I.
“I’SE here, Missus; I’se here, waitin’ fo’ you” (from one of a crowd of chattering Spanish, English, French, Portuguese creoles, outnumbered by the ever-present black, in every shade, from deep chocolate to light saffron), greets us as we step on land at Port of Spain, Trinidad.
We do not feel quite sure which particular one, in all that pushing, scrambling, good-natured crowd, is waiting for us; whether it is the man with the two monkeys, or the man with the green and blue parrot, or the woman with the baskets, or the boy with the shells; but whichever one it is, he’s there, and all his friends are there, with everything salable they possess, strung around them, fastened to them, hitched to them, in some fashion—any way to allow them free use of their arms.
“Well, we’re glad you’re waiting, Sambo. We fully expected to find you here. It wouldn’t be Trinidad without a monkey or a parrot. We’ll buy later. Oh, no! Not the monkey; we have one at home, and Heaven knows that’s enough! But maybe, by and by, we’ll see about a basket.”
If there is one thing in the world Sister and I can never resist, it’s a basket. That distressing mania breaks forth at the slightest provocation; it doesn’t seem to make any difference where we are, or how impossible it is to gratify it; difficulties only whet the appetite. The more inopportune the occasion, the more we want the basket.
So we stood there on the quay at Port of Spain, with the lofty headlands of grand old South America away to the south of us, taking their morning bath among the clouds, and off in the north the mountain sweep of Trinidad, watching the queer old city at its feet, and betwixt the two, the Gulf of Paria, loosened from the Dragon’s Mouth, spreading and expanding, with its waters a commingling of the blue of the Caribbean and the brown of the near-by Orinoco, washing the outstretched feet of the great mother and child; and we stood there, with all this grandeur ablaze in the first light of the morning, wondering if we would better buy the basket right then, on the spot, or whether we should wait until our return.
To be sure, we had one big basket—and a beauty, too—from St. Thomas, but it was always full, a sort of catch-all for our curious leaves, and seeds, and coral, and beads, and newspapers, and precious bills of fare,—treasured reminders of old balconies and lingering melodies; and it really seemed to be our duty to provide a number two size to carry to market. We could use it in so many ways, and then we wanted another basket. But, before we had time to strike a bargain,—for it’s a half-day’s work in these ideal lands to buy anything,—some one cried out: “If you are going to the Coolie Village, you’d better come right now, or the carriages will all be taken!”
“Who are the coolies?” Blue Ribbons asked, as we rattled along up Frederick Street. The answer to her question was squatting not far distant, where some cars, just arrived from San Fernando, were being unloaded. His hands were clasped around his thin bare legs; his face, serious, dark, immovable; his hair, black as ink, and straight; on his head, a voluminous white turban bespoke the worshipper of Brahma, Vishnu, and Shiva. It was with mingled sensations of awe and fear that I beheld this unexpected Hindoo. His apparent unconcern of mundane affairs recalled not only deeply treasured teachings from his great masters, but, in his eyes, there was the black, unforgotten story of Lucknow. It was hard to reconcile the two.
It seems that the Hindoo “coolie” is imported by the ship-load into Trinidad, and indentured for a period of ten years; at the expiration of which time he may return to India at his company’s expense, if he so chooses (and he usually does choose to do so, taking home with him a goodly store of gold). He makes a most valuable and reliable labourer, and has really been the salvation of the vast sugar and cacao estates on the island. It has been next to impossible to exact any continuous labour from the negro, without some system of slavery, and had it not been for the Hindoo, the resources of Trinidad would have been practically undeveloped.
The coolies were in evidence everywhere. In fact, they seemed to form a considerable proportion of the population. We do not wonder any longer at the emaciated pictures of the famine-stricken East Indians, for here, in a land of plenty, where food, almost ready cooked, is only waiting to drop, the Hindoo is the sparest, leanest creature imaginable. His ever-bare legs are not like flesh and blood, but small-boned and thin to emaciation, and almost devoid of calves below the knee; they have the hard statuesque look of bronze stilts. And the arms, too, are thin, and terminate in slender little hands that seem incapable of heavy and prolonged labour.