Some well written accounts of railroad journeys across the Isthmus during the nineteenth century.  Very informative and entertaining at the same time. 

Journal of Army Life (1874)

The Panama Canal from a Car Window (1893)

The Panama Fever (1868)

From Aspinwall to Panama (1867)

A Gold Train (1852)

Personal Memoirs of U.S. Grant  (1885)

What I saw on the West Coast of South and North America (1865)

The Isthmus and Panama (1876)

The Railroad to Aspinwall (1877)

A California Tramp (1859)

Mark Twain on the Panama Railroad (1868)

Ferdinand De Lesseps crosses the Isthmus (1879)

A Panama Riot(1856)

An Accident on the Panama Railroad(1856)

A Trip on the Panama Railroad—Story from 1855 (1855)

Four Years on the Pacific Coast(1861)

Tracking a Ghost from Coast to Coast(1999)