The Republican. [volume] (Oakland, Md.) 1877-current, 1901-01-24
BANANA PLANTERS COMPLAIN.
Fruit ROtting Along the Monkey
River, Honduras, and No steam
ships TO Garry II.


ships TO Carry II.
The Clarion, newspaper published
at Belize, British Honduras, gives
voice to the troubles of the banana
planters on the Monkey river, south
of that port. G'hey depend wholly
epon the banana crop for a liveli-
hood. The Mobile Steamship Com
pany has for six years been running
a fortnightly service to the river
which has been its chief source of
banana supply, but to-day its vessels
are steaming past the port and buy
ing their cargoes in the harbors of
Guatemala and Honduras, leaving the
Monkey river planters in the lurch,
says the New York sun.
So the planters are writing letters
telling of their grievances. They say
the steamship company has hereto
fore paid fair price and everything
has been satisfactory. In september,
however, the company confronted
the planters with a contract and told
them they must sign it or the service
would be discontinued. The planters
say the proposed contract so changes
the classification of fruit that they
would be robbed of a third of their
income if they assented to it. They
told the company they would not
sign, and now they sit on the
wharf, where the fruit is rotting, and
see the steamers pass by in the offing
on the way to the republics south of
them to load up with bananas for the
American market.
The planters are tasting the bitter
ness of having commodities to sell
without any means of transporting
them to market. They say they will
not sign the contract, for it means
ruin, and they will not assent to in
justice. So they appeal to the colo
NAL government to redress their
wrong. Why, they ask, did not the
government compel the company to
ship the fruit of the colony when
contract was given it to carry the
mails? What will the government do
to secure transportation now that
the planters are helpless and living
in enforced idleness while their crops
are spoiling on their hands? These
planters have from 5000 to 1000
punches of bananas to ship every
week, and there is work for any
steamship company that wants the
job.
British Honduras is the least i'm
portant colony in the British empire.
The interior has been little developed
and everything has gone in a happy
go-lucky way, just as Belize was
named. The English who settled
there named the town Wallace The
Spaniards had difficulty in pronounce
ing the name and they corrupted it
so Belize, and later it came to be
called Belize. The Englishmen in
that warm country were too leth-
argic to oppose this corruption of
the name, and so they lazily acqui-
esced IN the Spanish version of it.
Few regions abound more in nat
ural resources. j. Bellamy wrote IL
years ago: "A remarkable peculiar
ity of the climate and soil is that
almost all the tropical products Of
commercial value may be grown in
the same zone. | have frequently
seen maize, rice, bananas, pineapples,
oranges, coffee, cacao, cotton, cassava,
rubber and cocoanuts all fiourishinp
on the same piece of ground. There
is an abundance of fibre-producing
plants and large extent of land
suitable for cattle and mule breed
ing"
The crying need just now is trans
portation for fruit. and it is to be
hoped that some day the develop
ment of this neglected corner of the
world may be commensurate with it's
large resources.