New national era. [volume] (Washington, D.C.) 1870-1874, 1871-04-13


'ence of industry and enterprise, the Sabbath
ike stiffness of her streets, the sparseness
Of her population, the wild and sll-abounding
vegetation, leaving hardly breathing space for
families in their houses the want of all the
handicrafts, and the presence of general desti-
tuition.
Take the FIRST great cause--slavery. My
readers, at least need no argument to show
how in its presence all mental and moral life
dies; how completely it degrades labor, max
ing idleness respectable and work despicable;
giving premium to the one and awarding
disgrace to the other for all this has been
gone over before. To eat bread in the sweat
of ones own face was dsgraceful but to eat 1t
in the sweat of some other mans face was
honorable and desirable. For more than three
hundred years the people of Santo Domingo
rested under this slavery with its false and
wicked sentiments and ideas; aud it has left
to that country inheritance of weakness and
heplessness which one may see at every foot
step. 1t is not strange that nobody should
want to labor where labor is not only hard
ship but disgrace; nor that men should seek
to escape from it by every possible device.
l found in Santo Domingo, as l found in the
Southern States, Hayti, and Jamaica, the cry,
ooh! the negroes won't work. and yet every
where went in the West Indies, l found the
negroes about the only people who do work
The white people and half white people of those
islands are the shirkers of society; they are
the shop keepers and traders, the lawyers and
doctors, the politicians and law makers, the
men who live by their cunning and not by ply
steal exertion. The negroes do not perform
any too much labor, but whatever labor is per
formed is performed by them. They work the
fields, they raise the produce, they cut the lig-
num-vita, the satin wood the mahogany, the
dye wood, aud they bring these woods to the
markets. They load the ships they, IN word,
do all the hard work that is done in Santo Do
mingo, and indeed, in the entire West Indies.
My blood was often made TO boil with indigna-
ton when | heard these white and yellow
drones lagily exclaiming The negroes won't
work - For one, / wish the negro worked less
with his hands and more with his mind. While
We are happy to bear testimony TO the fact that
whatever else the negro may be, he certainly 10
hard workman, and 70 him is committed the
work of producing about all that ia produced
by human labor ia Sauto Domingo and Hayti.
But. owing to slavery. to which they have
been victims. they do their work very awk-
wardiy and very impertectly. l saw no plows
in Santo Domingo and Was told that none were
used All agricultural and mechanical lnple-
ments are of the rudeSt description, and re-
auire less of skill than strength to use them
A black woman will here walk distance Of
ten or fifteen miles with basket of bananas
and plantans on her head, for which she re-
ceiyes not more than single dollar, and walks
home again; while q little more Is brought by
others on the back Of a good-natured donkey.
The roads are in miserable condition-narrow
crooked and rnuddy--and nobody seems to
think of good roads as possibility. There is
the evidence Of muscle everywhere, and the
evidence of mind nowhere. The heart is made
sad when it sees things as they are in COMPARE
son Of things as they might be. The old methods
of industry are toiling along in the deep ruts
Of slavery, and will continue to move in the
old slip-sbod way till better examples are
forced upon the attention of the people. Until
this is done there is no hope for Santo Do
mingo Labor will continue burden and
degradation. Men will shun it by every way
possible not only because it is uninvting IN
ITSELF but because it has always been performed
by slaves, or by the descendants of slaves
and of the ignorant classes. Verify slavery
has done here its appropriate work, and done
il eHectually. While it may not be the main
cause OF the lack Of Improvement, it certainly
is one explanation of the absence Of thrift and
industry, and it's fruit, in Santo Domingo.
After slavery comes absenteeism. For more
than two centuries this country has heaped its
riches, its silver and gold, and its precious
woods into the laps of distant peoples. The
money made here, instead of increasing the
wealth of the country aud improving its modes
of life and means of industry, have been spent
in luxury and ease in Madrid or Paris. The
curse of Ireland, of Jamaica, and of all the
West Indies has been this absen teeism. En-
erson says that those who made Rome worth
going TO see stayed there" No country can
prosper while the proceeds of it's industry are
spent beyond its borders. The old landhOders
of this island suck the life-blood of the in
dustry Of their country, and, instead Of build
ing educational institutions a. home, send their
children to foreign colleges, and seek pleasure
abroad for themselves. la the presence of this
pernicious practice they smite their country
with eanness aud curse their sons with un-
patriotic sentiments. Those who have been
thus educated stay away if they can do so !;
aud those who cannot, come home to foment
disorder and revolution, that they may seize the
reins of government. This brings me to the
third cause of restitution.
Santo Domingo has never known the bless
ing of a stable government. She has been the
sport and play thing of rival chiefs and revolu.
tionists. They have rolled over her like the
angry waves OF the ocean over O stranded
bark, each wave leaving her more completely
a wreck than before. Why don't you surround
yourselves with more ofths comforts of life said
| to the country people. The uniform answer
was, What is the uses Property is of no
account here. AS soon as We get q little to-
gether some revolutionary chief comes along
and takes it from us by force, and at the same
time forces al the male members Of the family
into the army, leaving nobody but the women
and children behind TO till the soil. Those
who have and those who have not are about