Another very useful and charitable institution in Kingston is the Deaconess Home, where the education is specially intended for the coloured children of a class superior to those who attend the elementary schools, and who are not gratae personae at the ladies’ schools in Kingston. This is really a work which is much needed, since it is unpractical to educate coloured men to fill responsible posts, if an equivalent effort is not made with the girls of the same class to render them companionable and helpful as wives. Nurses are trained in this Home, and all good works, such as temperance meetings, are undertaken. I was present myself at a service held by the Sisters, exclusively for the sailors who come to this port of Kingston. It did one good to see how at home these poor fellows seemed with the kindly women who addressed them. Each asked for his favourite hymn to be sung, and they were in no hurry to quit at the close of the proceedings. At a temperance meeting, held a few days afterwards, I was present when eight of them signed the pledge. Unfortunately, this good work is direfully in need of funds.
In conclusion, I cannot do better than give the gist of an article in which the bright future of Jamaica is looked forward to confidently, by one who must know, far better than myself, the financial attitude of the country. The writer is Captain L. D. Baker, a Bostonian, the head of the United Fruit Company, to whom, in company with Sir Alfred Jones of the Elder Dempster line, Jamaica owes much of its recent return to comparative prosperity. He says to those wanting to invest: “Investments in this country are safe, if in land for agricultural purposes. Values are normal; titles are as good and as well protected as any in the world. Our Governors have been the best that Britain can give to her colonies. By them we enjoy guaranteed safety and success.”
Speaking of the advance Jamaica has made since the days of Governor Darling, 1868, Captain Baker reviews the benefits the island has derived from each successive governor; he says: “To Sir J. P. Grant we owe the irrigation of the parched lands of the Spanish Town district. He turned them into a fertile plain. We next had Sir Anthony Musgrave. He gave the telegraph, and he gave steamship lines and railway extensions and general enterprise such an impetus that they have not ceased,” etc. Next came Sir Henry Norman, whose “steady brain kept the enthusiastic and the erratic man in check, so that there should be no regrets.” After him came Sir Henry Blake, and the writer of this article cannot praise that popular Governor too highly: “Ever full of indomitable enterprise and push—exhibitions, hotels, agricultural societies, agricultural schemes, willingly launching out his own money, riding through the country hither and thither, stirring up everyone that had a bit of enterprise in his nature. He left us, throwing his burden at the feet of Mr Chamberlain, to be taken up by him.” The present Governor, Sir A. Hemming, took up the work with equal zest and push. He presented the situation to his “double steam-engine friend, Sir Alfred Jones, thereby inaugurating the direct line, and consummating what may be justly termed a grand success for the future of the island.” It is good reading to hear this successful American business man say that neither he “nor his companies know anything but kindness from this Government.”
Jamaica is one of our oldest colonies; she has been rich, but now is poor; still, with patience, prosperity will revisit her shores. What one can say best to one’s country people is, Come and make her acquaintance; the beauty of the scenery will repay you for your trouble. Her associations with the past will kindle your sympathy and evoke your interest.
PRINTED AT THE EDINBURGH PRESS, 9 AND 11 YOUNG STREET.