118 A PLANTATION IN A TROPICAL FOREST 
est plantation in Tehuantepec we found pottery and obsidian 
knives, though a forest of great age had been apparently 
untouched above them. There are great pyramids, larger 
than those in Egypt, and huge temples, all built by a people 
who had entirely disappeared before the white man came. 
The Indians know nothing of them, and have’nt even tra- 
ditions of them. When Cortez came 400 years ago there 
were many picture-writings by the Indians in existence, 
but these were almost all destroyed by the monks in an ex- 
cess of religious zeal. The writings may have told of the 
vanished races, but we do not know. The aztec traditions 
simply affirm that these monuments were not built by 
them but by a race that had vanished centuries before, but 
whence the race came, who they were, or whither they 
went, no one knoweth. 
MAN AND NATURE IN THE TROPICS. 
CONDITIONS OF LABOR. 
I am tempted to make some observations about the 
condition of native races in the tropics and the labor 
problem. In this favored region I believe that life can be 
sustained with as little effort as in any part of the world. 
A few cuttings of bananas will produce abundant nourish- 
ing food. A little corn, a few other seeds are planted 
without plowing the ground, simply stuck in with a sharp 
stick. A little coffee or cacao can be raised and sold forthe 
needs that the land does not produce. Chickens, ducks 
and turkeys pick a free living around the hut and under 
the coffee and banana trees. A couple of days work ora 
little more will build a hut as good as the Indian cares for. 
These little tasks done, nature supplies him bountifully. 
Why should he work ? 
But we must work to develop the country. He must 
work so that the white man can live in superior luxury. 
