Show guano at the chincha islands A recent letter says the guano is dug by chinese coolies or li laborers borers who are brought here by english 11 ships from the free ports of their native coasts the poor fellows are madeko made to believe that they are going i ng to do well by engaging to serve as fo laborers b borers for five years at a real york shilling a day and a scanty allowance of rice they fancy it is said they are coming to labor in the gold mines minea of california however however this may be it is certain that they are shipped here in english vessels Tes sela and or assigned or whatever the word for such a transaction should be to the peruvian government ern ment I 1 have known englishmen who spoke 0 ke of having been engaged in the traffic the h e government places them on these islands d 8 avowedly under the original contract to labor for five years but who is is to know how far this contract if such it may be called is adhered to the truth is the poor are sold into absolute slavery the worst and most cruel perhaps in the world here are about eight hundred of the unfortunate creatures at work on these islands at a time as fast as death thins them out ont the number is increased by new importations tat ions ohp labor labor is severe much more so than that of the negroes on our southern thern plantations they are kept at hard work in the die hot sun throughout the day on the middle island they are tasked each one strong and weak alike to dig from the hill and wheel to the mang five tons of guano each per diem the guano is compact pa c like hard clay like lo loam amand and as dusky when he dug as ashes on the north island it has to be blasted for the steam paddles it has to be wheeled from a hundred yards to a quarter of a 8 mile the nature of the labor may be eon conceived the chinese work almost naked under a tropical sun where it never rains they are slender figures and do not look stron strong 2 negro drivers driers the most ugly looking I 1 blacks acks I 1 ever saw are stat stationed ione among them with heavy thongs which I 1 have seen teem we the poor coolies have no BO nope hope of reward no days of rest the smoke of 1 |