There are more than seven hundred thousand
inhabitants on Jamaica, of whom less than fifteen
thousand are white. There are ten thousand East
Indian coolies, and a few hundred Chinamen, on the
island. The whites govern ; the colored people are
professional lawyers, doctors, etc., and tradesmen
who would compare favorably with any people ; and
they are also clerks, managers, and overseers, rail-
road employees and servants. The negro men and
women perform the menial work and hard labor of
the island. They live simply, and are as industrious
as any inhabitants of the tropics can be, are without
care or anxiety, and seem to be also without ambi-
tion. As is the case among all primitive peoples,
the women do the hardest work. "We met them on
all the roads barefooted and with short skirts, walk-
ing rapidly with large bunches of bananas, baskets,
trays, or bundles on their heads, and sometimes
driving a laden donkey before them. They were
the incarnation of cheerful and enterprising industry.
They bring their little invoice of fruits and vege-







m


<!

01

H

3



JAMAICA 221

tables to market, and if they are successful in selling
them for a shilling or two, they walk home a dozen
or twenty miles as fast as a horse can cover the
distance, happy and contented with what seems to
them a holiday excursion.
Everywhere they are seen at work, loading the
vessels with coal and cargo, carrying building mate-
rials in the town and using the hoe in the fields.
