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Followed hastily a labored confab through the linguister, broken in the midst by a fury of hot oaths from Falconnet; and then the chase swept on toward the plantations, and we were left to make their losing of us sure by whatsoever means we chose. We paddled slowly up stream in silence, keeping well within the blacker shadow of the tree fringe.
What few settlements did exist were mostly grouped about the southeast corner of the lake, into which emigration had naturally flowed from the older New England States. And even these were but feeble plantations, separated from the Connecticut valley by lofty mountains, over which one rough road led the way.
Slaves were urgently required in the plantations, and a healthy, vigorous man could be reckoned worth at least from ten to fifteen pounds. Then, there were at court many gentlemen who had some claim or other upon His Majesty's bounty. Here was a cheap and ready way to discharge these claims.
Virtually all the work of the immense sugar plantations is done by the little brown men and women, while China supplies some of the merchants in the city and the sailors and stewards on the ocean steamers. What admirable servants the Chinese make, so respectful, so prompt, so silent, so quick to comprehend! The Japanese house servants on the islands also give efficient and gracious service.
They then proceeded through large plantations of cotton, indigo, Indian corn, and yams, and over stony fields, till between ten and eleven, when they entered the town of Chouchou. They were almost immediately introduced to the chief, and from him into a ruinous hut, in a more filthy state than can be imagined. No pigstye was ever half so bad.
If you do, he will inevitably see you too, and will shell you out of them in no time. You need not be afraid of being rushed; a field of fire of two hundred yards or so will be sufficient to wipe him off the face of the earth. Never, under any circumstances, take cover in farm buildings, or plantations, or behind railway embankments, or in any place likely to be marked on a large-scale map.
The Resident having invited us to visit the nutmeg plantations on Great Banda, we accompanied him to the landing-place at Lontar, where we found chairs waiting for us, fitted with long poles, like those of a sedan, and were carried by eight men, who placed the poles on their shoulders, thus raising the chair, with its occupant, above their heads, a position which we found at first anything but pleasant.
The large amount of losses proven on good testimony according to existing laws, by affidavits of fictitious or unscrupulous persons to have been sustained on small farms and plantations are not only far beyond the possible yield of those places for any one year, but, as everyone knows who has had experience in tilling the soil and who has visited the scenes of these spoliations, are in many instances more than the individual claimants were ever worth, including their personal and real estate.
In the first place, such an emute would fulfil their predictions with regard to the passing the Emancipation Act, and so establish their reputation as seers; and in the next, it would lead to the sale of many of the plantations at one-sixth their real value, and so transform them from agents to principles, as they would not fail to be the purchasers.
Enlightened individuals in some European states, the Governments in others, have made extensive plantations, and France, particularly, has now set herself energetically at work to restore the woods in her southern provinces, and thereby to prevent the utter depopulation and waste with which that once fertile soil and genial climate are threatened.
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