The Hancock Jeffersonian. [volume] (Findlay, Ohio) 1857-1870, 1867-10-25
A Splendid Place For Lazy

Ninety-nine years years age, six
hundred and eighty specimens of
the genus homo were embarked on
board of one of Her Brittanic Maj
esty's brigs at the Island OF st. Vim
cent, the seat of government for the
English Windward Islands, and
transported across the whole width
of the caribbean Sea to Ruatan, q
small Island, then but little known
except to the buccaneers.
The main land, the north coast of
Honduras, is from the island distant
about twenty-five miles, and the
Spanish planters soon learned of this
suffering people upon the Ruatan,
and gave them employment upon
their plantations, and this island,
which was only a resting place, and
a final one to many OF the $50, re-
mained unoccupie1 for sixty years
or more, and now it has a population
of about 1000, but not q descend
ant or that cargo of -Caribs brought
from st. Vincent in the British brig.
That race has expanded to near I5,-
900, and they are now found over
about three hundred miles of coast
from the Cape Gracias a Dios west
ward to the port of Omoa, in the
Gulf Of Honduras. And it is here
with these people that every hater
of work and believer in the degrade
tion of labor should immigrate.
The Caribs retain many of their
old customs, and the Mohammedan-
Mormon institution of polygsmy is
one. This peculiar institution car
ries with it the inferiority of woman
as necessary consequence, and the
Caribs believe with Mr.. Ruskin that
labor is degrading, which naturally
leads them to impose the greater
burthen upon the already degraded
portion of community, the females.
When young lord of creation be-
comes too large to yield to the con-
troll of his mother. he takes his ca
noe, and, hunting up a good location
for a home, proceed to clear the
the trees from about an acre of
ground. and, building a cabin, is, in
his own estimation and in the opin-
ION of the whole people, deserving Of
a wife, which secured, he is relieved
by her from further care. She at
tends to the garden, which produces
them food, and also makes the scan
ty clothing they require, or else by
fishing, or the gathering Of sarsapa-
ri!la-which grows plentifully in the
forest, and for which ready market
is found in the United States-pro-
cures the means of purchasing cloth
of course, the degraded
halt converts into garments.
The young lord of creation Is thus
relieved from all labor until such
time as he again shall tire of his
slave wife, when he again takes his
canoe and hunts another sitaatten,
where he repeats the clearing and
building, and when done he chooses
another wife, who takes possession
of this new home and divides the Ia
nor OF entertaining the husband with
the first wife. When his lordship is
tired again of his inactivity, this
same labor is repeated, sometimes
till one man has five or six wives up.
on as many estates, usually so dis
tant one from the other that the va
rious wives never see each other.
When the number of wives is sufh.
cient for the ambition of the husband
his days of labor are ended; and his
life is spent in equal periods with
each, and he troubles himself not in
the least with the cares of the family,
or his food, hut his days can pass
in that hlissful state of Incidence so
lauded BY many, but achieved by
fam n,L,.. A.o.xs,1,