A PLANTATION IN A TROPICAI, FOREST 119 
What can the white man do? He must develop wants in 
the Indians so that he will work to supply them. The 
Spaniard has solved the problem in this way: The Indian 
acquires a taste for drink, and to satisfy it he is willing to 
work. He must have his daily liquor, pulque, aqua- 
ardiente, or mescal, and periodically he must have a grand 
spree. As long as he is in debt or cannot borrow money, 
he is contented and happy, but once out of debt he becomes 
restless, and will not work until he has raised all the money 
he can borrow, and then he has a grand carouse, in which 
he spends every cent he has or that he can borrow. After 
this he goes back to work and contentedly works out his 
debt. Once out of debt another carouse must come as soon 
as he has credit once more. 
The Spaniards, or Spanish Mexicans, that is the big 
planters, thus keep their laborers in control. I speak of 
the South of Mexico and of Yucatan. Iam not so sure of 
the north. : 
The Mexican planters keep their laborers under the 
influence of liquor which they sell to them at enormous 
profit, and keep them always in debt, thus, especially in 
Yucatan, they have established a perfect peonage, almost 
slavery. 
The big planters or ranchmen own almost all the land. 
Thousands, and sometimes hundreds of thousands of acres 
are in single estates. They wili not sell this in small lots. 
The common people have no chance to acquire small farms, 
and this also tends to keep them from advancing, 
But into this nature’s Paradise, spoiled by man, has 
come a new element—the Southern Pioneer from Canada 
or the United States. We hear much of Western Pioneers, 
but seldom of Southern Pioneers, but the finest and most 
forceful examples of this type are in the Spanish countries 
to the South. All over Mexico and Central America, and 
reaching far into South America, one sees the American 
and Canadian Pioneer. Wherever there are railroads to be 
