The Hero of Panama: A Tale of the Great Canal. Brereton Frederick Sadleir
time; but we've fixed it a while since. Soon as a train's loaded it's pulled back, while an empty spoil train crosses the switches behind. That comes over another switch just behind the digger, and so right on alongside, the last truck just in position for loading, the first 'way ahead. Then, as you've seen for yourself, we move along, a few inches after every dig, filling the trucks as we go."
"And then?" asked Jim. "What happens? Where is the dirt taken? Who unloads the trucks?"
"Gee! You are a chap fer questions. Where does it go? Away up there, at the far end of the river gully, where the Lake of Gatun'll be, there's a sight more dirt than this being taken from the isthmus. Some of that's being dumped at the dam just away over our heads; some of it's being emptied outside Panama, filling up a swamp through which the canal will run. Reckon there won't be swamps when we're done. There'll be good hard ground, and houses'll be built on a spot where there's fever nowadays. We're using dirt at this end in the same way; but you was asking about the dumping?"
Jim nodded, and looked at the spoil train being hauled away. "The gangs of niggers do it, I guess," he said. "But it must take longer than the loading by a long way; at least that's what one would imagine."
"Jest about seven minutes fer the whole train," smiled Harry. "My davy on it! You ask how? Wall, listen here. I've been here a long while, and in them days when we was fixed badly fer more trucks niggers did see to clearing the spoil trains – and precious bad niggers they was, too, about that time. Yer see, they mostly comes from the West Indian Isles, and somehow the place didn't seem to suit 'em. They was too slack to work much; but guess our officials fixed the trouble. They found it was the food, and now every nigger employed on the works gets his meals regular at a Commission barracks, and sech meals as gives him strength. But we was talking of unloading. See that truck 'way in front of the trains, the one just close to the engine? Wall, that's the Lidgerwood apparatus, and guess it beats creation. There's a plough right forward of the train, and a wire rope attached to it. When the spoil train has been brought to the place where the dirt's to be dumped, niggers or Europeans let down the truck ends, so's the whole train's one long platform. The plough then gets pulled from end to end, and shoots the dirt out. Seven minutes for a whole train, siree! Lightning ain't in it!"
Whistles sounded at this minute, and promptly Harry shut down his levers and leaped from the cab.
"Guess you've done right well fer a first time," he said. "In a day you'll be able to get to at it alone. Anyway, you've earned your grub. Come along to the Commission hotel; there's meals there for all whites, and no one can grumble at them."
Wherever he went Jim found something to interest him, so much so that it was a matter of wonder to him that, though he had often been close to the isthmus, he had had no idea of the extraordinary bustle taking place there. It was so extremely surprising to find small towns sprung up where he was assured there was but a single native hut before, to discover buildings so temptingly cool and elegant in appearance, and to learn that America not only employed labour, but provided quarters, food, and recreation for her employees. And here was another example. Harry took him away from the lock cutting, where one of these days a double tier of three locks will elevate ships from the Atlantic, and introduced him to his friends in one of the well-equipped hotels erected for the accommodation of white employees. Hundreds of men were streaming up the steps as they arrived, and passing in behind the copper-gauze screens of the veranda. Jim noticed that all bore much the same appearance – for the most part clean shaven, with here and there some wearing moustaches and beards. Dressed in rough working clothes, with broad-brimmed hats, none showed signs of ill health. There was a buzz of eager conversation as they washed before the meal, and a loud clatter from many tongues as they sat at the tables. As to the food, it was plain, abundant, and well cooked.
"Costs jest fifty cents a day," explained Harry. "If you've finished we'll get to the club. We usually go along fer a smoke at dinner-time. 'Sides, there's a cable of interest now and agin, and sometimes letters."
A few minutes with Harry at the club served, in fact, to banish any doubts which Jim may have had as to remaining on the isthmus. For here was comfort and recreation at the same time, and plenty of men with whom to make friends.
"This here's Jim, him as saved Phineas Barton," Harry told his comrades, and the statement was at once sufficient to rouse interest. Hand-grips were exchanged with our hero. The news of his presence spread round the huge room, in which men were smoking or playing dominoes at little tables, and one by one they strolled up.
"You're stayin' here?" asked one, and when Jim nodded, "I'm main glad: Phineas is one of the best, and a chap who could go in for him as you did must be one of the right kind. What are you going to do?"
"Steam digging, I hope," said Jim. "But of course I'm green yet."
"You'll do. If you've got the grit to face being sucked under by a foundering ship, guess you've the gumption to run one of them diggers. Anyway, I'm glad you're staying. Play yer a game of dominoes one of these mornings."
"Say, siree, ken you sing any?" asked another, when he had shaken hands; "'cos there's concerts here sometimes o' nights, and a new hand aer wanted."
"Guess I can do a little," answered Jim, reddening; for here was a find. No one loved a sing-song more than our hero, and, to give him only his due, he had an excellent voice, badly trained, or not trained at all, to be accurate, but pleasing for all that. "When I've put a little together I'll buy a banjo," he told his interrogator. "I had one aboard the ship, but guess it's deep down below the Caribbean."
"My, that are good news! Say, boys, here's one as can strum on a banjo."
The information was hailed with delight by those present, for a banjo player was an acquisition indeed. These skilled white men engaged in the Panama undertaking were as simple as well could be, and longed for nothing more than mild recreation. After an eight-hours day of strenuous work, and supper at the Commission hotel, it delighted them to gather at one of the clubs and there listen to an impromptu concert. But the midday halt was not the time for dawdling. Already the better part of the interval was gone, and very soon the blowing of steam whistles summoned the workers back to their machines; for nearly every one of the white employees in that hotel managed some sort of machine.
"There's a heap of them engaged with the rock drillers," said Harry, "and ef you go along the line to-morrow, towards Panama, and enter the great Culebra cut, you'll see and hear 'em at work everywhere. Most every night, when the whistles has blown and the men cleared off, you'd think a battle was being fought over there, for there's dynamite and powder exploding on every side, and huge rocks jest bounding down into the trench. Gee! There is a dust up. But I war saying that most everyone who's white has a machine to mind. Of course there are overseers, and lots of officials. Then there's a small army kept going in the repair shops 'way along over Panama direction, at Gorgona. That's a place as would open the eyes of people at New York. I tell you, they turn out a power of work there. See that machine down there running along the rails? Wall, that's home-made, every stick and rod of it put together at Gorgona, and, what's more, it's the invention of one of the employees here."
He was bursting with pride, with a legitimate pride. There was no conceit about Harry, but merely a robust belief in all that his comrades did, and in particular in the brains and muscles at work on this giant undertaking. With a sweep of his hand he pointed to a heavy truck, with a crane-like attachment built on it, running along the rails on one of the higher steps of the huge cutting on which he himself was engaged.
"Jest watch it," he invited Jim. "It's a treat to see it handle rails. You see, our rails wants shifting constantly; for as the diggers clear the dirt they naturally want to get forward or outward, as the case may be, seeing that we cut our steps away to the side. Anyhow, there's need to swap the rails from place to place and lay new tracks, and that 'ere machine is a track layer, which handles the double lengths of bolted rails as if they was sticks."
Jim was fascinated, indeed, as he watched this new wonder; for wonder the machine undoubtedly was. As he looked he could realize that gangs of men and much time might be needed to shift the lines of rails, and time, he remembered, was an item of which his comrades were sparing. Bustle was the order of the day, and of every succeeding day, on the isthmus. As to the machine, it swung its arm over a long length of rail, fastened its clutches upon it, and