1939-02-16 — Page 30

THE HONGKONG TELEGRAPH, THURSDAY, FEBRUARY 16, 1939.

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By William J. Makin

Yesterday, it was reported that the military have been mobilised in Jamaica as result of further disorders. The author of this article apent aeveral months in the troubled area,

T

HERE is irony in the fact that Jamaican natives have just celebrated the centenary of their emancipation from slavery.

Theso labourers, as they bend beneath a kindly sun to cut the cane with their gleaming machetes, are picturesque figures to those British people who look upon Jamaica-aşa winter playground. But in the scrub behind the sugar estates and banana plantations condi- tions are anything but picture- aque. It soon becomes evident

Hongkong Hotel that poverty and hunger stalk

Garage

Phone 27778/9

The

Stubbs Rd.

are

these blue-green hills; and that rags and cast-off clothing the garb of many.

Hongkong Telegraph. tropical or sub-tropical fruits?

Wyndham St., Hongkong 'Phone 26615 February 16, 1939

to

ELS

much as 56 per cent. of the work's stock or three-fifths of the total.

Why should this poverty exist in an island where the soil is. so rich that it will grow almost

The people are industrious enough. Despite their African origin and a suggestion of tro- pical languor, the labourers in the field toil from early dawn until late evening. And, as was shown during the construction

R

Alex Bustamante.

WHY

MEN

RIOT

His voice carries like a high wind,

And on some sugar estates I have visited these conditions are definitely bad, Some workers

live in little huts which can only A Look Through

be described as dog-kennels.

The “Telegraph”

In these wooden boxes, Ilable to be swept away in a hurricane, live whole families. Pigs grunt and root in a patch outside, the patch ropresenting the family's food supply. Many workers do

It offcially announced that the not even possess houses, but Peines Imperini (of Austro-liungary)

with committed eufeldo live in gipsy fashion among the whilst in a stato of nervous insanity.

rovolver

coconut trees.

Others have sold

IN JAMAICA

to their huts

in

50 YEARS AGO

Feb. 10, 1880.

A

The Italian Budget shows very heavy defelts owing to armamenta.

The Court has decreed the dinnolu tion and liquidation of tho Panatua Chant Co. The value of the shares hos

25 YEARS AGO

Feb. 16, 1014. Last week there were twelve cases

65 deaths.

*

Sen is a highly important Convention

United States.

.

10 YEARS AGO

Feb. 16, 1929. Another hole in one has to be re- corded. The feat was performed over the holidays at the sixth hole at Deep Water Bay by Mr. H. F. MacDougall, who has only recently returned from

lome leave. sixth yarde,

hole in 120

*

5 YEARS AGO

Feb. 17, 1034,

*

The Gold Rush

of the present work in Central When a big concern such as the roofing America, the thousands of Messrs. Tate and Lyle arrived order to pay Government taxes.

For the most part Jamaicanf plague antined in the Colony, all THE French

phrase about | Jamaicans employed there give in the island about a year ago

and decided to spend something labour is uncomplaining and Chinese, at all ended fatally. This embarras de richesses surely general satisfaction.

like a million pounds buying and peaceful. The people possess rings the year's total to 70 cases, with applies to the United States in

The inevitable reply is that developing sugar estates, there something of that inherent regard to gold. Never before Jamaica is overcrowded. At the was a certain amount of hostility African happiness which even The outcome of the labourn of Inter- has the United States held so moment the inland supports a from the old planter aristocracy, the direst poverty cannot dispel. national Conference Safety of Life at much of the world's gold. A population of about a million and Rumours that modern labour. But again, like the Africans, which has been signed by all the dele-

quarter. week ago it amounted

Cuba, which has saving devices would be intro. they can easily be roused to antes. One of the chief recommendn ttons dents with the security of naviga been employing some thousands duced spread among the workers, passion that becomes berserk in ius and the steps to be taken to pro- It is these passions vide an ice patrol service in the North of Jamaican workers," is now The fact that Messrs. Tate and its rage.

Atlantle at the cost of the countles repatriating these men, as there Lyle publicly announced that which certain agitators in the principally concerned. This ice patrol is no work for them in the neigh- they sought the betterment of towns, are now playing upon. service is to be under the control of the It so happens that this is bouring, island.

Haiti, too, is labour conditions did not help And it is to the towns, particu- banning regarded as the ratio of Ameri- Jamaicans because of her own older established planters.

the immigration of their initial dealings with the larly Kingston, that the unem- ployed and unemployable swarm. can material power to the poverty. And these returning world's. There is no definite Jamaicans, unemployed for the That powerful body, the Sugar index of material power. But most part, add to the argument Manufacturers' Association, met such indexes as steel output and of those who state the island is in Kingston with representatives

The Much may be heard of thin- of Messrs. Tate and Lyle. The faced Alex Bustamante, a flam bank credit give the United overcrowded.

outcome of the conference was boyantly-speaking figure at most States A three-fifths raling. But the argument is fallacious. that the wages of labourers on There should be none of the Keen economists point out possi- all estates were slightly raised, mass meetings of unemployed in anxiety such as seems generallybilities of development in this and Messrs. Tate and Lyle re of him is that he desires ardently no way ahead, people are beginning Kingston. My own impression | Although the bathing season in still to be felt in America that the island of 2,848,160 acres. There served to themselves the right to become a martyr in Jamaica, ing the Colony's principal summer-time United States will be left "hold-nre, for example, some 413.440 to make whatever provision for a prototype of Uriah Butler in diversion. Unfortunately, despite ing the bag"

as the world's acres of swamp and marsh land the welfare of their workers Trinidad. Nightly his voice de./Inet that we are situate no close to the which could easily be drained they would decide upon. It was claims through the streets of dieult to secure except by the process custodian of gold.

and set to cultivation. Another reason is that the there are Crown lands, number the Frome estate to build cot wind into the remote country-spot. The number of such

Then the body of artisans called in to Kingston and carries like a high / or either renting or building a matshed Because of tages for the workers who even- side of Jamaica. present inward movement is ing 300,000 acres.

There is however, limited, and it thus comer artificial. In the present state continual agitation by natives tually provoked the strike which something Epstein-like in his ing-sheds are in a very fortunate posi

about that people who have these bath- for some form of land settle led to such fatal results. of European alarm, frightenedment, 12,500 of these acres have

poses before the crowd, and there tion, Bume of them, it appears, are br (no manner of moans above indulging in money holders are transferring been set aside.

It has been emphasised that it is no doubt that the crowd be-sheer profiteering when it comes either to selling or Intting their sheds. There their wealth into dollars, which

has thus arisen what has come to be Land hunger is very evident in was town labourers taken to leve in him. were available at the United | Jamaica,

An extraordinary individual, known as "the matshed ramp, a sub- as well as bodily Westmoreland who provoked the

There is the obvious a money-lender, a powerful Ject which is arousing considerable alle-

cumaton at the moment. States Treasury in return for hunger; and if the island were trouble.

that cane-feld workers speaker, and an incessant letter- gold at $35 an ounce. Thus properly. developed it could reply

so writer to Labour `M.P.s in much of America's gold hoard maintain another half-million have been depressed for

many years that only the intro- England and the local is refugee capital. It follows people easily.

duction of town agitators would papers. Listening to him there that, as soon as the fears in It is the sugar and banana provoke them to revolt against is no doubt that Jamaica is anj Europe subside, gold will start plantations that provide a bitter- their present conditions. island of despair. to flow outward, as European money holders, their fears at rest, seek to repatriate their capital for money-making use.

sweet atmosphere. Several planters have endeavoured to give their labourers decent living conditions. These same planters recognise that such conditions make for contentment, even if Only with political appease the working wage for cutting ment can these alarms and ex-sugar cane makes for discontent. cursions on the foreign ex-It is these planters who, after changes be avoided.

Sorrow for Spain

war

Pity the people of Spain whose moves into a dreadful, maybe final, resistance without hope. Pity brave men who turn at bay, battered by an over- whelming weight of arms. Pity for older men who dig feverishly tho hasty trenches that will be graves to-morrow.

long hereditary ownership, are recognised as the aristocracy of Jamaica, Several of them have mixed with native blood, but that has assured their 'continu-

ance,

The planters, particularly those owning sugar estates, are among the most powerful groups in Jamaica. They have not hesitated to depose English Governors who challenged their autocracy. On the other hand, recent years have seen world economic factors challenging their existence--the develop- One end only, unless France ment of sugar beet growing, ateps in, the only Power that world sugar quotas and general can change the fortune of thís economic depression. war in a day.

One end only there can be, whether it comes through a sudden cracking or drags on in slow torture.

Sugar estates which received To all who fight against a tremendous filip during tho appalling odds, to all lost causes Great War are now declining | manfully defended, admiration sadly. The labourer, for his and sorrow go out. For the hire, still receives a matter of innocent victims of ambition and five or seven shillings weekly, hatred, the children and the after tilling' his' own little plot] women, the heart keeps its pity.for two or three days in a dos- Let there be an end, at any perate effort to feed himself and price an end," of the horror.

his family,

GRIN AND BEAR IT

PRIVATE

ZA UZE, PRES.

W MAROG

OF PENCIL

Llian Opp. 1800 ky Unčted Posters REMAINDE, IME:

newo-

to look about for facilities for enjoy.

the

BER, facilities are at present oxtremely

or similar structure at some convenient pois in,

U.S. DEBATE ON NEUTRALITY

WASHINGTON, Feb. 15. "WHEN WE SEE England'

By Lichty and France go down, we are

Yoo hoo, dear—I just wanted to tell you I won't bother you about my dress allowance any more--I opened a charge decount?"

threatened," declared Represen.. tative Stephen Pace, a member of the House Military Affairs Committee in defending the sales of warplanes abroad, be- fore the House to-day.

"Isn't it better to sell England and France planca for defence than go to war with a big Power, and prevent encroachment on this_hemisphere?" asked Representative Pace..

He naerted that he United States "for selfish reasons," would be forced defensively

ively to aid, Canada or Britain.

in an emergency, and ho declored that Frealdent Roosevelt might well have sold our first

ever

Is Enviend and France" of defence Mr. Pace reminded the House of the possibility of

of the cession of Bermuda it

it Germany were victorious over England and France. The Republican member, Mr. Charles Gifford, started; the debate.on foreign palley by declaring that the sale of planes made the inference dreadfully plain that the United States was alliancing itself "with somebody." He said that the present defence programmo was undermining the Neutrality Act, which WAN designed to keep the United States out of war.—Reuter.

French Fascists Rounded Up

Paris, Feb. 15. Over 200 members of a ̈ ̈pocret. Fascist organisation and organisations with Fascist sympathias, have:bean, arrested.----Neuter Special.

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