Saturday press. [volume] (Honolulu, H.I.) 1880-1885, 1883-11-17

EDITOR SATURDAY PRESS - Sir /
Since Mr.. ]. f. Searles, of the sugar
commission, has such great objection to
the Hawaiian planters importing
Chinese and Portuguese labor, perhaps
he will condescend to letthem 90 down
on their knees and ask what he would
have had them do
The plantations already in existence
before the treaty passed, often suffered
sefious loss and were sometimes almost
compelled to shut down for want of
labor. Every new plantation started
only added to the difficulty What a
thorn-what an irritating prickly hair
rope in the flesh would the treaty have
been had planters been compelled to
confine themselves to only such native
labor as could be obtained. And
treaty or no treaty, some of them would
have been forced to close long ere
this. Some of the planters held strong
prejudice against Cinnamon, and
yielded the point only when compelled
to do so or fail. Imported labor, as
much as the treaty, has been the saliva
tion Of the sugar, and consequently of
all commercial, interests in these
islands. Would Mr.. Searles have had
them import American labor? Even
supposing that it could have been OBJ
tanned at high prices it would have
been a source of lntolerable vexation
and worse than useless. The propo-
sition to exclude such imported
labor as could be obtained at
living rates, when reasoned according
to facts and common sense, redses it
self to an absurdity. And what do
Mr.. Searles or the Eastern sugar refners
care whether the Islands employ
Chinese or any other labor' They see
the question only through the purblind
eyes of rehners, who are frantic because
they cannot as conveniently obtain the
sugar as other purchasers, and object
to any one else having it. Their
pseudo philanthropy is indignant that
the sugar consumers on the Pacific
coast should pay * to cents a
pound more for their sweets than those
on the Atlantic seaboard Did they
ever feel sore that the consumers in
China pay 3 or 4 cents a pound less
than those on their own coast? Per
haps not; those are only Cinnamon,
and they object to Cinnamon. But let
them eMrcise their philanthropy little
and reduce their prices to par with
those of ''the most favored nation"
Let them brush the dust from their
eyes, put themselves in the place of the
Hawaiian planters and view the subject
in reasonable light. Let them trans
fer themselves to the Pacific coast, or
to these islands and take advantage of
the Bonanza" The scales would fall
from their eyes and their tune would
change.
Mr.. Searles likens the Hawaiian Is
lands to boy who got so cents out
of an old woman, then bought with
part of it few of her apples, and told
her she should be thankful for the en-
couragement he gave her
Let him continue the comparison,
look little deeper, and see how, with
J that SO cents, the boy was enabled to
create employment for a horde of her
children; open market for their wares;
and SO by enabling them to increase
their worldly goods and support them,
selves, render direct benefit to the old
woman.
Again; in comparing the high yields
of sugar per acre obtained in some
parts of these islands (as is occasion
ally done) with those obtained in the
Southern States, the Eastern refiners
and the Southern planters as well must
bear in mind that these yields are OBJ
tanned only on growth of IS months
to upwards of two years, and that the
planter here, rarely if ever sees his
money within two years from the time
he begins to break his sod. So that
the Southern planter, with his yield of
tons per acre grown in 9 months, is,
other things being equal, as well off, to
say the least, as the Hawaiian planter
with his to 4 tons grown in double or
three times the length of time. While
1t is true that favored spots or irrigated
lands yield occasionally S or tons per
acre, this is not the rule, the average
yield having been estimated at 3 tons
per acre. The facts and figures on the
various branches of this topic are suffi-
cient to convince any mind that is open
to conviction. A PLANTER.
kohola, October 90. 1883
One of the Topics for the Times in
the November Century has the following
query-caption Is the Old Faith Dy-
ingp The conclusion of the article is
worth quoting "The one grand fact
on which defenders of Christianity
should rest their case is presented in
the words of Canon Fremantle sThe
spirit of Christ is supreme over the
whole range Of the secular life-educa.
ton, trade, literature, art, science and
politics-and is seen to be practically
vindicating its supremacy If this can
be seen, 1t is worth seeing No fact
could be more significant or more i'm
pressive."
| The new time standard for the
United States railroads goes into effect
tomorrow November 18th meridian
time at Philadelphia, Or at IS west
longitude, is to give the clock time to
all places between Brunswick and De-
troit; St. Louis, or 90 west Longitude
sets the standard for all from Detroit to
Colorado; Denver or Io5' west longi-
tude for the next division and Carson
City, or 100 vest longitude for the
Pacific coast.
The United States Postmaster-G Gen.
eral has issued an order to the effect
that mo letter, or no parcel, will be
forwarded upon which the postage has
not been fully paid II the card of the