[34] These were increased to four, and finally to six, as the colonies became more populous.
[35] This tribute varied in the different provinces. In Mexico it was about four shillings annually, levied on every male between eighteen and fifty years of age. It produced latterly about half a million sterling from all the colonies, and was collected with difficulty, owing to the extreme poverty of the Indians.
[36] A suggestion of which the good man bitterly repented, when the enormous evils which sprang from it began to develop themselves.
[37] Cromwell interested himself much in the welfare of this island. Thirty years after the Pilgrim Fathers had settled in Massachusetts, he invited them to remove to Jamaica. But the Fathers declined to renew their pilgrimage; they wisely elected to remain where Providence had led them, and where their descendants were destined to become a great nation.
[38] A Bill was, however, passed in 1873 for the abolition of slavery in Puerto Rico.
[39] This was the population according to the enumeration of 1867. It has been seriously diminished by the war which began in the following year; but the amount of loss has not been accurately ascertained.
[40] The expenditure of 1878 was £16,000,000, while the revenue did not exceed £11,000,000.
[41] The Cuban paper currency amounts to £13,000,000. Great Britain would be in the same position if she had an inconvertible and depreciated currency of £450,000,000.
[42] In Venezuela, where writing was almost unknown, it was necessary to allow votes to be given orally. For weeks before an election the priests taught their list of candidates as a school exercise to Indians and other ignorant persons who were under their influence.
[43] An incident in this defeat reminds us of one of the remarkable conditions of tropical warfare. The routed Conservatives were driven towards a broad river swarming with alligators. These savage creatures were probably less terrible than the victorious Liberals. The fugitives took to the river, where, it is told, they suffered heavy loss from the alligators.