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Show Hi ONE HUNDRED DOLLARS i ; I Price Paid for Kanaka Slavos in Aus- tralia JTot Long Ago. j, i "Two Hundred Head of Labor for a fli Hatful of Amens" perhaps vou re- j momber the terriblo story hinted by H the old S'dnoy scoundrel in Stevon- 1 bou's "Wreckor." It was for tho Hj j .r Queensland sugar, planter that men Ii i; turned labor thieves and risked their souls among the islands. With tricks I and lies tho natives were involod on isssH ssssfl)i board. Once there they wero supposed (for the sake of formula and nomenclature) nomen-clature) to sign a document that bound thom to labor for a term of years in tho sugar-fields. As none of them could read or write or understand tho document they wore supposed to sign, the true nature of this solemn farco may be readily gathored. One hundred dollars a head the planter was wont to pay tho "recruiter" for catching Kanakas Ka-nakas and lnnding them in Queensland rather less than African slavers' rates in tho good old days, but tho distance dis-tance was much less and tho danger nothing, becauso for reasons of its own the British Government protected this traffic. Once in Queensland the Kanakas Ka-nakas labored in the canc-ficlds for "wages." They got $30 a year each. That is, they got $30 a year if they lived. Very oitcn they died. The death-rate among thom after they reached Queensland was nover less than fifty in tho thousand and was sometimes some-times as great as 1GS. When a Kanaka died, his kind, indulgent employer inherited in-herited all his effects including his wage claims. You think this was a long time ago, J two or three centuries at least, and pertained to conditions now happily passed from the earth. Yes? Then you should be interested to know that in its substantial features it was going on six years ago under the sanction and protection pro-tection of the flag of a civilized nation. Charles Edward Eussell , in Everybody's Every-body's magazine. |