The daily chieftain. [volume] (Vinita, Ind. Ter. [Okla.]) 1898-1902, 1899-02-08
AMERICANS IN JAMAICA.
They Are Succeeding While the Brit
ish Planters Are Having
Hard Times.

couraged concerning the business out
look. They talk glibly enough of the
splendid natural resources of theiI
island but in the same breath will tell
you that there are no longer any in
ducements TO emigration or openings
for younger sons. and declare that ruin
stares them in the face unless imme-
diate reciprocity places Jamaica on an
equal footing with the neighboring is
lands.
Most of the queens subjects in ia
maica still persist in raising sugar, TO
the exclusion of everything else, al
though nowadays there is little profit
in it. The sugar plantations are bar
onial in extent, and time was when their
cultivation was so easy and profitable
that the owners thereof could remain
abroad, leaving overseers in charge.
But year after year during the last
decade the overseers have reported
smaller and smaller profits, always hop
ing for better returns next time, and
each succeeding year has regularly
proved little worse than the last. Alb
sent proprietors and hired supervision.
bounties, hostile tariffs, and, above all,
the production of beet sugar, have con-
spired to bring about this natural re-
suit; and now that Cuba and Porto
Rico, with their unrivaled possibilities,
have passed into energetic American
hands, Jamaica's mismanaged estates
may move along 10 the bow-wows more
rapidly than ever. Already the plant
ers are appealing to the government for
help, and talking of grants-in-aid and
countervailing duties; but the truth
is that the government feels the pinch
as much as any private individual.
While the Englishmen are moodily
forecasting ruin. and blaming the
home government. America and Colo
nial Secretary Chamberlain, for what
is clearly their own fault, and the hap
py-go-lucky blacks, like other natives
Of the tropics, are idly contented with
what nature provides few Ameri-
cans are quietly laying the foundations
for solid fortunes here. Some of them
have invested a good deal of capital in
island enterprises. They have bought
number OF abandoned or rundown
plantations for tithe of their original
value. besides inaugurating new indus
tries and starting afresh several lag
ging old ones, with their accustomed
vim. A few years ago an American
syndicate purchased the government
railway, &C miles long, which runs from
Port Royal 10 nowhere in particular
and the new owners Immediately in
vested SS.000,000 in extensions. which,
when completed. will open up the rich
est lands of Jamaica. as well as some
OF the most enhancing tropical scenery
in the whole wide world.
One American of my acquaintance de-
voted himself TO the raising of oranges
about five years ago, and last season
$4,000 boxes of them from Ja-
msica 10 New York, and cleared dol
lar box on the lot. Though oranges
grow wild on this island and have never
before been cultivated for commerce,
there are few localities which produce
finer ones and none where the climate
is better adapted to their raising. An
other of my countrymen is making
fortune in plantains. another in sweet
potatoes and another in bamboo. The |
last named. of spontaneous growth,
fourishes wonderfully in Jamaica. and |
there is almost no limit TO the uses to |
which 1t may be put, from building of |
houses to the making of carts and |
furniture. After many experiments
and almost as many failures, our
Yankee friend discovered that bamboo |
fiber had certain elastic and incom-
,ressible properties, which make it
without a rival for some purposes. So |
he built big factory away up on the
Black river, in the interior of the is
and, and settled down into the con-
'erting Of bamboo fiber into what is
Snown as packing for the wheels
# railway carriages. 1t is said to be
he very best article now used for that
purpose, holding oil like a sponge,
lever hardening and never wearing out,
md the demand for it is great both in
Europe and America.
The Yankees show more originality
han the sons of Britain in their ways
II money-getting, and are always on
he lookout for new avenues Of enter
rise. The few who went into sugar
aising and its side issues, rum and
nolasses, do not retire from the field
n disgust, or sit down and growl, as the
do when the market is
-lutted and sugar depressed, but make
hift with other crops till times i'm
rove. They get along good deal bet