JULV 



[906] 



THE INDIA RUBBER WORLD 



315 



A FLYING TRIP TO JAMAICA. 



ny the Editoy of ' ' The India Riihhci: World. ' 



'I' AM. MCA — peaceful, fertile, rich in cheap, free labor, 

 I and close to the United States through location and 

 I langua.tje. will some day, perhaps very soon, be an ex- 

 porter of India-rubber g-athcrcd from annual crops. 

 The beginning of experimental ])lanting may l)e even be- 



KINGSTON STREET, KINGSTON. 



fore this article goes to press, hence the story of the island, 

 brielly told. 



I had long wished to visit it and see for myself how it 

 sized up as a place for planting rubber. This wish was in- 

 tensified when Professor N. L. Britton, director of the New 

 York Botanical Gardens, leased the I'"nglish tropical experi- 

 ment station at Chincona. and assured a future for Amer- 

 ican botanical work in which rubber can hardly be ignored. 

 I was more than glad, therefore, when mj- journeyings made 

 it convenient for me to stop and have a look for myself. 

 We left New York late in November on the Saniia. which 

 was crowded; so much so that one of our party, planning 

 for my comfort, wrote a few days prior to the start : 



"I have ordered the upper bunk in Stateroom 21 made 

 up especially for 3'ou, with a delicate blue counterpane, with 

 little pink ribbon bows on the pillows which I think will 

 match up with j'our beautiful complexion ver}- well." 



Newspapers, however, have special privileges, particularl}- 

 when the Editor knows the agent of the line, so I was able 

 to secure a roomy cabin bj- myself, but alas, without the 

 delicate colored counterpane and ribbon. 



Wegotoffin a snow squall and stopped for an hour in 

 Gedney channel to ease up on a hot bearing, and then we 

 put out to sea. It was not too rough to have the port holes 

 open, although an occasional big wave slopped in. Our 

 fellow passengers were a circus troupe on a two years' cir- 

 cuit around the world, via South American ports; some 

 mining and lumbermen bound for Columbia, and a miscel- 

 laneous lot of tourists. One of the lumbermen confessed to 

 owning a small plantation of Castilloa in Honduras, but was 

 far from enthusiastic about it, as he could not keep the na- 

 tives from stealing the rubber, poor though the 3-ield was. 



As we got further South it became warmer very rapidly 

 and soon sweaters and heavj' suits were laid aside. At For- 

 tune Island we took a lot of Jamaica negroes aboard, and 

 one evening they came to the promenade deck and gave a 

 concert. It was very darkeyish, but not half so musical as 

 what the American plantation negroes do. Off the coast of 

 Cuba the temperature on deck was .SS and in mj' cabin, 98. 

 It is unnecessary to state where I spent most of my time. 



Now just a word concerning the place we were to visit. 

 The island of Jamaica was discovered in 1494 b5' Christopher 

 Columbus, who was very much taken by its beauty, and 

 delighted with the politeness and good nature of the na- 

 tives ; so much did he and his followers appreciate them 

 that within a very few years thej- had robbed them of all 

 they had and practically exterminated them. The island, 

 by the way, was not known as Jamaica in those davs, but 

 as Chab-makia, from two Indian words meaning wood and 

 water, or in the thought of the Indian, "watered by shaded 

 rivulets." The Spanish softened the word to Chaniakia, 

 and in turn the English made it Jamaica. 



In 1654 the English captured the island and began to 

 colonize it. For many 3'ears they sent their convicts there 

 to work for the planters, but in 1689 the labor situation was 

 such that the government recognized slaver^-, and for a time 

 all was peaceful. There w^ere several revolts, however, on 

 the part of the slaves, one occurring in 1760, when 60 

 planters were killed and half a million dollars' worth of 



COUNTY NEGROES. 



propertj' dcstroj'ed. The rebels were finally subdued, and 

 as a warning, one of the ringleaders was burned at the 

 stake and two others were put in iron cages and allowed to 

 slowly starve to death. In 1S34 the British government in- 

 sisting that the slaves be freed, arranged an apprentice sys- 

 tem for the 311,000 slaves, by which laborers in the field 

 were to work for six years more and then be free ; while 

 domestic laborers were to work four years more. The crown 

 also paid $30,000,000 indemnit3^ to the owners. After being 

 freed the slaves became English subjects wnth all their 



