The Indianapolis journal. [volume] (Indianapolis [Ind.]) 1867-1904, 1899-07-16

for all well-to-do people in San Juan live
above stairs.
The Porto Rican clerk puts in from six
teen TO seventeen hours per day. He takes
down the shutters at 7 in the morning and
by 1870 trade Is in full blast. 1t keeps on
all day, with the exception of an hour at
noon, say from IL 80 to 1870, and continues
on until 10 or IL at night. Some of the
smaller stores do not close for the noon
hour, and not a few are open from Z a. m.
until IL y. m.
And are there many young men who want
such positions at IS per month?
Yes, any amount Of them. They are glad
to get them add anxious to hold them.
They work a year or so before they are
advanced, and when they rise to $50 or $50 a
month they begin to put on airs. About
this time they take lodgings outside the
stores and aspire TO a partnership in the
business. Good clerks are often taken into
partnership by their employers, but il is only
after years of service.
These low wages prevail In all branches
Of trade. One OF the best cutters in the
most fashionable tailor shop here receives
less than 81 a day. He has to work every
day and Sunday, from Z a. m. until 10 p. m.
and his master Is always telling him he is
paying him too much wages.
PEDDLERS OF SAN JUAN.
Quite a lot Of business is done in the
Porto Rican cities by peddlers. The streets
are full of hucksters. candy sellers and ice
cream vendors. Each has his own cry and
the walls ring with them from daylight
until dark and after dark. Here comes a
man peddling chickens. He is yelling a cry
We do not understand, holding out as he
does so one of the three dozen fowls he
has tied together by their legs and slung
over his shoulder.
The chickens squawk as he carries them
along the street, and their shrill cries are
apparently in opposition to his statement
that he will sell fine chickens for 20 centa-
vos-about 45 cents apiece of our money.
But see those queer bundles he has under
his arm. He seems to be a feather peddler
as we'll. The bundles are wrapped with
jagua palm bark. and out of their ends
stick what look like feather busters. Now
he has turned about and we see the other
ends of his bundles. Each contains a live
turkey, and it is poking its head out Of the
bark. The turkeys are laid fiat, with their
legs doubled up under them. The legs and
wings are bound around with strings, and
the whole is wrapped up in the thick bark
Of the jagua palm. In this way he can
carry three or four turkeys. and at the
same time the dozen or so chickens he has
thrown over his shoulders.
1 ask as to prices and find that turkeys
are exceedingly cheap. while the chickens
are dear. AS I talk to him a man comes VI
with a round basket the size of one of our
bushel baskets slung to his shoulders. II
seems to be filled with dry leaves. 1 thrust
H. - - c-I ~.
which are packed about in this way.
But there comes the ice cart of San Juan
1t takes two such TO supply the city. 1t is
hardly bigger than a dry-goods box and is
hauled about on wheels by a donkey. TIL
ice here is manufactured. 1t is shipped In
hogsheads TO the interior of the island or
an OK cart and, considering the slow method
Of transport, lasts pretty we'll.
Behind the ice wagon is q bread peddler
He stands there near that beer saloon over
which you see the sign Of one of oul
American beers. See the basket Of bread
upo his head. 1t is as big around as z
wash tub and the long loaves stand out OF
all sides. Each of these loaves costs ST.,
centavos or four cents. They are made Of
American flour and are baked by profes
sional bakers. No bread is made in the
IA vi lie W hlCdUSs lut DOOT can
raise enough capital to buy flour and every
one relies on the bakers, who furnish fresh
bread every day. They make as good brea6
as you can find anywhere in America. 1t IL
light and crisp, with a crust as delicious a:
that which you get in Paris or Vienna.
The bread is peddled about from house tc
house and you find bread peddlers far off il
the country districts selling the loaves.
| have unna into cnnon % Tho Ily1.Lo--
Bare-armed men knead the bread just as We
do and lay it sway in old-fashioned bake
ovens which look more like furnaces thar
anything else. This is done at night and ir
the morning it is ready for sale.
THE MARKETS OF san JUAN.
But let US go to the markets and see wha
the Porto Ricans eat. We cross the wild
plaza. walk up the hill between the post
office and city hall, and come at last to
long. low building surrounding a court. w,
hear the din of buying and selling as W,
approach it. We enter and find o~urselve
in the midst of about an acre of Port,
Ricans. negroes, mulattoes and whites
There are men. women. children and babie
buying and selling. chatting and squawl
ing. There are black-faced women in whit
or gay ~calicoes with bandana handker
LII NAth hCouS- Il mdIhe
men wearing nothing but shirts and pants
the former cut very low at the neck.
Women squat on the floor with vegetable
and fruits piled around them. Here Is on
selling egg plants, some of which are as BIZ
as pumpkins. She offers me one the size O
a football for 6 cents, and. seeing it doe
not attract me, she picks up a squash tn
size of a peck measure and asks me to buy
Over there is a woman selling tomatoes
They are no bigger than marbles and hay
probably grown wild.
/ ask the price Of eggs of a man at on
of the counters in the building and am toll
they are 4 centovas apiece, or about 2
cents OF our money a dozen. Eggs are hig
all over Porto Rico. The chickens, as yo
can see from the little ones all about Us
are game fowls. and it occurs to us tina
there might be money in an America
chicken farm near San Juan. Chickens ar
easily raised here, but such a thing as on
the size of a Langshan, a Plymouth Rock O
a Buff Cochin is unknown. ]
would be as great a curiosity as an Ostrich
Get out of the way of that goat. Their
are goats wandering about through tn
court picking up what they can get. The,
are stray goats belonging TO the city, an,
do not seem 10 bother the peddlers.
Let US go over there and visit the butch
ers. They sell chiefly beef, and We Loo
in vain for mutton or lamb. There are bu
; few lambs in Porto Rico. and the only n,ea
of the town is beef and pork. The hog