188 THE IEEIGTION A GE. 



It has been due largely to antiquated machinery that the sugar 

 interests of the islands have never paid as they should. Even under 

 the conditions which existed for years previous to the war, the sugar 

 mill owners made very large amounts of money. I have stopped for 

 weeks with some of them, and their homes are fitted with modern con- 

 veniences, the sons and daughters have been educated in Spanish 

 schools, one hears piano playing, and there are indications of general 

 prosperity. Then one may go to the sugar mill and there find the 

 source of revenue for the family to consist of a broken down old shack 

 in which animal traction is the power, and in which naked natives are 

 employed at sugar making after the crudest of style. Yet these sugar 

 mills have been and are now little gold mines to the owners, and many 

 of the proprietors are immensely rich and spend much of their time 

 with their families traveling abroad. With such good profits on the 

 sugar cane crop under the crude methods used, the opportunity for 

 increasing the profits by using modern machinery would be very great. 

 There is a good future of sugar growing in the islands, and the most 

 important advancement will be made when better systems of irrigation 

 are introduced. 



COFFEE PLANTATIONS AWAITING IRRIGATION, 



The first operations in the Philippines towards the development 

 of the coffee plantations should be in the direction of irrigation. The 

 writer rode for many days through coffee lands which were in bad con- 

 dition and partly abandoned because of the extra dryness of the sea- 

 son, while in the mountains nearby there were many pools of water, 

 formed by numerous brooks, which might be utilized if the proper 

 apparatus were employed. 



In taking up new coffee lands in the islands the natives clear away 

 the undergrowth, and the coffee berry is planted and some sort of 

 shade is arranged for, as the full power of the hot tropical sun would 

 destroy many of the young plants. The next season the plants are 

 arranged in rows with alleys between. As the plants attain growth 

 the poorest are thinned out. Coffee raising in the Philippines has 

 paid some of the larger investors extremely well. I know of some 

 recent comers who have made considerable money by starting planta- 

 tions and afterwards selling them at high values. 



In some of the plantations on the island of Panay they have ar- 

 ranged for irrigating the lands by pumping water from the rivers by 

 means of crudely designed windmills. The mills are made something 

 after the style of the old mills employed 100 years ago for turning the 

 grinding rolls of flour mills. At one place the water raising device 

 was erected from a series, of buckets arranged to be run up full of 

 water from the river and back empty by means of animal traction. 

 All sorts of water-lifting devices are employed. There were few good 

 pumps in service, although I saw some which had been imported from 



