The evening telegraph. [volume] (Philadelphia [Pa.]) 1864-1918, 1869-05-07

island yielded AZ abundance of the precious
metals. According to the historian Herrara,
there was at tAat time mint at Buenaventura,
which coinrd from $225,000 to $3.50, 600 per
annum; and Oviedo testifes that the Gov
ernment royalty of one-ffth yielded annually
sc, 600 600 to the National treasury. This refers
to gold; but specimens of rich silver ore have
alsO been found in several parts of the island
and in the Southeastern Division there is an ex-
tensive copper region which has been pro-
nOunced by competent scientific authority, after
careful survey, equally rich in promise with the
celebrated copper district of the south side of
| Cuba. immense beds of coal have been dis
covered in the Bay of Samana rock salt is found
in large quantities on the south coast; marble is
plentiful, and native iron, lead Nickel anti
mony, bsmuth, zinc, cinnabar, and cobalt must
be added to the list. There can be no doubt
that when stable government shall have sue
| ceeded in Hayt to the era of incessant political
revolutions, thus aiiordng free scope to enter
prise, and security to capital, this island will
! yield an amount of mineral treasures far ex-
ceeding the returns il gave to the rude and
ftful mining operations of its first European
masters.
POPULATION.
The aboriginal inhabitants of the West Indies,
amounting at the period of the discovery, to
about l 500. 600, have all disappeared with the
exception of a handful Of Caribs in the Island
of st. Vincent descendants of the tribe that was
found living in that island and some of the
neighboring ones when they were first visited
| by the Spaniards. Spanish oppression and
| than n century from the time when Europeans
began to settle in the islands, the aborigines had
! been virtually eXtermnated. The present popu-
! lation of the West Indies, according to the most
recent returns is, in round numbers, 3,5OO,OOO.
| OF this Cuba and Porto Rico have between them
! 1,4S0,OO0; Jamaica has 100000; Hayti 100000;
and the Bahamas and the lesser Antilles number
! 10000. The Island of Barbados the most
popuous of all the Antilles, being, indeed, quite
as densely peOpled China. Only 81 miles
long by ID in breadth, it has population, ac-
! cording to the census of 1861, OF l32, III or
| about one thousand inhabitants to the square
mile. From 1851 to 1861, after allowing for
! losses from an epidemic of cholera, the pOpula-
! tion increased by nearly 10000 souls This little
! island affords perhaps the most remarkable in
| stance in the world of population pressing upon
the means of subsistence for production has
| been pushed in Barbados to its utmost limits,
almost every acre of land in the island being
under cultivation, while of additional mouths to
| feed 'the cry is still they come
The population in all the islands is made up of
whites, browns COR people of mixed blood), and
blacks. With the exception of Cuba and Porto
Rico, the blacks everywhere greatly outnumber
the other two classes, the average proportion
being as follows-Whtes, per cent; colored,
10 per cent; blacks, {, per cent Thus in the
Island of Jamaica the last census taken in 1861
gives 14OOO whites and $4,000 colored people,
against 354, 600 blacks. In Cuba the case is diff
terent, the whites prcrOnderating over blacks
and cOlOred together According to the census
of that island, taken in 1861, the total popula-
tiOn was 100000, of which number 794, 600
were whites, GOO free persons of color, and
81 600 slaves. The Haytien nationality is COM
posed entirely of blacks and mulattOes, the only
whites in the country being foreigners and the
consular representatives of foreign powers; and
here the proportion of the cOoIed people to the
blacks is even smaller than in the Island of
Jamaica. This is, however, reversed in the
neighboring republic of Santo Domingo, in
which there are still many of Spanish descent,
and the people of mixed blood largely exceed
the blacks in number.
SOCIAL CONDITION.
The state of society in the West Indies is very
peculiar, might be expected from their past
as well as their most recent history. Its most
striking feature is its heterogeneous character.
! Such mixture of blood as we have in the
Antilles is perhaps nowhere else to be found to
the same extent on the face of the globe The
! Latin race, the Anglo-SaXon, the Teutonic, the
! Celtic, the Scandinavian, the African, the Mon
| golian, and the Hin are all represented in
their purity; besides which there are large num-
| bers in whose veins the blood of two more
of these various races comminge in different
degrees The introduction of Chinese and
Hindoos in the West Indies is of comparatively
recent date; but many of these immigrants of
both races have married among the black and
the colored classes, have become converted to
Christianity, and have adopted the islands as
! their home. That part of the population which
is of African descent-by which is to be under
stood the people OF Acknowledgment blood as
well as the backs-is, as we have already seen,
by far the most numerous but the dominant
race is the Caucasian, which here, as elsewhere,
asserts and maintains superiority over the other
races by virtue of its higher Intelligence and
its indomitable energy. With the single eXcep-
tion of Hayti, the white man rules everywhere
in the West Indies. The Governorships of the
different colonies are all held by whites few
men of mixed blood are here and there to be
found on the bench, but these excepted, the
judiciary and magistracy are white, and the
same remark will apply to the different legisla-
tive bodies, where such exist. Most of the pulpits
are filled by clergymcn of fair complexion and
unmiXed blood The principal merchants are
chiefly whites, the large landed proprietors are
nearly all whites, and so are most of those who
! practise law and medicine. Next to the whites,
! in point of social standing, come the colored
! people, as distinguished from the blacks. OF
late years education has done great deal for
! this class, among whom are to be found Il goodly
and increasing number of men who have
| achieved distinction aC some of the first uni
versities of Europe. The colored people
! are gradually working their way, in the
British colonies especially, into all those
| departments of public and profess
! sOnal life from which, not much
more than quarter OF a century ago, they were
! jealousy and rigidly excluded, and are making
| good their claims to u iuir share of the honors
and emoluments of The public service. The
| blacks, thanks to slavery are everywhere the
! lowest in the social scale, the "hewers of wood
and drawers of water being everywhere and
| almost exclusively of the African race In the
islands where slavery till exists, viz, Cuba and
Porto Rico, their condition is deplorable; and i'm
the free islands, embracing all the other parts of
the West Indies, they have not yet recovered
| from the blighting effect of the accuTsed system
| although they are steadily marching forward in
the path of Improvement. Among the Haytien
blacks, however, are to be found a number
Iy III Nery superior men possessing rare talents,
hlghly cultivated, with polished man
nerS fitting them TO shine i'm the