This is the second city of importance of the Dominican Republic and one of the most ancient on the island. The original city of Santiago was founded in 1500, but an earthquake in 1564 completely destroyed it. The present city, a commercial center, was built near the Rio Yaque. It is famous for having been the scene of the battle of March 30, 1844. which decided the issue of national independence.

MOLE AT SAN PEDRO DE MACORÍS AND VIEW OF PUERTO PLATA

San Pedro de Macorís is a beautiful modern seaport situated in the southern part of the Republic. It may be considered the sugar center of the country, for in its vicinity are situated the principal sugar mills and plantations. Puerto Plata is situated on the north coast of the island. at the foot of the beautiful Mount Isabel de Torres, and was founded by Christopher Columbus. In 1605 it was destroyed by order of the King of Spain, but was rebuilt in 1750. To-day it is one of the finest, most picturesque, and important towns of the Republic.

The considerable development of modern methods of communication has reduced distances in such a manner and has made transportation so pleasant that the number of those who look for new and agreeable impressions in foreign countries steadily grows greater. Numerous trips by automobile may be taken in the Dominican Republic. A few years ago a great highway was opened connecting Santo Domingo with Port-au-Prince, the capital of Haiti, and traversing some of the most superb scenery to be found in the Western Hemisphere. The views on this trip, which requires only nine hours by automobile, indicate the diversity of climate and topography to be found within the limits of the Dominican Republic. Another high road also connects La Vega, Moca, and Santiago, running through a fertile and picturesque countryside.

The eastern part of the Dominican Republic has many miles of fields planted to sugarcane. In the Province of Seybo, the easternmost of the Republic, there are excellent grazing lands, which, notwithstanding the mahogany and mango trees growing here and there, look like the cattle ranges of the western part of the United States. Some of the best livestock in the country is raised in this region. Directly to the north and beyond the Cordillera Central which forms the watershed of the Republic, is a fertile plain, called the Vega Real, or Royal Plain, by Columbus. Here the principal products of the national wealth, cacao and tobacco, are cultivated,

COLUMBUS

AS SEEN BY HIS CONTEMPORARIES

RE

By DOROTHY PLETCHER HOWERTH

1

EADERS interested in Columbus's daring exploits of 1492 revel in the early allusions to his discoveries in books written over 400 years ago by the Genoese Admiral's own friends and contemporaries. Unique with their oddly printed pages, and brown with age, the ancient volumes serve as a link between our age and the days when the Great Navigator sailed the seas. How odd, in this era of submarines and dirigibles and swift ocean liners, to be handling and reading books that have come down to us from a time when tiny sailing vessels were considered the last word in navigation.

On the shelves of the Rare Book Room in the Library of Congress at Washington are 10 books relating to the discovery of the New World which were included among the 3,000 incunabula purchased by Congress from Dr. Otto H. F. Vollbehr in 1930. Doctor Vollbehr's aim, it has been pointed out by a member of the Library staff, was to get together a collection that would show what the people of the fifteenth century were thinking about. His library is representative to an amazing degree of every sort of publication that came from the fifteenth century presses. Apparently nobody else thought that the fifteenth century books best worth having were those that show the mind of that century.

Particularly intriguing in this group of 10 rare Americana is a picturesque little volume with an old binding of oak boards and half-leather sides, besprinkled generously with worm holes. Broken metal fasteners are attached so that the book may be snapped shut. This is none other than the highly prized Verardus volume, published in Basel on April 21, 1494, and celebrated because it includes the famous "Columbus Letter," an account of the admiral's first voyage to America, together with six woodcut illustrations of the trip, the very first news pictures to depict the discovery of the New World.

The "Columbus Letter" is preceded by a drama in dialogue on the siege and capture of Granada from the Moors by King Ferdinand. Written by Verardus and acted in Rome in 1492, it begins in this wise: "To the praise of the most illustrious Ferdinand, King of the Spains, Bethica and Granada, the siege, victory and triumph. And of the islands newly discovered in the Indian Sea."

1 First published in the magazine section of The Sunday Star, Washington, D. C., November 15, 1931, and here reprinted by courtesy of the author, Dorothy Pletcher Howerth, and The Sunday Star.