THE MOJOS INDIANS. 
170 
industry during tlicir hours of leisui-e. The community of goods, 
therefore, existed only in favour of their masters ; into whoso pockets 
all the profits of the common Avork went, and who gave to their 
subordinates only such share as they pleased or thought absolutely 
necessary. 
Whether such treatment was at all Christianlike, or not, the famous 
disciples of Loyola must have been the best judges themselves : but 
Eepublican it surely was not ; and our Socialist theorists, not to speak 
of the firebrand-Avielding disciples of the same school. Anil hardly 
assent to this interpretation of their principles. On a revieAV of all 
the circumstances, we cannot look upon the Missions in the same rosy, 
ideal light as Jesuit authors did; yet, when Ave obseiwe the state of 
degeneracy and misery in Avhich the descendants of those Indians (avIio 
in the narroAvness of their views certainly felt themselves happy) exist, 
Anthin a century of the great change in their affairs, it strikes ns that 
the seeming adAmrtage of the greater liberty they noAV enjoy has 
been too dearly purchased. If the J esuits did take advantage of them, 
it was after a cleverly-conceived system, calculated to bear fruit for a 
long season. Their existence, at least, Avas ensured to them ; whereas 
now they are cleaned out, ruined physically and morally, after no system 
at all, by hundreds of pitiless adventurers, who haAm no concern 
whatever for their futiu-e Avelfare. 
MTiile under the rule of the Fathers, they were, it must be OAvned, 
in a condition of tutelage not exactly faAmurable to their future 
development ; but the time of emancipation Avould have arrived to 
them also, perhaps under better auspices than the present ; for let us 
hope tliat the sun of real ciA'ilisation will some day shine upon 
unfortunate BoliA’ia, continually disturbed A\dth internal storms, and that 
her latent treasures will yet emerge to the light. 
In the present state of things, the Indians are entirely in the 
hands of a horde of lawless adventurers, intent upon their own gains , 
from the vain but crafty Bolivian, and the fugiti\'e defaulter from Eio 
de Janeiro, to the ignorant Polish pedlar, and the dirty Neapolitan 
tinker. Under pretext of trading, these cheat and deftaud the artless 
red-skins in the most shameful way. And AAuthal it seems as if these 
people had all sworn to do as much injury as they could to the morals 
of these children of Nature. The A’igarios (the priests of the Pueblos) 
especially do their utmost to undo the Avork of their predecessors. To 
N 2 
