The daily morning journal and courier., 1902-03-22


 tion midway between Christianstoed
 and Frederickstoed The way thereto
 led over one of the excellent roads for
 which the island is famous, bordered on
 both sides by a tangle of gorgeous nas-
 turtiums, tall spires of organ" cactus
 and giant century" plants, (AgaVe Americana), fragrant white jessamine rioting over every wall and hedge-roW and frangipani common as a coW-slips | in marshy meadow at home, pertaining 1 the air. DiVersing from the road are many green valleys which we long to explore, where a world of strange ] flowers allured us and shade was of | fered by delicate-leaved, tamarini trees and the silk cottonWoods with their enormous mis-shapen roots Writh ing about like colossal serpents turned to stone and their long horizontal branches, upholding multitudes of air plants. The last half-mile to the plan tation gate was magniticently bordered by double rows of cocoa palms. impress stve as the pillared arches of some an- cient temple This particular planta- tion is now devoted largely to the man. ufacture of Santa Cruz rum, instead of the former saccharine product. Since time out of mind this island has been famous for it's rum, you know, and it is still a profitable industry. There is hardly any tale of piraticai days with out some alusion to it, and if half the stories are true, one must believe that the old buccaneers disdained to get drunk on anything else They used to put into the now choked-up harbor of Christianstoed for the sole purpose of loading up with rum-both them selves and their ships-and any enc who is at all familiar with the powerful qualities of the rum, can readily under stand the subsequent ferocity of those sad sea dogs.
 Our Danish host informed me that he pays his negro laborers an average of twenty cents day for the men, and twelve cents for the women, who ap- pear to do the most work. But none over-tax themselves, you may be sure, and there seemd to be a grinning dar- key to every square inch-mostly resi- ing on their hoes and chattering like a flock of black birds l counted forty seven women pretending to be at work in one tWo-acre lot, besides few men and troops of children. They use ei- gantic hoes of different sizes the smallest being bigger that half dozen of ours and the clumsy implements are evidently effective for not weed is to be seen The very old negroes, male | and female who are too decrepit for | anything else, feed the huge boilng'- | vats through the hopper. Now that the 1 days of compulsory labor are over the | negroes indulge their prejudices to the l full and while a few planters can al- | ways secure plenty of laborers, nothing | will induce the blacks to do a stroke of | work for others. On the favored plan | tations all is hustle and hurry for | few weeks with an immense amount of f noise and fuss to help the work along; the rest of the year idleness, One Won- 1ers how the swarming black popua- ton manage to live, on the small, bare sland. The secret of 1t is in the genlai the bounty of nature and .heir simple habits. Any West India 1arkey can fare sumptuously evry day 1n a banana and a flying fish, and those adbles cost nothing here; or in default If these, "I draw my belt one hole tighter, ma am" explained an old ne- gro with whom l discussed the prob em A common saying in these islands 70 indicate extraordinary plumpness is As fat as a darkey in cane time" Ev- ny colored person of the lower class ] whom you see anywhere, big and little, , Jld and young is sure to be sucking or ,hewing a section of Cane-stalk, and the babies appear to be literally raised on t. No matter how hot is it, or what work they pretend to be doing, there l s always leisure enough to munch the sweet morsel much as cows half-un- chew their cud
 The combination of modern machn- lry with old fashined methods employ d upon some of these estates forms an pdd commingling of the past and pres mt. Side by side you see a wheezing i'd windmill for crushing the cane, and
 modern steam appliance for the anne purpose. The cane is hauled from he fields in great, fiaring, two-wheled arts, to each of which is attached four -okes of shaggy under sized oXen | .uided by half-nude negroes, armed with long, sharp pointed goads of cane, mid a superfuous amount of shouting l nd yelling. When the carts arrive at he mills, scantily clothed women tand in line waiting to carry it on their eads to the crushers, genrally chant ng a rolicking chorus as they go, or houting ribald jokes to one another. |