CHAPTER XIV. 



Central Mills. 



I have stated that the planters discourage the partition 

 of the land into small properties, because it tends to pro- 

 mote the independence of the laboring classes, and indi- 

 rectly to advance the cost of labor ; I have also stated the 

 prices of labor to range as low as the lowest, in any civi- 

 lized country in the world, and four or five times lower 

 than in the country from which they import about three- 

 fifths of their bread stuffs. That the apprehensions of the 

 planters are well founded, there can be no question ; and 

 that the prices of labor ought to advance, is also beyond a 

 question. Labor will always bring its value unless in some 

 way coerced, and hence its price in Jamaica must rise, or it 

 will continue to be as it now is, inefficient, and its supply 

 irregular. Nor is it the duty of the political economist or 

 the statesman to make it otherwise. It is rather their 

 duty to remove all the restrictions by which it is burdened , 

 and then it will be as abundant and as productive here as 



