TRINIDAD : THEN AND MOW- 147 



sity for it to be tested, for the offender never came up 

 to receive them and his country ■ 6 knew him no more. ' ' 

 As for this story se non e vero, e ben trovato. 



There is also another cause for this poverty, 

 although it is observable in a lesser degree, that of 

 deporting — I think deporting is the proper word — 

 from India under the indentured labour system 

 many who were unsuitable as labourers, and being 

 unable to perform the class of work for which they 

 were introduced soon became an unwelcome burden 

 on the planters and in course of time on the colony 

 in general. Hence, from the causes named, one sees 

 more beggars wandering about Now than Then 



Having alluded to the poverty amongst us, and 

 endeavouring to account for its cause, I will now re- 

 turn to other matters of a more pleasing nature. 



Leaving Port-of-Spain and visiting country dis- 

 tricts the first thing that struck me after my arrival, 

 was the apparent poverty of the labouring classes. 

 I have used the word apparent in the visual sense 

 only, for when I came, in a very short time, to see 

 things in their matter-of-fact aspect, I found that 

 what I had taken as resembling poverty, mainly 

 from the scantiness, untidiness, and want of clean- 

 liness of the clothing worn by the workers, was not 

 in reality an indication of poverty. The scantiness 

 and untidiness of the clothes they were wearing 

 was suitable to the climate and their emplovment. 



I soon saw them on Sundays, market days, and 

 holidays decked out in at least some of their finery. 



