The free lance. (Fredericksburg, Va.) 1885-1926, 1910-03-10
CONDITIONS
CONTRASTED
Interesting Letter From Rev. J.
Y. DOwnman
HIS IMPRESSIONS ABROAD
Constantinople, Feb. l2. 1910.
To The Free Lance:

10 lhe Free Lance:
have often advised people who
thought they had more troubles than
anybody else in the world TO 90 occa-
sionally to hospitals and aims houses, to
homes for incurables and TO the poor
districts of our cities and see some
thing of the suffering and destitution
and wretchedness Of other people.
Those who have done this have as
rule been very much benefited. The
contrast between their lot and that of
others has been a revelation and they
have been happier and more contented
because of IL. On the same principle.
II an American is discontented with his
country, II he thinks his opportunities
small and his comforts few, and his
chances Tor progress and promotion
sim, he ought. if possible, to leave
his country for little while and visit
the old world. This visit need not in
clude what we call the near East. -
We never have thought there was anv
room for comparison between ourselves
and Oriental peoples. Let the visit
then be to Europe alone. Let the
American go first to the island of
Madeira, belonging to Portugal. Here
frost never falls, flowers bloom in pro-
fusion all the year. The sea tempers
OF summer. The clouds coming in con-
tact with the mountain peaks are con-
densed into rain, which runs in bitches
along the sides of mountains and is
used whenever wanted for irrigation.
SO there is no such thing as drought.
All kinds of fruits and vegetables
grow, and grapes and sugarcane are
the staple crops. Yet on this beauti-
tul island so blessed of nature we saw
conditions which cannot obtain in Vir-
ginia. Beggars are everywhere and
simply wore one out by their impor-
tunity. Old men and women, seventy
years old in appearance, went bare
footed and carried the heaviest loads
on their heads and backs. We saw one
woman carrying on her head five bask-
cts full of produce. making a load
about as high as she was tall. We
looked into the house of one Of the peo-
pie and found the floor paved with
cobblestones, just like the streets out
side. The bread in the market was
very dark and was made of flour i'm
ported from Manitoba. No wheat is
grown on the island. The duty we
were told on wheat is so great that the
mills cannot afford 20 export the flour,
so they import just so much wheat as
the island can use, and that is very
little. Only few of the people can
afford TO eat -four bread and the .at
mass of them eat corn bread only and
very seldom have any meat, and these
people are Europeans.
Let's take look at Spain. In a ride
OF one hundred miles across the country
between two cities, one of them twice
the size Of Richmond, we never saw a
tree except fruit trees and one or two
groves of pines The pines were trim
med up to a few branches at the top
and every vestige of the trimming used
for wood. We saw boat loads of these
pine trimmings, many of them no big
ger than mans finger, tied in bundles
and piled up on the dock at Cadiz.
In the country we passed through
men were digging up the fields with
hoes, preparatory to planting their
crops. When any blowing was done it
was generally with oxen and a primi-
tive wooden plow was used with one
handle. Now and then a team of horses
was worked to plow with a yoke and
a pole just like Virginia OK yokes. We
have heard Of the fine Spanish Jacks
and Andelusian mules, but with the
exception of some fine ones in the cities
the general run of the mules was little
better than donkeys and those in the
country were so poor il was wonder to
me how they did any work at all.
The country people looked poor and
haggard and prematurely old: they
live in houses with roofs covered with
straw something like the roofs the Vir-.
ginia farmers put on their cattle sheds
IN winter. Numbers of women were
working in the fields with hoes and
some of them acted as ''flagmen' at
the railroad crossings. With US the
refuse from hotel and the tables of peo-
pie generally is either given to dogs
and hogs or taken to the crematory and
burned, but in Spain we saw a man
with great hamper of garbage selling
1t by handfuls and the people crowding
around him, more eagerly than they do
around the first watermelon cart of the
season in fredericksburg, buying the
garbage and sitting down on the spot
and eating it. | remember the de-
lighted look on the face of a child as
she held up to her mother a bone, on
which were several mouthfuls of meat.
And yet these people work hard and
step along briskly and will do anything.
With US when one man has to handle a
bale OF hay or bag of fertilizer he
has TO have hook or truck or he
rolls II or drags it along in any sort of
ing barge of beans in sacks: each
sack weighed 2l4 pounds. These men,
with the help of another, got these
sacks Zone at a time) on their heads
and stepped off as briskly as if the bag
weighed no more than 25 pounds and
did this all day long. The people are
as polite and courteous as possible,
ready to help you in any difficulty as to
showing you where you want to go and
interpreting your signs. They are
ahead of US in this. The soil in this
part of Spain is wonderfully rich, Anv-
thing that is raised in Virginia will
grow readily here and as much as thir-
ty bushels of wheat to the acre are
raised right along in the best soils.
And yet in spite of so many advantages.
all this povertyl One cause, we were
told, is that the land is owned in great
measure by few, and this is the case
as we know in many other places in
Europe. Under such conditions the
poor man has no chance at all to acquire
land and has to grind out a living on
anything the landlord chooses to give.
In the matter of taxes, the State as
rule takes from US for general pur-
poses something like 4Oc. in the hun
dred dollars, and in Richmond, for in
stance, the whole thing, State and city.
amounts to $1.70 in the hundred dollars
and yet our people grumble and com
plain about excessive taxation. OF
course II is hard to make a comparison
here, because the whole system Of gov
ernment is different from ours and il
seems to me that what follows must be
taken with a grain Of allowance; at