LABOUR AND LABOURERS. 4! 



in that case they would bolt, his estate would get 

 a bad name, and he would be left entirely without 

 labour. 



When the first morning for work comes and 

 the mornings in the jungle are decidedly raw and 

 cold, with usually a thin, drizzling mist or damp 

 fog hanging about until the sun is up the planter 

 turns out about 5 a.m., and, after sounding the 

 muster-call on his great bell or gong, makes a hasty 

 toilet and partakes of the invigorating hot Coffee 

 and toast which his " cook boy" has prepared. 

 Then, as soon as the coolies, all swaddled up to 

 their chins in blankets, have sauntered up to the 

 open ground by his hut, he takes his memorandum- 

 book and goes down to divide them according to 

 the work to be done. Twenty men, perhaps, under 

 one maistry, are sent with axes and crowbars to 

 cut and move the logs from the line of a new road ; 

 ten or twelve more to weed the " nursery ;" so 

 many women and children, under two or three 

 overseers (they always want a lot of looking after) , 

 take baskets and hoes and depart to weed the 

 Coffee land already planted ; some are sent to fetch 

 grass, some to building, and so on. As each party 

 goes down to the store to get the necessary tools, 

 the assistant has to see that each one takes the 

 right thing and only the right thing, and the building 

 is full of coolies pushing, fighting, and quarrelling, 

 some taking the wrong implements, and some none 

 at all, in spite of vigorous endeavours to get affairs 



