If the interior of the houses of the highest class of people even in the towns display nothing indicative of that peculiar regard for propriety and cleanliness which we have heard of as being so characteristic of the people of colour, in the tropics, what will be said of the habitations of the cultivators in the interior of Hayti, where they resemble more the huts of the most savage tribes of the eastern and the western world? The former are far from being in such a condition as to make them desirable residences; for in fact they exhibit nothing approaching to that state which is so common with people of colour in other colonies, the sluggish occupiers caring little about cleanliness except in the exterior ornaments of their persons. The huts of the interior are merely mud edifices with two rooms for the accommodation of the whole family, and in which the slaves of the British colonies, and particularly in Jamaica, would disdain to reside; nor would their proprietors offer them such miserable abodes. In these houses filth and every species of uncleanliness prevail, for the people give themselves entirely up to their indolent and lazy habits. It is common to see the pigs and poultry herding with the family, and whilst the latter are at their repast, the former are in attendance, “picking the crumbs that fall from their master’s table.” One bed often suffices for all the inmates. The furniture consists of a very few articles, a table, a stool, two chairs, a side board, or rather a tray on four legs, and some bowls made from the calabash as substitutes for earthenware, with an iron pot or two for culinary purposes. Every thing seems useful, there is nothing ornamental, except now and then a small pier glass in a gilt frame decorated mostly with the labours of Arachne, and a wood-cut of the cap of liberty, considered to be an emblematical representation of Haytian heroism.
It may not be improper to offer a few remarks on the subject of education in the republic, and which seems to me to have been represented in colours far too glowing. Most people, I apprehend, have formed an opinion of the progress of education from what they have perceived in Port au Prince, Cape Haytien, and one or two others of the principal places, as though those places contained the largest proportion of the population. This is an erroneous impression, as the youth in the country parts, not having the means of education placed within their reach, are brought up in the darkest ignorance. This is immediately seen at any of the little villages through which the traveller has to pass, for making an inquiry at many of them if there were any schools, the answer was generally “there were none, except at Port au Prince.” In the north, the public schools established by Christophe, who really made efforts to disseminate knowledge and to improve the morals of the people, have all been suspended and the houses turned into barracks for the military, to the utter disgrace of the government.
In Port au Prince there is one school supported by the republic upon the Lancasterian principle, and a military school for young men who are intended for the scientific departments of the army, and there is a similar establishment at the cape; but the few schools which are to be met with in the large towns are merely private institutions to which youth are sent whose parents have the means of supporting them. The ignorant cultivators give themselves no concern about procuring moral education for their children; and on the score of religion they seldom feel the least anxiety, for three-fourths of them are at this moment as rank idolaters as their forefathers were in Africa.
In the towns also it should be understood the people are mostly engaged in some mercantile avocations, or else they are handicraftsmen, or persons holding some civil or military appointments. They therefore have not only an opportunity of educating their children, being contiguous to the schools, but they have the pecuniary means for doing so. The cultivators in the country have neither; money in particular they never have, except just as much as the sale of their vegetables on a Sunday brings them, but which is generally disposed of in payment for the salt provisions, and the supply of taffia required for their weekly consumption. They have no reserve for purposes of improvement, nor are they taught to improve; but the government seems to consider that to keep them in ignorance is the most secure way to insure tranquillity and repose to the country. That such is the feeling of the government I think is quite evident from the one hundred and seventy-eighth article of the Code Rural, which I have given before, and which orders that children shall be sent to their fathers “to follow their condition of life.” As long therefore as their parents continue in ignorance and immorality, it is clear that the children have no means of profiting by a good example. It is the prevailing sentiment of the people of colour, that the blacks should be kept in their present state of ignorance, and so long as the government be composed of people of the former class, the latter will remain in their present abject condition. As the negro is now situated, he is in a worse state of degradation than the slave; for although he is free, he is almost excluded from the general mass of the population; he is marked with the name of freedom, whilst he actually groans under despotism and oppression. In this state he is likely to remain, until some general change be effected in Hayti which shall place him in a state of unresisted intercourse with the more enlightened portion of the people, by which he may be taught properly to estimate the value of liberty, and made to participate in those blessings which it is wont to diffuse.
I do not know a circumstance that shews more clearly the backward state of knowledge and education in Hayti than the little progress made by the representatives of the people in the senate and in the chamber of communes, for there are many of them who can neither read nor write. In the senate, out of twenty-four members I could mention four or five who, at the time I left the island, could not write their names, nay, not even their initials. It may appear strange that the president, who has the selection of the members who occupy seats in the senate, should appoint men thus incapable and uneducated to become his council and advisers. However strange this may seem to others, it excites no surprise in my mind, because I am convinced, and it is a matter of general notoriety, that Boyer wants only mere passive instruments to obey, and not canvass or oppose any measures emanating from the government. Out of about seventy-two members composing the chamber of communes, there are twenty-six equally ignorant, and their only qualification seems to be a sufficient degree of pliancy to yield a ready assent to any proposition which has been submitted by the government for their consideration.
All that government wants of the members of either house is to keep up the appearance of legislative deliberation, to give a colour to their own proceedings, and form a cloak to cover their plans of oppression and rapacity. The persons selected in the different communes as representatives, are those who have been recommended by the government, for the people have no voice, or, what is nearly the same, they dare not raise it against those whom the president has recommended to their choice. These abject representatives are mere tools in the hands of government, and as they are well paid, they care little or nothing for the duties of the station to which they are elevated.
The senator with his one thousand two hundred dollars per annum, and the commune with his eight hundred dollars received from the treasury, would not hesitate to accede to any proposition, however monstrous and unconstitutional, in order to secure his seat, and preserve the favour of the government.