CENTRAL AND SOUTH AMERICA.
Low moral Condition.—San Salvador.—Guatemala.—Yucatan.—Costa Rica.—Honduras.—The Caribs.—Depravity in Peru and Chili.—“Children of the House.”—Intrigue in Lima.—Infanticide.—Laxity of Morals in Brazil and Paraguay.—Foundling Hospital at Rio Janeiro.
The whole peninsula of South America, and the states comprised in Central America, are involved in the same social system with Mexico, derived as they are by common origin from pure or mixed Spanish blood. The same political circumstances and organization have always affected the various territorial divisions, and whether we consider the semi-civilized nations of ancient Peru and its dependencies, or the savage tribes in the valleys of the Amazon and the La Plata, we find them, after the first irruption of Spanish conquerors, victims of indiscriminate oppression, insatiable avarice, and unsparing lust. South America was long considered a mere treasure-field of the Spanish monarchy, to be worked without liability to account by every adventurer who chose to encounter the hardships of foreign travel, or the perils of residence in a tropical climate and amid hostile savages.
The natives far outnumbered their masters, and the same ruthless system of depression was extended to them as to Mexico. The consequence was, that before the lapse of many generations from the Conquest, there were but two classes throughout the vast Spanish territories—masters and slaves. The natural and inevitable result of servile institutions could not long be postponed. The descendants of the conquerors rapidly degenerated, and imbecility and incapacity took the places of heroism and ability. The original hardihood and daring, which had vanquished uncounted enemies, had traversed unknown wilds, had defied every danger, were lost in voluptuousness and self-indulgence. The posterity of those men who had discovered a new world, and swayed the destinies of the old by a nod or the stroke of a pen, were unable to protect themselves against the weak ministers of a worn-out despotism, or against any unscrupulous demagogue who could rally a band of roving Indians around him, and maraud the peaceable and well-disposed. A state of political degradation reigned supreme over the whole of South America, only to be paralleled by the debasement of its social condition.
In Central America, including San Salvador, Guatemala, Yucatan, Costa Rica, and Honduras, the condition of the women is very much the same as in Mexico. The statements of travelers in those little-frequented regions are very vague in reference to the subject of public morality, and give us no reliable or detailed information on the specialities which would be of service in this inquiry. In Yucatan, the ladies are said to be somewhat more domesticated than their Mexican neighbors, and to interest themselves in the management of their households and the education of their children; but still the standard of morality is not very high, if measured by United States habits and ideas.[326] In the neighboring republic of Guatemala, the free manners prevalent in the country districts of the kindred territories are usually met with;[327] but these would rather indicate low ideas of decency than any actual immorality. Difference of climate and of race would make many things tolerable, or even reputable, which our colder skies and more rigid notions would totally exclude from the observances of civilized society.
The Indian populations of South America have become so completely slaves during long years of bondage that they have lost their prominent characteristics,[328] and are but a reflex of their masters in the lowest state of ignorance. The women may be generally described as of very loose morals, yet kind and gentle unless roused by jealousy, in which case they can use the knife as promptly as their male friends. It is said they make very affectionate mothers.
There are a few tribes who have preserved some semblance of nationality. The Caribs of Honduras are a hardy and athletic race. Polygamy is general among them, three or four wives being a not uncommon number. The husband is compelled to have a separate house and plantation for each, and, if he make one a present, he must give the others something of equal value. He must also divide his time among them, giving a week to each in succession. When a Carib takes a wife, he fells a plantation and builds a house; the wife then takes the management, and he becomes a gentleman. The women attend their plantations with great care, and, in the course of twelve or fifteen months, have every description of breadstuff under cultivation. About Christmas they engage several creers, and freight them with produce for Truxillo and Belize, hiring their husbands and others as sailors. It is also the custom, when a woman can not do all the work required on her plantation, for her to engage her husband as a laborer, and pay him two dollars per week. Industry and forethought are peculiar traits of the Carib women, consequently they easily surround themselves with necessaries and comforts.
The data bearing on the proportion of the sexes in the aggregate population, although too imperfect to be worth presenting, yet go to show that, as in Mexico, there is a considerable preponderance of females.[329] The disproportion in births is not so great as in deaths; for, while the number of males and females born is nearly equal, more of the former than the latter die annually. There are more old women than old men, ascribable, no doubt, to the greater sobriety of the women, drunkenness being a vice which, under the tropics, is rapid in its consequences. In Nicaragua the women number two to one of the male population. The Department of Cuscatlan in San Salvador has an excess of 1838 women over men, and of 1709 boys over girls.
Peru and Chili, though neighboring countries, and both in the strip of western coast between the Andes and the sea, present considerable difference of condition. Chili is rapidly rising in political importance by means of the internal energy of the people, and the development of natural resources by native and foreign enterprise and capital.
It has been asserted by resident eye-witnesses that female virtue was at so low an ebb in Chili within a few years, that in most families, even of good standing, there were one or more children who were called “children of the house,” and whose parentage was distributed generally among the ladies of the family. Nay, we have heard that the rites of hospitality sometimes included civilities in respect to the females which are usually considered as peculiar to certain Oriental nations. A rapid change for the better is, however, taking place in these usages, and even the sea-port of Valparaiso is described by Wilkes as being greatly improved from the period of his first visit, when few sailors left it without having lost both their money and health among its women.