day there came reports from a spot out along the line that some
negro laborer strolling along in a perfectly reasonable manner
suddenly lay down, threw a fit, and went into a comatose state
from which he recovered only after a day or two in Ancon or Colon
hospitals. The doctors gave it up in despair. As a last resort the
case was turned over to a Z. P. sleuth. He chose him a hiding-
place as near as possible to the locality of the strange
manifestation. For half the morning he sweltered and swore without
having seen or heard the slightest thing of interest to an old
"Zoner." A dirt-train rumbled by now and then. He strove to amuse
himself by watching the innocent games of two little Spanish
switch-boys not far away. They were enjoying themselves, as
guileless childhood will, between their duties of letting a train
in and out of the switch. Well on in the second half of the
morning another diminutive Iberian, a water-boy, brought his
compatriots a pail of water and carried off the empty bucket. The
boys hung over the edge of the pail a sort of wire hook, the
handle of their home-made drinking-can, no doubt, and went on
playing.

By and by a burly black Jamaican in shirt-sleeves loomed up in the
distance. Now and then as he advanced he sang a snatch of West
Indian ballad. As he espied the "switcheros" a smile broke out on
his features and he hastened forward his eyes fixed on the water-
pail. In a working species of Spanish he made some request of the
boys, the while wiping his ebony brow with his sleeve. The boys
protested. Evidently they had lived on the Zone so long they had
developed a color line. The negro pleaded. The boys, sitting in
the shade of their wigwam, still shook their heads. One of them
was idly tapping the ground with a broom-handle that had lain