The Colfax chronicle. [volume] (Colfax, Grant Parish, La.) 1877-1981, 1907-02-02
LIVING IN SLAVERY.
piTlFuL PLIGHT OF ITALIAN EMF.
GRANTS IN BRAZIL.
Completely at the Mercy OF Crue!
Taskmasters, Unfortunates Wear
Out Their Lives in Hardest
Kind of Toll.

For the last few years Italian peas
antry have been encouraged to emf
CRATE to Brazil, and Roman and F.Sc-
entine reviews have published arti.
cles setting forth the advantages OF
South America for the exploitation OF
Italian capital and labor, says the Lit
erary Digest. In the year 1904, we
are told, there were 100000 Italians
settled in Brazil, 650,000 being In San
Paulo, in the south region OF the re-
public. But according to ,Oreste Ris-
tori. who writes from San Paulo, the
condition of the Italian farm laborers
in that region is most deplorapie.
Writing in the University Poplorae
(Mantua), he speaks of the miserable
slavery of lis fellow countrymen.
They are compelled to work from IL
to IA hours a day. The food given
them is both unwholesome and insif-
ficient. Physical and moral degen-
Grafton has resulted from the hor-
rors of their lot and they have sunk
into a condition below that OF the
brutes. This writer says that al
though heavy taxation and capitalistic
IMPRESSION have driven them to for
eign lands, they find after some years
in South America they have merely
jumped out of the frying pan into
the fire. To quote:
ION their arrival in Brazil they are
distributed through the fazandas, or
farms of the country, and are com
PEELED to labor far beyond their
strength, badly fed. lodged like swine
IN the mud of novels destitute OF
light or fresh air. Here they are ex-
posed to the weather, to disease. to all
the pestilential vapors Of night, with
no alienation for their exhaustion ex-
cepting a few hours of sleep between
sunset and dawn. After years OF
WEAKNESS and tribulation our slaves
of the soil, those strong and indom-
table cultivators of the ground. are
not longer recognizable. Their physi-
cal constitution is broken, their
strength is exhausted, their blood be-
comes impoverished. their spirit is
gone. Even their countenances be-
| tray their condition, for privation and
suffering have emaciated and turned
them into the aspect of skeletons"
The personal liberty of the Italian
settlers has become subject to the
whims of cruel taskmasters, and the
law in San Paulo affords no redress
Mr.. Ristori tells us.
On the fazendas the Italian colon
lists count for nothing. They are mere
ly chattels gifted with the power Of
locomotion, and their masters have
absolute right to them, as to the ne
groes who were formerly their slaves
They are compelled to give up al
their human rights, to think only Of
their duty and to conform to the loca
estimate of their own inferiority tt
their masters, at the risk of being Sc
verely punished Weakness and res
ignation are indispensable requisites
In avoiding the lash of the slave drivel
or foreman, and only in this way
can the laborers escape from . worse
fate"
The worse fate" is forfeiture o
wages, torture and sometimes death
The laws and the Italian consulate
have no protection for the Italian
farm hands of San Paulo. Thus:
1.-THE laws of the land, which breathe
the spirit of the fullest liberalism
have no force in protecting the Italian
colonist. All the guarantees of which
we so freely hear are a mere dea'
letter as regards him. The police in
variably favor the assassins, and tn
magistrates exculpate them. Their ez
cellencies the Italian consuls dine witt
the owners of the fazendas, and tn
horrors Of slavery, apparently put
stop to by Brazilian legislation, ar
actually brought back again in al
their frightful cruelty and still flour
fish under the blue sky Of the reput
hc."