THE RESULT OF A SPREE. 
of his own with him ; he would smoke no more of 
Wildgoose’s tobacco, 
Mr. Brown was very unwell, not able to go out to 
work, as he went into his bed-room, lay down on the 
couch, and fell asleep. The head kan^iani had noticed 
the master’s arrival, and came to the bungalow, to 
report on the out-turn and the various works, but, the 
master being invisible, he went to the c okhouse: 
The servant looks into the bungalow, L.oks through a 
crevice in the door, or takes a sly peep at the window, 
returns and reports : “ Master asleep.” Then the 
whole doings of yesterday are discussed in the kitchen; 
they are all known, very well known, the shf)oting 
of the cat, even the amount of beer and brandy con- 
sumed; it was even told to the kangani, that master 
bad drunk off two tumblers of cold water when he 
arrived, and that he di I not eat any breakfast. The 
kangani goes oat to the W'>rking place and reports 
everything to the sub-kang inies, v/ho in their turn 
told the coobes» The work row all begins to get slack, 
and nobody seems to do anything. I he head kangani 
and a few of his favourites go off to the lines, the 
others sit down and commence to chatter. In the 
course of the afternoon Mr. Brown visits the working 
place, but, as be could not tell where they had com-^ 
menced to work in the morning, he culd not tell how 
much or what had been done : he t(^ok the kaugani^s 
word for it, and went away. 
An old estate proprietor once said to me, “I highly 
approve of planters meeting together occasionally in 
a friendly social way. The one receives information 
from the other, and a little genial society occasionally 
i3 needful and necessary, but I do object to those 
‘spreads and sprees’: they are injurious to all parties 
concerned. The giver of them spends his money, with- 
out getting any reasonable or permanent satisfac-^ 
tion for it in any way ; just the reverse, for it may be 
doubted if even his guests think any the better of him 
for his hospitality. The guests are certainly generally 
the worse of them ; they have not the same interest 
or clearness of perception in the works under their 
supervision ; the next day they feel used up and 
‘ seedy.’ The coolies know all about it, and take 
advantage of it. It is very probably reported in the 
lines : ‘ There is a great dinner over the way to-night. 
Master is going, he won't be back till late to-morrow, 
and perhaps will not come lo work at all.’ The pro- 
prietor is the chief sufft-rer, he suffers in pocket. The 
day’s work is not sufnciently done, or is done badly. 
The superintendent finds it out after v\ards; and quar-; 
rels with the people for it, perhaps s' ops their pay, 
creating grei^t dis-ratisf action on pay-day,” Perhaps fchii| 
