Читать книгу The Hero of Panama: A Tale of the Great Canal - Brereton Frederick Sadleir - Страница 4

Phineas B. Barton was in his own way an extremely pleasant and jolly man, but he required a great deal of knowing. He was moderately tall, clean shaven, as is the typical American of to-day, fairly good-looking, and about forty years of age. When he liked he could be voluble enough, but as a general rule his conversation was chiefly noteworthy by its absence; for Phineas was undoubtedly prone to silence and taciturnity.

"It's like this," he explained to Jim; "I'm boss at the present time of the foreign labour we employ on the Panama Canal works, and guess I have to talk most all the day when I'm at work. So a fellow gets used to keeping his mouth shut at other times, so as to rest his jaw. Glad you're coming out to my quarters."

He had thanked Jim quietly and with apparently little feeling for his action in plunging into the sea to save him when the steamer foundered, and after that had said not a word. But that did not imply that Phineas was ungrateful. It was not in his nature to employ many words; he had decided to show his gratitude in other ways. It was for that reason, no doubt, that he had invited our hero to his house. And, now that the whole party had disembarked, he proceeded to lead the way.

"Got any traps?" he asked.

"Not a stick," Jim answered. "We're here as we stand up."

"Then transport isn't a difficulty. It's nine miles to my quarters, and the railway will take us there quick. There's cars going one way or the other most always; come along to the terminus."

Jim and his comrades had no idea of the work which was going on on this narrow isthmus of Panama, therefore the reader may imagine that he was intensely surprised, once he and his friends had left the one-storied dwellings of Colon, to find human beings seething everywhere. Bands of labourers of every colour were working along the route where the canal would open into the Caribbean, while heavy smoke and the rattle of machinery came from another spot farther on.

"Where we're getting to work to cut our locks," explained Phineas, nursing his broken arm. "It's there that I broke this arm of mine two weeks ago. I was fool enough to get in the way of a dirt train, and of course, not having eyes itself, it shunted me off the track with a bang. That's why I was on my way back to the States; but guess that holiday'll have to wait. I'm keen to get back to work."

From the open car in which the party was accommodated he pointed out the various features of the isthmus, and in particular the works of the canal. And gradually Jim gathered the fact that this undertaking upon which his country had set its heart was gigantic, to say the least of it.

"No one knows what we're doing save those who've been here," said Phineas, a note of pride in his voice. "Back home there's folks ready enough to criticize and shout that things aren't being done right; but they ought to come right out here before opening their mouths. You've got an idea of the canal, of course?"

Jim reddened. To be truthful, his own struggle to make a way in this world had occupied most of his attention. He was naturally interested in all that concerned his own country, but even though so near to the isthmus he had never been farther than Colon when the ship put into port, and whilst there had merely observed rather a large number of policemen, both white and black. Of the huge army of workmen engaged in the canal enterprise he had not caught a glimpse.

"It's an eye-opener, this," he admitted. "I had no idea there were so many men, or so much machinery, though if I had thought for a little I could have guessed that there must be a bustle. As to the scheme of the canal, I haven't more than the vaguest idea."

"And I can't give you much information here. We'll want to get aboard an inspection car and run right through. That'll be a job for to-morrow. We'll have the inspector's car, and run along to the other side. But, see here, this canal's the biggest thing in canals that's ever been thought of. The Suez Canal don't hold a candle to it. The Kiel Canal is an infant when compared with what this will be when it's finished. There's fifty miles, or thereabouts, of solid dirt between Colon and Panama, and America has decided to get to at that dirt and cut a way clear through it, a way not only big enough to take ships of to-day, but to take ships of to-morrow, ships that'll make the world open its eyes and exclaim."

The very mention of the work made Jim gasp. He asked for particulars promptly. "It'll take a heap of time, I expect," he said. "Reckon a canal a mile long and fifty feet wide by thirty deep isn't dug in a day."

"Nor hardly in a year. But we're not digging all the way," explained Phineas. "America has selected what is known as the high-level canal; that is, she's not just digging a track clear through from Atlantic to Pacific, a tide-level canal as you might call it, for there are difficulties against such a scheme. To begin with, there's a tide to be reckoned with at Panama, while this Atlantic end has none; which means your water level at the Pacific side is different from that at the Atlantic. Then there's river water to be contended with. This isthmus gets a full share of rain, particularly near the Atlantic, and the rivers get packed with water in a matter of a few hours. Well, you've got to do something, or that flood will swamp your canal, wash away your works, and do other damage."

"Then the high level has fewer difficulties?" asked Jim.

"You may say so, though the job is big enough in all conscience. Shortly put, it's this. We begin the canal by dredging in Limon Bay, right here beside Colon, and cut our dirt away, in all for a matter of just over seven miles. Then we build three tiers of double locks, which will take any vessel, and which will float them up in steps to the 85-foot level. Once up there the ship steams into a huge lake where there's dry land to-day. We get that lake by damming the Chagres River right there before us, at Gatun, throwing the water back into a long natural hollow, and when the work is finished we shall have a body of water there four-fifths the size of Lake Geneva. Anyway, it'll allow a steamer to get along under her own power till she arrives at the other end of the lake at Obispo. Even then she uses her own power, though she has to slow down. She enters what we call the Culebra cut, just nine miles long, where we are burrowing our way through the hills. That's one of the biggest of our jobs. You'll be interested when you see it. We've a small army of men at work, and rock drills and steam shovels are going all day, while dirt trains travel to and fro more often than electrics in the New York subway. Then comes a lock at Pedro Miguel, and another at Milaflores, which let our ships down to Pacific level. Way down at that end we've a lot of dredging to do to clear the below-sea track of the canal."

Indeed it was no wonder that Phineas found it a matter of impossibility to describe the gigantic, herculean task which America has undertaken. Moreover, it may be forgiven our hero if he failed, in such a short space of time, fully to comprehend what was being done. A canal was being fashioned, that he knew well enough, and now Phineas had given him a rough idea of its direction, and of the methods to be employed to obtain a waterway from one ocean to the other. The rest had necessarily to be left to the imagination, and to the moment when clear plans of the works could be studied.

"But you know a bit about it, and that's good for the present," said Phineas. "I'm not going to give you a bad headache right off by throwing more particulars at you, though I fancy you'd be interested to know just one or two items."

"And those?" asked Jim, by no means bored with the description. In fact, like any healthy youngster, he was intensely interested in this canal, and was burning with impatience to see all the machinery employed, the methods used by the engineers and their staff to bring about the various works. "I'd give something to see the lake," he admitted. "Almost as big as that of Geneva? Gee! That's a whopper."

"You may say so," agreed Phineas, again a tinge of pride in his voice. "There'll be somewhere about 160 square miles of water in that lake, and a fleet will be able to lie to in it. Those locks at Gatun, which are to be double – one for steamers going up, and the other for ships coming down – will each give a usable length of 1100 feet, which is a good 300 feet longer than any ship yet afloat. They'll be 110 feet wide, and have a minimum depth of 41 feet. Put that all together, and remember that when the gates of the locks are shut, and water allowed to come down, the biggest battleship yet heard of will be lifted solid just about 32 feet, and then warped on into another lock as like the last as two peas. In less than an hour we'll raise a ship up to our high-level canal from the Atlantic, and we'll do it, sir, as easy as you lift rowing boats down on the rivers."

Phineas went hot at the thought of the undertaking, and, looking at him, Jim could see that the man was filled with a huge pride, with a tremendous fixity of purpose, the courage and tenacity to push on with a labour which his country had begun, and which the honour of the nation demanded should be brought to a satisfactory conclusion. And in a little while Jim understood that there was not a white employee engaged on the isthmus who did not dream of the day when the canal would be opened, when their own countrymen, some of whom at this moment were ready to discount their labours, would be amongst the keenest admirers of the finished task.

"But guess it's time we thought of the house," said Phineas, dragging his attention away from the works before him. "I've a shanty way up the hill there, with a housekeeper to look to it for me. She'll take care of Miss Sadie."

They descended from the car and slowly trudged up the hill. Then Phineas gave them a welcome to his home.

"Looks cool and nice; don't it?" he remarked, as they ascended a flight of steps leading on to a wide veranda. "I can see you looking at my windows, young man. Well, we don't have any out here. A chap gets to live without them easily enough. There's just copper gauze right round the veranda, and the same over the window openings. Most days it's so hot one doesn't think of their absence. And if a cold spell comes, one can easily put on something warmer. Now we'll get along in and feed. Ha, Mrs. Jones, that's you again! You didn't think to see me back so soon, till I telephoned from Colon. This is Miss Sadie, and this is Jim, the young man who rescued me. We're just hungry, so we'll come right in if things are ready, and Tom here, and Sam, and Ching can get round to the kitchen. You'll find 'em useful boys."

The widow who looked to Phineas's affairs was a pleasant woman, and gave our hero and his sister a real welcome. As to the negroes, though she looked at them askance at first, she rapidly found them a blessing. For Tom installed himself as butler unasked, while Sam carried dishes to and fro. Ching settled down to the work of washing up the things as if he had been brought to the isthmus for that very purpose.

"All of which just makes things slide along as if they were oiled," said Phineas with a glad smile, as he lolled on his veranda afterwards.

"See here, Jim, them boys of yours can go along helping Mrs. Jones while you're here; but of course, if they were at work on the canal, they would have their own quarters along with the other coloured men. Pity you're not staying. Where do you go after New York?"

It was a leading question, and Jim explained his position frankly.

"I don't complain," he said, "but we certainly have had our share of ill fortune. First Father lost his money, then his life. Afterwards my brother went off his head with fever, and was lost in the forest way down there below Colon. I've got to find work other than diving."

"You've done a bit of that, then?" asked Phineas.

Jim nodded. "A lot," he said. "But I'm not really skilled."

"You've handled tools and machinery?"

"Many a time; Father made me learn from the very beginning."

"See here!" cried Phineas suddenly; "you're after a job, and look to earn dollars. Well, there are dollars to earn here for a good man. Try a spell on the canal works. We've vacancies almost all the while, for men get tired of the job, while others fall sick. Then there's every sort of work, to suit the knowledge of everyone. Of course white men have the pick. They're skilled men, and naturally enough they get posts of responsibility. Some drive steam navvies, others rock drills, while some are powder men, and place the charges which we fire every night after five. At the locks there's pile driving and concrete laying, with white men to run the engines or supervise. As to diving – well, there may be some of that, but it's the land we're chiefly engaged with."

The temptation to accept the proposal right off was strong, and Jim found it difficult to keep from answering. Then he suddenly asked a question.

"There's my sister," he said. "I suppose Tom and the others could easily get work, and so stay here; but this place hasn't the best of reputations for health. I must look after her."

"And she'll be as well looked after here as anywhere," said Phineas eagerly. "We're high up out of the valley, the house has lately been built, while that yarn about the health of the isthmus is old history. We've changed all that. An American army surgeon, with others to help him, discovered that yellow fever was given by a particular form of mosquito. Well, he set to work to find where that mosquito lived and bred. Then he formed a sanitary corps, drainage was looked to, scrub cut down, windows barred by copper gauze. And we've fixed that mosquito. Yellow fever is now unheard of on the isthmus, while there's very little malarial fever. The canal zone, particularly in these high parts, is as healthy as New York. Come now."

"I agree to stop if she cares to do so," cried Jim suddenly, for there was an eagerness about the man before him which captivated him. It was clear, in fact, that Phineas was anxious that Jim should stay; and since he promised work, and stated that no harm could come to Sadie from residence there, why, if matters could be arranged, Jim made up his mind he would stay. Perhaps here he would find the means to cut the first steps in that flight which was to lead to a revival of his fortunes.

"Then here's a plan," said Phineas. "I'm real glad you'll stay on here, for I want a companion. I lost my wife five years ago, and by rights should be living way over there in one of the hotels the American Government has built for its employees. But I chose to have a house alone, and at times it's lonesome. You'll stay along with me, and Sadie'll have Mrs. Jones to look after her. There's a Government school a quarter of a mile away, with plenty of boys and girls going. As for the darkies and the Chinaman, I can't promise anything at present. Depends on the work they have to do; but I've an idea I could make that fellow Tom extra useful."

Exactly what was in the mind of this American official Jim could not guess. He went to bed that night with a feeling of exultation to which he had been a stranger for a long while, for Sadie had taken to Mrs. Jones, and was delighted at the thought of remaining.

"Why trouble to go along to New York?" she asked him, in her wise little way, when he asked her what she would like. "This place is glorious. The view from the house is really magnificent, and there's no loneliness anywhere. Look at the works going on, with thousands of men. Then Mrs. Jones tells me that there are a number of boys and girls, so that I am sure to have companions. You can earn good wages here, Jim, and perhaps rise to a position of responsibility."

"Rise! that I will!" our hero told himself, for he was bubbling over with enthusiasm. "I've myself alone to look to, and I'll work and make those in authority over me see that I'm trustworthy. I'll show 'em I'm not a skulker. Wonder what job I'll get?"

It was at an early hour on the following morning that he was up and out, only to find Phineas abroad before him.

"That you, youngster?" he sang out cheerily, seeing Jim. "I've been down to the office of the Commission doctor, who's fixed this arm for me. The man who saw to it aboard the ship that brought us in hadn't too much time, for there were others who'd been injured by some of those Spaniards who'd been fighting. In consequence I had a bit of pain last night; but I'm easy now. Let's get some breakfast, then you and I'll be off."

An hour later found the two down at the point where the dirt trains were already dumping their contents, and just where the huge Gatun dam was to be erected, so, standing on an eminence, Jim was able, with the help of his friend, to follow in a logical manner the plans of the American engineers. For he could look into the long, winding hollow along which at that moment flowed the tributaries of the Chagres River.

"It's just as clear as daylight," said Phineas, his face aglow, for anything to do with the Panama Canal warmed him, so great was his enthusiasm. "Away there below us, where you see two rivers coming together to form what is known as the Chagres River, you may take it that the level of the land is just a trifle above that of the sea, and of course the water on this isthmus has found the lowest level possible. It could not get away to the east because of the hill, and west here, where we are, there's another. So that water just flows out between them, the hills themselves forming, as it were, the neck of a bottle. Well, we're just putting a cork into that neck. We're erecting a dam across the valley between these two hills which will be 7700 feet in length, measured across the top, while its base measurement will be 2060 feet."

"Enormous!" exclaimed Jim. "But surely such a tremendous mass is hardly necessary?"

"What! with 164 miles of water behind it? Young sir, let me tell you that there'll be a clear depth of water of 80 feet all along this end of the lake we're forming. A body of water like that exerts terrific pressure, and to make that dam really secure against a fracture, to make an engineering job of it, as we should say, the dam ought to be constructed of masonry built right into solid rock. But there ain't no rock, more's the pity."

"None?" asked Jim. "Then you won't be able to use masonry?"

"Right, siree! But we're going to fix the business, and reckon, when the dam's finished, nothing'll move it. Listen here, and jest look away where I'm pointing. There's an army of niggers and European spademen at work along the line the dam's to follow. They're working a trench right across, 40 feet down into the soil. Those engines you can see smoking along there are driving sheet piling of 4-inch timbers 40 feet down below the bottom of that trench. When they have finished the job of piling, the trench'll be filled chuck up with a puddled core of clay that'll act like a sheet anchor."

"And so hold the dam in position," suggested Jim.

"Just what I thought you'd say. No doubt that puddled core will help to hold the huge mass of earth that we're going to dump around it. But we're working that piling in and making the core for another purpose also. With a huge body of water in this hollow there'll be a certain amount of soaking into the subsoil – seepage we call it. It might loosen the ground underneath our dam, and so cause the thing to burst; but with a 40-foot trench, filled with a puddled core which'll stop any water, and this extra 40 feet of piling – just 80 feet of material altogether – we stop that seepage, and at the same time kind of fix a tooth into the ground that'll hold the weight of New York city."

The whole thing was gigantic, or, rather, the scheme of it all; for the reader must realize that Jim and his friend were looking down upon an unfinished undertaking. But those smoking engines and the army of men at work were an indication of the enormous labour and skill required in the erection of this Gatun dam, itself only one item in the numerous works of the canal, though, to be sure, one of the vastest. In fact, When Jim learned that from base to summit the dam would measure no less than 135 feet, and would be 50 feet above the level of the water in Gatun Lake, there was no wonder that he gasped.

"It just makes a man scratch his head," laughed Phineas. "And sometimes it makes one inclined to swear, for there's folks in the States who can't cotton to what we're doing here, and who wonder why there are so many men employed and so much money being spent. They seem to think that the canal ought to be finished in a matter of three or four years."

"Then the sooner they come out here and see for themselves what is happening the better for everyone," cried Jim indignantly. "That dam alone will take a vast amount of time, I imagine."

"Then you come along down here, sir, and I'll show you a work that's just as gigantic."

Phineas took our hero to the western end of the trench across which the dam would lie, and there caused him more astonishment. For here another army of labourers was employed in delving, while enormous steam diggers tore huge mouthfuls of earth and rock away from the sides of the cutting that was being made to accommodate the double line of three locks which, when America has completed her self-imposed undertaking, will raise the biggest vessel ever thought of to the surface of the lake above, or will drop her with equal facility down on to the bosom of the Atlantic.

"There's those steam navvies," observed Phineas, halting in front of one and surveying it reflectively. "A man who runs a machine like that can earn good dollars, and there's competition for the post. Say, Jim, how'd you care to try your hand at it?"

The very suggestion caused our hero to hold his breath. It was not that he was frightened by the mass of machinery; it was merely the novelty of the work. He stepped a pace or two nearer before he answered, and watched closely what happened. A young American, only a few years older than himself, sat on a seat beside the gigantic main beam of the digger, his head within a few inches of the flying gear wheels which transmitted movement, while right beside him, fixed to the base of the steel-girded beam, was the engine. One hand was on the throttle, while the other operated a lever. Down came the huge bucket attached to the secondary beam, the chains which supported it clanking over their stout metal pulleys; then the hand operating the lever moved ever so little, the chains tautened, and the hardened-steel cutting lip of the digger bit into the bank which was being excavated. Deeper and deeper it went. Glug! glug! glug! the machine grunted, while the tip of the main steel girder, where the hauling chains passed over it, bent downwards ever so little. A shower of broken earth burst over the edge of the digger, a faint column of dust blew into the air, while the engine gave forth another discordant glug. Then up came the huge bucket, crammed to the very top with debris, the whole machine shuddering as the strain was suddenly taken off it. But the man remained as composed as ever. He touched another lever, causing the apparatus to swing round on its axis. Almost instantly a movement from his other hand released the trigger holding the bottom of the huge earth receptacle in place, so that, before the machine had actually finished swinging, the huge mouth of this wonderful invention was disgorging its contents into a dirt car alongside.

"Fine!" cried Jim delightedly. "That's a job I should like immensely, but I guess it requires a little training."

"Practice, just practice," smiled Phineas. "See here, Jim; this arm of mine has started in aching again. How'd you care to stay along here and have a lesson? That young chap's a friend of mine, so there'll be no difficulty about the matter."

It may be imagined that Jim eagerly accepted the offer. He was keen enough to accompany Phineas on his promised trip right along the canal works, but already the sight of all that was happening round about Gatun had been sufficient for one day, while the huge machine before him and its cool and unruffled operator fascinated him.

"Gee! nothing I'd like better," he cried.

"Then come along." Phineas at once went close up to the machine, and at a signal from him the operator brought it to a rest.

"Howdy?" asked the young fellow. "Getting in at it, Mr. Barton?"

Under the tan which covered face and arms there was a sudden flush of pride which an ordinary individual might well have passed unnoticed. But Jim was slowly beginning to understand and realize something of the spirit that seemed to pervade every member of the whole staff engaged on the isthmus. For there was no doubt that the completion of the canal was a pet object to them one and all, an undertaking the gradual progress of which filled them with an all-absorbing interest. Each mouthful of dirt, for instance, which this steam digger tore from the ground and shot from its capacious maw into the earth trains was a little more progress, something further attained towards that grand and final completion to which all were sworn.

"Howdy? Say, Harry boy, this here's Jim. You've heard of that little business we had on the way to New York?"

The young man nodded, and regarded Jim critically. "Wall?" he asked curtly.

"He's the lad that came along after me when I was left aboard the foundering vessel."

The one who had been addressed as Harry dropped his hands from the levers, swung round on his seat the better to gaze at our hero, and, still with his eyes on Jim, replied to Phineas.

"I read it in the paper," he admitted. "How did it happen?"

Phineas promptly gave him the narrative, Harry meanwhile keeping his eyes on Jim. Then, when he learned that our hero had decided to stay on the isthmus, and seek work there, he climbed out of the narrow cab bolted to the side of the digger, dropped lightly to the ground, and, walking straight up to Jim, held out his hand.

"It's men we want here," he said pleasantly. "Guess you're one. Glad to shake hands with an American who's done a good turn for my friend Phineas. What job are you after?"

Jim told him promptly, while he exchanged his handshake vigorously; for he liked the look of this young American, and took to him instantly.

"I'm not sure yet exactly what job I'll ask for," he answered. "Guess I'm ready to take anything that's going; but I was wondering whether you'd give me a lesson on the digger."

"Know anything about engines and suchlike?" asked Harry sharply.

Jim nodded. "Guess I do," he said, with that delightful assurance so common to the Americans. "I've handled engines of many sorts, particularly those aboard ship; and for some months past I've been doing diving."

"Git in there," said Harry, motioning to the cab, "I'll larn you to work this plant inside an hour or two. Then all that's wanted is jest native gumption, gumption, siree, spelt with a big G, 'cos a man ain't no good on these here chugging machines unless he can keep his head cool. There's times when the digger pulls through the earth quicker than you can think, and when, if you didn't cut off steam, you'd overwind and chaw up all the chain gear. Then the lip of the digger may happen to get hold on a rock that wants powder to shift it, and if there's steam still on, and the engines pulling, you're likely as not to break up some of the fixings, and tip the whole concern over on to its nose. Hop right in; Mr. Barton, I'll see to this here Jim till evening."