THE PEOPLE 1G7 



and feet, and dress in Parisian styles, although these styles 

 are usually a year or two old by the time they reach Porto 



Rico. 



As has been remarked, the peasants show clearly their 

 Andalusian origin. Although indolent, they are sagacious, 

 and skilful in conversation, fond of eating and drinking, 

 and free in their customs, manners, and morals, as judged 

 by our standard. The poorest gives his best to the pac- 

 ing stranger. They are not disposed to continuous labor, 

 however ; nor is this necessary in so prolific a land. With- 

 out much ambition or thought for the future, they are con- 

 tent to live for the passing to-day. 



In the country the poorer classes are mainly engaged in 

 the business of planting; others live from hand to mouth 

 in the towns or cities. The former live as nearly in a 

 state of nature as the laws will allow, for the simple 

 reason that it pleases them best and is comfortable. The 

 children generally don the garb of civilization at or near the 

 age of ten or twelve. In the interior district the coffee- 

 laborer is paid in plantains; fifty plantains are a day's pay 

 and on this he feeds his family and then sells the rest, los- 

 ing one day per week in going to market, often twenty 

 miles away. The people are very fond of amusements, 

 principally gambling, in which they squander their sub- 

 stance. The gambling habit is common to all classes, from 

 the rich planter and priest down to the lowest beggar. 



Colonel Flinter, the historian of the island, has described 

 the gibaros as like the peasantry of Ireland, proverbial for 

 t heir hospitality ; and, like them, they are ready to fight on 

 the slightest provocation. They swing themselves to and 

 fro in their hammocks all day long, smoking their cigars, 

 and scraping a guitar. The plantain-grove which sur- 

 rounds their houses, and the coffee-trees which grow- 

 almost without cultivation, afford them a frugal subsis- 

 tence. The cabins are thatched with the leaves of the 

 palm-tree; the sides are often open, or merely constructed 

 of the same kind of leaves as the roof, gnch is the mild- 



