What was the character of the machinery with which they were to enter on this competition will be seen by the following extract:—
"I could not learn that there were any estates on the island decently stocked with implements of husbandry. Even the modern axe is not in general use; for felling the larger class of trees the negroes commonly use what they call an axe, which is shaped much like a wedge, except that it is a little wider at the edge than at the opposite end, at the very extremity of which a perfectly straight handle is inserted. A more awkward thing for chopping could not be well conceived—at least, so I thought until I saw the instrument in yet more general use about the houses in the country, for cutting firewood. It was, in shape, size, and appearance, more like the outer half of the blade of a scythe, stuck into a small wooden handle, than any thing else I can compare it to: with this long knife, for it is nothing else, I have seen negroes hacking at branches of palm for several minutes, to accomplish what a good wood-chopper, with an American axe, would finish at a single stroke. I am not now speaking of the poorer class of negro proprietors, whose poverty or ignorance might excuse this, but of the proprietors of large estates, which have cost their thousands of pounds."[39]
Cuba, too, had its cities and its shops, and these it had because the Spanish government had not desired to compel the people of the island to limit themselves to cultivation alone. Manufactures were small in extent, but they existed; and the power to make exchanges on the spot had tended to prevent the growth of absenteeism. The land-owners were present to look after their estates, and every thing therefore tended toward improvement and civilization, with constantly increasing attraction of both capital and labour. Jamaica, on the contrary, had but a seaport so poor as not to have a single foot of sidewalk paved, and of which three-fourths of the inhabitants were of the black race; and among them all, blacks and whites, there were no mechanics. In the capital of the island, Spanishtown, with a population of 5000, there was not to be found, in 1850, a single shop, nor a respectable hotel, nor even a dray-cart;[40] and in the whole island there was not a stage, nor any other mode of regular conveyance, by land or water, except on the little railroad of fifteen miles from Kingston to the capital.[41]
Such was the machinery of production, transportation, and exchange, by aid of which the free people of Jamaica were to maintain "unlimited competition" with Cuba, and its cities, railroads, and virgin soil, and with Europe and its science. What is to be the ultimate result may be inferred from the following comparative view of the first four years of the century, and the last four for which we have returns:—
Sugar, Rum, Coffee,
hhds. puncheons. lbs.
——— ————— ———-
1800 to 1803,
average export, 124,000 44,000 14,600,000
1845 to 1848,
average export 44,000 17,000 6,000,000
The consequence of this is seen in the fact that it requires the wages of two men, for a day, to pay for a pound of butter, and of two women to pay for a pound of ham, while it would need the labour of eighty or a hundred men, for a day, to pay for a barrel of flour.[42] The London Times has recently stated that the free labourer now obtains less food than he did in the days of slavery, and there appears no reason to doubt the accuracy of its information. This view would, indeed, seem to be fully confirmed by the admission, in the House of Commons, that the cost of sugar "in labour and food" is less now than it was six years since.[43]
How indeed can it be otherwise? The object sought for is cheap sugar, and with a view to its attainment the production of sugar is stimulated in every quarter; and we all know that the more that is produced the larger will be the quantity poured into the market of England, and the greater will be the power of the people of that country to dictate the terms upon which they will consent to consume it. Extensive cultivation and good crops produce low prices, high freights, large commissions, and large revenue; and when such crops are made the people of England enjoy "cheap sugar" and are "prosperous," but the slave is rendered thereby more a slave, obtaining less and less food in return for his labour. Nevertheless, it is in that direction that the whole of the present policy of England points. The "prosperity" of her people is to be secured by aid of cheap sugar and high-priced cloth and iron; and the more exclusively the people of India and of Brazil can be forced to devote themselves to the labours of the field, the cheaper will be sugar and the greater will be the tendency of cloth and iron to be dear. What, however, becomes of the poor free negro? The more sugar he sends the more the stocks accumulate, and the lower are the prices, and the smaller is his power to purchase clothing or machinery, as will now be shown.
The London Economist, of November 13, furnishes the following statement of stocks and prices of sugar in the principal markets of Europe:—
1849. 1850. 1851. 1852.
——- ——- ——- ——-
Stocks…. cwt.. 3,563,000 2,895,000 3,810,000 3,216,000
Prices—duty free.
Havana Brown… 17 to 24s. 20 to 27s. 16 to 22s. 19 to 26s.
Brazil Brown… 16 to 20s. 18 to 22s. 12 to 17s. 16 to 20s.