is exposed (see figures 14, 15, and 16). Exposures were formed by the river and by the excavations along the Costa Rica Railway which traverses the valley for about 50 miles, but even along the Reventazon and the railroad good exposures are rare. Vegetation grows so rapidly and weathering defaces with such speed that an outcrop must be continually worked to keep clear exposures. Outside the Reventazon Valley the work was much more difficult. The alluvial fans east of the mountains cover all of the older rocks and the valleys leading back from the fans are difficult to work. Camps were usually established near the place where a stream debouched on the plain. Horses could be taken that far back without great difficulty and baggage brought to the camp. From camp the best way to work was by walking up the stream courses and looking for exposures. In order to avoid the necessity of cutting the way through jungle and forest one waded the stream. One day one of the carriers was instructed to punch a tally register every time the stream was waded and at night the register showed 82, but the carrier said that he had forgotten to punch the thing sometimes. Going was unobstructed on the gravel bars on the inside of meanders and the stream had to be waded where the meanders struck the side of the valley. Even along such streams the outcrops were usually poor and far apart. |