THE SOUTH AMERICAN ISLANDS 369 



One of the chief sources of value to Trinidad is the 

 asphalt lake, which supplies the material for American 

 pavements. This is a plain of one hundred acres more or 

 less, situated about sixty miles south of Port of Spain. 

 The lake has a I )lack surface, with inky pools of soft bitu- 

 men and spots of yellow bubbles and water-cracks. The 

 surface is yielding, and a strong odor of sulphureted hy- 

 drogen prevails. Anything more black and repulsive can 

 hardly be Imagined. It has been likened to a vast asphalt 

 pavemenl with many holes filled with inky waters in 

 which swim ugly fish and black beetles. When pieces of 

 pitch arc taken from the lake, nature at once begins to re- 

 pair the damage, and in twenty-four hours the hole is filled 

 again. The tract is leased by the government to an 

 American asphalt company for forty-one years, and yields 

 a revenue of $142,500 a year to the government. The 

 company has established machinery near the lake to crush 

 and purify the pitch, which comes from the lake in carts. 

 It is formed in blocks, packed in barrels or transported in 

 bulk by elevated trolleys direct to the ships at La Brea. 



The population of Trinidad is two hundred and forty- 

 five thousand people, and it is a medley of English, French, 

 Spaniards, negroes, and coolies. The English go there to 

 make money and go home again. Old families have but 

 few representatives left. The Caribbean natives have long 

 since vanished, and negroes and East India coolies have 

 taken their place, and now constitute four fifths of the 

 population. 



The chief laboring element of Trinidad are the coolies, 

 of whom there are ninety-eight thousand upon the island. 

 They are brought from Hindustan, under contract, at the 

 expense of the colony, and under care of the government 

 agents. They are apprenticed to owners for five years. 

 The Hindus are of low cast.- and do not amalgamate with 

 the blacks. They dwell by themselves in little huts of a 



peculiar type, and maintain their own dreSS, priests, and 



religious ceremonials. Rice, cassava-roots, and fruits sup- 



24 



