18 



COOLIES. 



nated by pairs of those dark swimming and propitiatory 

 eyes, which exhaust the language of tenderness and pas- 

 sion at a glance. 



But they are the most inveterate mendicants on the 

 island. It is said that those brought from the interior of 

 India are faithful and efficient workmen, while those from 

 Calcutta and its vicinity are good for nothing. Those that 

 were prowling about the streets of Spanishtown and King- 

 ston, I presume, were of the latter class, for there is not a 

 planter on the island it is said, from whom it would be more 

 difficult to get any work than from one of these. They sub- 

 sist by begging altogether, they are not vicious, nor intem- 

 perate, nor troublesome particularly, except as beggars. In 

 that calling they have a pertinacity before which a north- 

 ern mendicant would grow pale. They will not be denied. 

 They will stand perfectly still and look through a window 

 from the street for a quarter of an hour if not driven away, 

 with their imploring eyes fixed upon you, like a stricken 

 deer, without saying a word, or moving a muscle. They 

 act as if it were no disgrace for them to beg, as if the least 

 indemnification which they are entitled to expect, for the 

 outrage perpetrated upon them in bringing them from their 

 distant homes to this strange island, is a daily supply of 

 their few and cheap necessities, as they call for them. 



I confess that their begging did not leave upon my mind 

 the impression produced by ordinary mendicancy. They 



