href="#fb3_img_img_93da4a71-01ca-5005-b5cc-9946e81cf5ae.jpg" alt="Official Lottery in Bishop's House, Panama"/> OFFICIAL LOTTERY IN BISHOP'S HOUSE, PANAMA
There is the official lottery, suspiciously located. To be sure, the bishop does not personally supervise the drawings, and perhaps he does not get anything out of it, but no one who knows Panama claims such to be the case. When did the hierarchy ever oppose a gambling game that promised profit for the cause? Gaunt, hungry-looking cripples and pobres hang about the corners selling lottery tickets. Evidently, none of the profits come to these unfortunates.
Panama City has its neighborhoods like any other Old-World town. "Inside" the old wall includes the original fortified town on the little peninsula jutting into the bay. Here live officials, professional and business men. Beyond this lies the town that overflowed the wall and now reaches down to the park in front of the Tivoli Hotel. This is the barrio of Santa Ana. Caledonia and Guachapali and San Miguel lie across the railway and serve to fill in the space between the Spanish town and the Exposition grounds. A mile and a half beyond the palaces of the exposition lies Bella Vista, beautiful for situation and rivaling Southern California for its real estate enterprise. Over toward the Canal is Chorilla between the Cemetery and Ancon Hill. At the end of the five-cent car fare on the line to the savanas is the famous—or infamous—bull ring. Who said that bullfights had been abandoned? Not much. Between bullfights and prize fights the season is not allowed to drag, and it must be admitted that the number of American patrons of these brutalizing contests is not to the credit of the kind.
The open market where the fishermen come ashore is one of the show places of Panama. Pangas and chingas and craft of every sort, except the modern kind, bring in on high tide cargoes of bananas, coconuts, charcoal, camotes, rice, sugar, syrup, rum, papayas, mangoes, lonzones, chiotes, poultry, pigs, ivory nuts and a score of fruits and vegetables unnamable by the uninitiated. When the tide recedes the boats lie high, if not very dry, and the unloading proceeds apace. It is an interesting and lively scene, and the bicker and barter go on by the hour.
Hard by is the big native market, resort of housekeepers and servants in search of commissary bargains. This one is fairly clean and is the morning recreation of thousands of shoppers.
Panama has its theaters, of the sort to be expected. One of the movie houses compares well with the best anywhere, and most of the others are in good condition. The national theater is a credit to the country and forms a section of the national palace. On the Canal Zone the clubhouses, sometimes called Y. M. C. A.'s, put on several picture shows a week in commendable effort to supply recreation to their patrons.
The architecture of the old churches is a bit disappointing to travelers who have seen the splendid buildings of other Latin lands. The Cathedral has two modern towers, a clock in one of them, and the twelve apostles in life size on the façade. The Jesuit Church by the Malecon is very old and rather interesting. Recently a new concrete tower has been added, of striking appearance, but not closely in conformity with the architecture of the church. This church contains a famous old painting of purgatory and heaven, and down below, the flames of the lost. It is notable that in the place of purgatory are bishops, priests, and kings. There are ten people in heaven, and ten in purgatory, and of each ten three are women. Query—Where did the painter think that the women belong? It is an interesting question, especially for the women.
The big Merced Church on Central Avenue has a curious and interesting little street chapel on the corner of the sidewalk, and here are arranged curious exhibitions at Christmas and Easter. I saw here the ancient village of Bethlehem, with the inn and manger and oxen; but there were also a miniature lake with a steamboat, and a grocery wagon delivering goods to the ancient Bethlehemites. The stores bore advertisements of patent breakfast foods.
No place can be truly romantic until it possesses some good ruins, and Panama claims distinction in the old Flat-Arch Church near the palace. The interior is now used as a garage, and no one but the tourist seems to think the place of any interest. Two blocks away stands the façade of the fine old stone church that has been a ruin now for years. The interior is now a stable, and the old walls of the college have been used for the construction of a modern cheap tenement house. The stone front of the old wall stands as a fine example of the architecture and building of 1751, when the church was finished.
The San Filipi Neri Church, at the corner of Avenida B and Fourth Streets, is made from stone carried in from Old Panama. This church is said to have the most beautiful interior in the city, but, as it is very rarely opened to the street, the visitor will have to accept the statement without opportunity to judge for himself.
The savanas lie northeast of Panama and beyond the ruins of Old Panama. The rolling slopes of green and the growing number of villas will make this strip of country valuable and famous before long.
Of Panama's hotels not much need to be said, except that they are good of their kind. Latin hotel standards are different from those of North America, but good judges of hotel life have pronounced those of Panama to be quite endurable.
There are always two or three daily papers in Panama and an indefinite number of weeklies. An immemorial custom exists by which when any citizen has anything on his mind that he feels he should unload to the profit or otherwise of the public, a printed pronunciamento is issued and circulated about the streets by boys, handed out freely to everybody in sight. This really effective method is sometimes used for important matters of state.
The educational system is modeled upon the best Latin-American standards, with primary schools of four grades throughout the Republic. Provincial centers have schools with two, and in a few cases four years more. The National Institute, at the foot of Ancon Hill, maintains a normal school for men and a liceo which grants the degree of Bachelor of Arts upon the completion of about the equivalent of the American college freshman year. The young women are given a normal course in the Women's Normal School at the Exposition grounds. There is no coeducation above the primary grades. The Agricultural Experimental Farm and School, abandoned as an experiment station, is used as a reform school.
Taboga Island lies off shore and furnishes a point of much interest. It is the week-end Mecca of the Zone people and also of many of the Panamanians. There are a good American hotel, several fair native hotels, good fishing, tramping, an interesting native village, a healthful climate, and a fine view—and all within ten miles of Panama.
If the prowler is looking for real adventure, he can seek for it on Gocos Island, three hundred miles south of Panama. Here are said to lie hidden somewhere ten millions of dollars' worth of treasure, stolen from Callao and other points between 1820 and 1830. Harvey Montmorency wrote it up in a book entitled On the Track of the Treasure, and so well did he tell the story that four large expeditions have been organized and sent to find it. One man is said to have found a little gold for his pains, but the others went home poorer than they came. And if these are too easy destinations, there lie the Galapagos Islands off the coast of Peru, said to contain many possibilities, of many kinds. Peru is supposed to have the islands on the market, and anybody with the money can purchase one, all his own.
CHAPTER IV
A CITY OF GHOSTS
