A PROSPECTIVE SUGAR KING NEAR BUFF BAY Many little patches of cane are worked by the natives for home consumption. In 1865, after a negro outbreak at Morant Bay, it was decided by the British that thereafter there should be no legislative assembly, but that the powers of government should be reposed in the English sovereign. Thereunder is a Governor, a Privy Council, and a Legislative Council. The The Privy Council, as well as the Governor, is appointed by the King of England. The Legislative Council is made up of the Governor as President, five ex officio members, ten appointed members, and fourteen elected members. Thus the white majority in the council, coupled with the veto power of the Governor, insures that, even if all of the fourteen elected members were blacks, the whites would still be in control of the island administrative affairs. By this arrangement the negroes can always have the fun of the political game without harm befalling the island thereby. Slavery was abolished by the British Government in 1834, as those who sometimes sit in judgment of that empire should remember, and the slaveholders recompensed for the loss of their serfs. The immediate results of this voluntary manumission in Jamaica were no better than those of war-enforced emancipation in our own South, however; for, little knowing how to use their new-found freedom, the erstwhile slaves settled down to such irresponsible idleness that agriculture, the one big industry of the island, was almost paralyzed. Most of the bigger planters, foreseeing the deluge of idleness that would follow, sold their lands at a sacrifice and, taking their wealth with them, returned to England for good. The poorer planters were not able to follow suit, and the ensuing years saw them struggling along with idle people all around, but labor unattainable. To remedy these difficulties, the gov A boatload of logwood on the Black River near Lacovia (see, also, Color Plate VIII). ernment undertook the importation of coolie labor from the East Indies and, with these coolies as a nucleus, began the rehabilitation of agriculture. Many of the East Indians are still there, and surely their lot is greatly improved when compared with that of their fellows in their own overcrowded land (see pp. 10 and 11). As the years passed, the freed negroes began to discover that, even in so rich a modern Eden as is Jamaica, some work is required if one is to eat regularly; and the urge of hunger, among other things, brought them back into the cane fields, sugar mills, and rum stills.' However, the necessities are so few in the eyes of the rural Jamaican negro, and the dolce far niente appeal so persuasive, that he is able to exist with comparatively little exertion. So, on the island in general and in the rural sea-level districts in particular, the urge of existence does not call for steady labor the year round. House rent demands no place, generally speaking, in the rural-dwelling Jamaican black's budget. He can build his own home of heavy grass and thatch it with banana leaves, or he can make it of mud and thatch, with cobbled floor. The more prosperous among the natives build wood houses out of old packing cases, scraps of cast-off corrugated roofing, flattened kerosene-can tin, and the like. Tropical vines. soon hide the patchwork, for Dame Nature is a great healer of scars. Nor is clothing a pressing problem with the rural blacks. The children may run naked during the tender years. The womenfolk dress in cotton gowns, which they wear as long as there is a piece left, barring Sundays, when they appear neatly and becomingly attired, and those occasions when they go into the city to market. The men wear long cotton drawers or the remains of trousering, shady shirts, and battered, frayed straw hats; but, in good sooth, who cares? Now and then in passing along the roads one has a flash of a turbaned figure of the East, or his shy womankind in head scarf, with silver ornaments on arm and NEWCASTLE, A POINT OF VANTAGE Photograph by Publishers' Photo Service Beautifully located on a summit 3,000 feet above the Caribbean, this resort is much frequented by residents of the isle in summer and by foreign visitors during their winter stay. En route to Moneague, in the Parish of St. Ann, is situated the remarkable forest glade between the high hills one passes through several miles of amazing ferns that fringe the road. hair, trembling filmies, and others of the fern family. Photograph by Jacob Gayer called by the unromantic name of "Fern Gully.' Deep AS THE JAMAICAN HOUSEWIFE BAKED A CENTURY AGO Customs do not change greatly among the humble people of the island; thus they bake their bread and cakes to-day as of old. ankle and now and then a nose jewel, giving a touch of oriental atmosphere to the mellow scenery. SIDELIGHTS OF NATURE With less than 2 per cent of the population white and with living conditions so easy, it may well be imagined that the rural Jamaican negro has comparatively little inner urge to lift him above the Gold Coast outlook of his ancestors, and that he is about the most care-free, happy-golucky human being in the world in spite of public schools. Even in his ancient proverbs we read of the perpetuation of his past in his present, and his religious ceremonials are now and then a strange admixture of barbarian rites and Christian practices. "Cho," meaning chore, "too much boderation" is the way the older rural Jamaican black puts it, as he leaves the care of his patch, the gathering of his food, and the collection of the little fuel required for cooking to his womankind. "Tek time get dey to-day" is the Jamaican's equivalent of "more haste, less speed." "Greedy choke puppy" is his way of telling his children that if they eat too fast they will choke. "When black man tief, him tief half a bit; when bockra tief, him tief whole plantation," is his way of saying that a negro is a petty thief and a white man a big embezzler. "Darg hab liberty fe watch gubnor" is his equivalent of a cat may look at a queen, while "Behind darg it is 'Darg'; before darg it is 'Mr. Darg,'" is his way of saying he pays homage only when he has to. "When fish come out o' sea an' tell you alligator hab feber, belieb him"; "Rocktone a riber bottom never know sun hot"; "If snake bite you, you see lizard, you run"; "Coward man keep soun' bone"; "Braggin' riber neber drown s'mody"; "One finger can't catch louse," are samples of Jamaican philosophy in native lingo. With the advance of education, the use of such homely proverbs has tended to lessen, and, if you ask him to explain one you hear, the Jamaican black will prob |