The Meridian times. (Meridian, Idaho) 1909-1938, 1913-08-22

Cut. 2--one of the Great Emer.
to Protect the Locks.
and often have considerable educa-
ton. The best of them have found
positions as clerks, stewards and the
like. The Barbadians are in the main
dense1y ignorant, but they are q
happy lot and as they stream away
from the canal to their quarters in
the evening they sing, frolic and play
practical jokes as though they had
not just completed day of back
breaking labor. They receive an aver
age of $50 month, their meals cost
them 30 cents day and their living
| quarters almost nothing unless they
prefer to rent rooms from outsiders.
Then they get the worst of it, for
rentals for ordinary rooms, without
| furniture and conveniences, are ex.
orbitant. The barracks for laborers
provided by the commission are fitted
with several tiers of hunks made of
canvas slung on iron frames. At reg
ular intervals these are taken down
and boiled, and such other sanitary
measures as are necessary are car
ried out with regularity and pre-
| cision.
| If the laborer is injured or falls i'll,
there is a dispensary and doctor
| close at hand, and if the case is at
all serious the patient is sent to the
hospital at Ancon or Colon. There
| he receives free as skilfIl treatment
as money could buy, and there he is
kept until he RECEIVERS or dies.
There is intense rivalry between
the Jamaican and the "Bajian." for
each believes firmly that his island
is bigger and better than the others,
and. incidentally, both btSieve that
both Jamaica and Barbados are larger
than Cuba Their looks of dismay
when shown map of the West In
dies are comical to behold
Two things these negroes are ex-
tremely fond of-religion and rum.
And both are rather disastrous to
many of them. The insane asylum
whose buildings straggle up one slope
of Ancon hill is full of them, and
according to the doctors most of them
have been brought there by either
rum or religion. Every evening in
the streets of Panama may be en-
countered large groups of negroes,
listening to the exhortations of some
leader, often woman, and singing
with fervor the hymns she intones
for them. On other corners are de-
70 oh r,aa ntc nF he CaIx
working with equal enthusiasm. And
in the living quarters and the hos
pitfalls groups will surround some
amateur pastor who breaches to them
and prays for, them. In these ways,
when they are not drinking, the ne
groes spend much of their leisure
time, and as they are impressionable
and excitable and ignorant. the re-
suits are not always good.
Pay day in the zone furnishes
some interesting scenes. The pay
car traverses the railway and a. each
labor camp or town long line of
negroes files through it. Each man
Identification tag with one hand and
in the other hold his hat or cap Into
the latter the cashier shoves the sill
yer coins that make up the work
mans monthly stipend. The process
is extraordinarily rapid, as it must
be for there are many thousands of
laborers to be paid.
Up near the summit of Ancon hill
is large patch of ground where no
vegetation ever grows. According to
the legend, an Indian maiden sat
there centuries ago and wept bitterly
for the fate of her countrymen whom
she could see far below toiling under
the lashes of the cruel Spaniards. Her
salt tears flowed down the hillside
and SO impregnated the soil that
henceforth no vegetation could exist
there. If any maiden from Jamaica
or Barbados ever sits up there, she
need not weep over the lot of her fell
low-islanders. Indeed, her smiles at
their happy condition might well re-
store that bit of land to its pristine
fertility. Her husband, father or
brother is earning more than he ever
did before, is living better, and when
he returns to his island home may
have saved up enough to loaf for a
long time under the shade Of the
sheltering palm
So the real diggers of the canal,
though unnorored and unsunS. are
well paid, well fed and well housed.
In their degree they are as fortunate
as any others who have found en-
ployment in the zone.