had not the Government, with unlimited men and money, behind them, and the discoveries in sanitary science of which the French were ignorant, we, too, would have failed. They tell you, and show you how, the French worked on the Canal right across the Isthmus, and we are carrying out the great project they were unable to complete. And we have won the admiration of the world.

The sanitary problem is solved, but they tell you under the French, fever carried off a man for every tie that was laid on the Panama Railroad. This is a legend, but a true story is, that the French cared so little for their lives that with every shipload of machinery came boxes of champagne, and those who received them asked their friends to dinner—finished the bottles—and were buried in the empty box in the morning. Now there is no fever in the Canal Zone, but there is plenty of drink in and outside of it, but, I am told, "indulged in with wonderful moderation." I certainly never saw an American under the influence of it.

In the evening a ride of two hours took me over the thirty miles to Panama—one of the last passengers over the old line of the Panama Railway, now buried under the waters of the growing lake. From the railroad I saw for the first time the primeval forest, the tropical jungle, which I had never believed in, never believed that it could not be penetrated save with an axe or a machete; but it is so, and the richness of it, the riot of it, the variety of it, is incredible and endless. The train puffed along, in that time-taking fashion of the tropics I should soon be familiar with, passing points of view I made notes of, for first impressions are for me always the best, and one trip like this gives me more ideas than days of personal pointing out. Finally Panama was reached in the dark; all I saw was a great hill lit up with rows of lights, one above the other, in the night.

The day had not been hot, the sky was not blue or black—it was white, and filled with white clouds, though they were dark against it. There was no glare—and I had forgotten my sketching umbrella; but I never needed it. So far as I know, there is always a breeze—it is never really hot in the day—and as soon as the sun sets the trade wind rises—if it has not been blowing all day—and I could always sleep at night. It is all so unlike other hot countries—but, then, Panama is unlike other places: the sun rises and sets in the Pacific, and the city of Panama, though on the Pacific, is east of Colon, on the Atlantic.

There was not a smell, or a mosquito, or a fly on Ancon Hill, but over it all was the odor of petroleum, with which the streams and marshes of the whole zone are sprayed almost daily; and this has made the Canal and saved the workers.

Next morning I went to the Administration Building and presented my letters, though I did not know if I should be allowed to draw. But it seemed that everything had been arranged for me by the Commission, who, it also seemed, had been doing nothing for weeks but waiting my coming. I was clothed, fed, taken about in motor cars and steam launches, given passes on the railroad, and finally turned loose to go where I wanted and draw what I liked—and if anything happened or did not happen I was just to telephone to headquarters.

The following day, donning my khaki, which I wore only once, and pocketing my pass and some oranges, I started for the locks at Pedro Miguel—pronounced, in American, Peter Megil, just as Miraflores is called Millflowers. We were all down, had breakfast, and off in the train—a jim-crow one—before the sun was up, and at Pedro Miguel station I found myself one of a horde of niggers, Greeks, Hindoos, Slovaks, Spaniards, Americans and engineers, bound for the lock, half a mile away. Here I went down to the bottom to get a drawing of the great walls that lead up to the great gates, now nearly finished. I had come at exactly