Gloucester County Democrat. (Woodbury, N.J.) 1878-1932, 1900-10-25


Governor Robert E. Pattison, the other by
Governor Allen, Of Puerto Rico, the reader
win find some variance in opinion.
Your correspondent was at Coamo Springs
Hotel. Coamo. in the interest of the Puerto
Land and Improvement Company, in 1899,
as manager of the agricultural department
up to August s. the date when everything
! like vegetation was swept from the place by
wind and water. I do not doubt that times
are a little better now than year ago, for
such fruits from which the natives get the
most Of their living have more or less
gained their normal condition. Fried plan
/ tain or boiled banana and little boiled
maize {corn meal would constitute their
midday meal; not a very full dinner pail,
banana, only for size. l have seen them
twelve or fifteen inches long by two inches
thick.
Governor Allen says the Puerto Ricans
are lazy. ] have had from four to ten
poems (natiye laborers) to work for me at a
/ time, and ] have got to see the first lazy
peon yet. Plenty Of them are ready and
want work The established law is eight
hours a day. They would work from sun
to sun, if need be, for me; they take an
/ hour for meals. In that country the sun
sets about AN hour earlier than it does here,
and rises an hour later the mountains hide
! it for about that length Of time
The poems work slow, to be sure, but
they are steady. The climate will not
permit them to push very much, if a man
is to work all day. The sun is not so
hot, but the heat is so steady as to make
vigorous work out Of the question, and the
humidity is very great ! have seen more
than one native succumb to the heat, but
the next day would be ready to go to work.
Within a radius Of two miles of Coama
Springs the natives are squatted on their
little lots, possibly where no one viii ever
disturb them, and all have their plot of
land cleared for garden, from one-half to
two acres, where they raise the most of their
living bananas and maize, and work out
side when they get it, their wives doing
the farming, with nothing but a clumsy
hoe. ! have always found them employed,
and as for lounging, | have never seen it.
Governor Allen says they are beggars
They are III one sense of the word; not
from force, but habit. If native or any
one else starts out on journey, which is
often the case in that country, he thinks
nothing of stopping (if hunger or night
oyertakes hinl1 and asking for something to
eat or a nights lodging and is seldom, if
ewes, turned away. AS class, they will
divide as long as they have anything.
Governor Allen says they want work,
though he says they are lazy. II the PEG.
pie want work, why should they be called
lazy? If they had the wherewith to do
and were paid for their labor l think it
would be no trouble to get them to work,
and do as much and with as much good
will as any class of labor as can be found
in this or any other country. The main
trouble with them is they have nothing to
work with. Give such tools as they have
to our worllmen and they would run away
and hide. a small stub hoe with handle
ten feet long and an old machette are about
all the tools a native has to till the soil.
Give an American such tools and he would
be lazy too. They had never seen ground
turned up as did with an American team
to an American pillow, perhaps the first out
and-ont American rig in Puerto Rico.
Put goods into Puerto Rico, such as horses
and mules, machinery and agricultural
implements, SO the natives can afford to
procure them, and you will then see the
island blooming with success, but you never
will while they are taxed as heavy as they
are for such goods. This Administration
does not seem inclined to tighten their
burden, 50 let's try another.
Barranquitas, Governor Allen says, is
eight miles from Aibonito, and has about
eight thousand inhabitants, with no road
to get out on the military road; the map
shows only a bridal path. A bridal path
and pack mules is a slow way to get the
produce Of a productive country to market
| have often seen it; a dozen packed and
linked together with rope and one driver.
If the natives want work, why not build
them a road from Barranquitas to Aibonito
No doubt they could get all the poems they
could use at low wages If this Govern
ment would take some of the money spent
on officers salaries and unimportant doings
and build the projected wagon and rail-
roads, there need not be an idle peon on the
Island for years to come Pay them in
money, take off duties, then all would be
peace and happiness. Treat them with
kindness, and then the Americans would
be the greatest people in the world.
J. S. CARSON,
Former Manager Agricultural Department,
Coamo Springs Hotel,
Coamo, Puerto Rico.