California, made ready to ascend to Panama.

The first stage of our journey was by railway to Gatun, about twelve
miles distant. For the greater portion of that distance the lines ran
on piles, over as unhealthy and wretched a country as the eye could
well grow weary of; but, at last, the country improved, and you caught
glimpses of distant hills and English-like scenery. Every mile of that
fatal railway cost the world thousands of lives. I was assured that
its site was marked thickly by graves, and that so great was the
mortality among the labourers that three times the survivors struck in
a body, and their places had to be supplied by fresh victims from
America, tempted by unheard-of rates of wages. It is a gigantic
undertaking, and shows what the energy and enterprise of man can
accomplish. Everything requisite for its construction, even the
timber, had to be prepared in, and brought from, America.

The railway then ran no further than Gatun, and here we were to take
water and ascend the River Chagres to Gorgona, the next stage on the
way to Cruces, where my brother was. The cars landed us at the bottom
of a somewhat steep cutting through a reddish clay, and deposited me
and my suite, consisting of a black servant, named "Mac," and a little
girl, in safety in the midst of my many packages, not altogether
satisfied with my prospects; for the rain was falling heavily and
steadily, and the Gatun porters were possessing themselves of my
luggage with that same avidity which distinguishes their brethren on
the pier of Calais or the quays of Pera. There are two species of
individuals whom I have found alike wherever my travels have carried
me--the reader can guess their professions--porters and lawyers.

It was as much as I could do to gather my packages together, sit in
the midst with a determined look to awe the hungry crowd around me,
and send "Mac" up the steep slippery bank to report progress. After a
little while he returned to say that the river-side was not far off,
where boats could be hired for the upward journey. The word given, the
porters threw themselves upon my packages; a pitched battle ensued,
out of which issued the strongest Spanish Indians, with their hardly
earned prizes, and we commenced the ascent of the clayey bank. Now,
although the surveyors of the Darien highways had considerately cut
steps up the steep incline, they had become worse than useless, so I
floundered about terribly, more than once l