Report on Employment of Native Labor in Portuguese Africa Report on Employment of Native Labor in Portuguese Africa by Edward Alsworth Ross Professor of Sociology University of Wisconsin New York 1925 PRINTED IN THE U. S. A. The Abbott Press NEW YORK, U. S. A. Copy of a letter transmitting the following report to the Temporary Slavery Commission of the League of Nations Room 1639, 25 Broad Street, New York, June 5, 1925. The Secretary-General, League of Nations, Geneva, Switzerland. Sir : We beg leave herewith to transmit to you the report prepared by Professor E. A. Ross describing the results of his enquiry regarding the methods of em¬ ploying labor in Angola and Portuguese East Africa. We would respectfully request that this report be placed before the Temporary Slavery Commission at its next meeting. We have no recommendations or other requests that we would make excepting that the Commission should give to the situation described in this report its most careful attention with the hope that suitable measures may be adopted which will abolish compulsory labor and other practices that are an injustice inflicted upon the people of these colonies. We have great confidence in the trustworthiness of Prof. Ross and of the evidence which he has presented in this report. Prof. Ross has authorized us to say that he will willingly appear before the Commission in person if that is their desire and provided a suitable time can be mutually agreed upon. We have no desire to criticise unfairly or otherwise to embarrass the Government of Portugal. We recognize the heroism of its early pioneers in Africa and the great achievements of Portugal in the development of its colonies. We are confident that the Government of Portugal will do all within its power to abolish all evil practices in the employment of native labor in its colonies in Africa. We are, dear sir, Your Obedient Servants, George Foster Peabody, Raymond B. Fosdick, E. E. Olcott, Carrie Chapman Catt, John H. Finley, Thos. S. Donohugh, John Grier Hibben, Joseph P. Chamberlain Newton D. Baker, Glenn Frank, Wm. Jay Schieffelin, H. N. MacCracken, Ernest W. Riggs, Hamilton Holt, James T. Shotwell, A. L. Warnshuis, James R. Angell, James G. McDonald, Henry Goddard Leach. GLOSSARY Banian Indian trader. Barracas Huts; tents. Chefe Chief; head. Chicote Whip; the end of a cable. Cipaio Native police generally employed in garrisoning the posts and collecting hut-tax, etc., from the natives. Corvee An obligation to perform certain services such as mending roads for the government. Escudos Par of exchange is $0.50 or £0/2/0%. At the time of Prof. Ross’s visit $0.50 or 2 shillings equalled 20 escudos. Fazenda An estate, a farm, a land; fortune, wealth, goods; business; labour. Intendencia Native affairs’ office. Manioc The product or the plant of the bitter or the sweet cassava. A tropical plant from the roots of which tapioca and starch are made, and which forms one of the principal foods of the natives. Palmatoria Rod; punishment. Pano A sheet of 3% yards of unbleached muslin. Posto Post; place; office; charge. Prazo A form of concession granted to the highest bidder. “The holder is now compelled to put under cultivation a fixed proportion of the land he leases. He acts as magistrate and tax-gatherer to the natives, but at the same time it is his duty to look after their welfare, provide them with seeds and agricultural implements, educate the children, and minister to the sick. He is entitled to maintain a number of cipaes or native soldiers for police purposes. It is the duty of district governors and special inspectors, created for the purpose, to see that prazo-holders fulfill their obliga¬ tions. The system in its present form allows scope to in¬ dividual enterprise and energy, and under it agriculture is making considerable progress in lower Zambezia.” (Quoted from “A Manual of Portuguese East Africa,” compiled by the Geographical Section of the Naval Intelligence Division. London, H. M. Stationery Office, 1920, p. 145.) Shibaru (xibalu) Term of compulsory labor. Wattle-and-daub Wicker work daubed with mud or mortar. NOTE: Professor Ross is not responsible for the marginal notes. Digitized by the Internet Archive in 2018 with funding from Columbia University Libraries https://archive.org/details/reportonemploymeOOross REPORT ON COMPULSORY LABOR IN PORTUGUESE AFRICA INTRODUCTION The COMMISSION. —A number of American gentlemen inter¬ ested in the welfare of the African natives persuaded Prof. Ross and Dr. Cramer, who were planning a trip to India, to devote half of their time to a visit to the Portuguese colonies in Africa. Edward A. Ross is Professor of Sociology in the University of Wisconsin and the author of nineteen volumes dealing with sociol¬ ogy and his travels. He has made wide tours of sociological obser¬ vation in China, Japan, South America, Russia and Mexico. He is familiar with the technique of social investigation. R. Melville Cramer is a New York physician of long experi¬ ence, especially conversant with psychology and psychiatry. He has traveled widely and investigated social conditions not only in European countries but in Greenland, Porto Rico, Brazil, Mexico, China, and Japan. Neither of these gentlemen is connected with a church or with foreign missions. OBJECT. —The object of this investigation was to gather the significant facts as to the system of employing native labor followed in Portuguese Africa. METHOD. —To prosecute inquiries among the Portuguese officials would have been fruitless, for the law under which labor is requisitioned by the Government in these colonies is well known and any inquiries addressed to the officials would have elicited the response that they are proceeding in accordance with the law. What we needed to know was not the system as laid down in the decrees or as officials profess to carry it out, but the actual experiences of large numbers of natives taken at random. Accordingly we visited the native villages in the bush, gathered the people together and, through an interpreter known to them and in whom they had confidence, questioned them as to their compulsory labor. In Angola nineteen villages were visited from three centres not less than two hundred miles apart. The facts as to many other villages were elicited from conversation with the chief, the native pastor or the native teacher. The statements were taken down just as they fell from the lips of the interpreter and such notes form the basis of this report. Data were secured also from labor groups encountered on the highway and from individuals. Altogether for Angola we have the experiences of from six thousand to seven thousand of the native population in three different provinces. The method gave small opportunity to mislead the investi¬ gator. The villagers had no advance knowledge of the inquiry and, if any one of them had attempted to misrepresent facts within the knowledge of the others, his fellow villagers would certainly have corrected him. Nor is it likely that the head man, pastor or teacher, interrogated as to the incidence of compulsory labor in his village, gave false answers. Personnel. Object. Method. PART I 1 Women with babies working on the road. 2 Work without pay. Voluntary workers,— no compulsion. ANGOLA So far as possible the data will be presented in the order in which they were gathered. They were collected between July 19 and September 3, 1924. The commissioners made their enquiries separately, and what follows is drawn from the note books of Pro¬ fessor Ross. Work Gang A Sixty-five natives working on the public highway, two-thirds of them women, twelve with babies on their backs. I inquired how much time they had Worked for the Government in the last year. Case 1 .—In the last 5 months has worked on the highways 3 months— a month at a time. Case 2 .— Paid his 1923 head tax (40 escudos=$1.00) and then worked 3 months on end getting out timber for a house. Got nothing but 1.20 escudos ration money per day, which was not more than enough to buy two-fifths of the normal ration. Also worked some weeks on the road for which he got no pay. Case 3 .—Named three places at each of which he worked two weeks, either roadmaking, or helping build a house for the road boss. No food was supplied to him, no wage was given him—he paid his taxes besides, for which he got the money by selling his produce. Case U -—Worked on the nearby road a week at a time until its completion. No ration or wage or tax receipt. Case 5 .—Worked three months—a month at a time—about 20 miles from here, one month on one road, two months on the other. Got nothing whatever. Neither his wife, nor the wives of the other men worked on the highway. I asked the women: “Why are you working on the road? Have you no husbands to work for you?” One young woman said that some days she comes, some days her husband comes. Sometimes after the men are taken from the village, they take some of the women. Some men were taken to Catete on the railroad to work in the cotton fields. They may have to stay two or three years as contracted laborers. Some of them have been sent to work on sugar plantations for a six-month’s term, but under various pretexts the time may be prolonged to seven or eight months. The planter told them that he had “bought” them of the Government, that they were his slaves and that he did not have to pay them anything. They got only their food and a receipt for their head tax. Laborers on a Mission Estate None of a group of eight men working for the mission has had to do any compulsory labor this year. This obligation rests only on natives not already employed. A village chief who came to the mission for counsel said that some of his people who are working on the road in the provincial capital are given food, but it is insufficient, so that they have to have their rations supplemented from home. Six years ago ten Page 6 men from his village were taken away on a train by soldiers to work and they have never seen them since. The boss of a gang building a church said that none of his men have been occupied with anything but free labor this year. Four others have been on paid work for the mission for two years. From them the Government has exacted nothing but the head tax. Work Gang B One of the gang working on the highway said he had worked a whole year on the cut-off on the railway, receiving plenty of food but no pay other than a receipt for his tax. No complaint of ill-treatment. In the evening we visited the camp of the laborers on an estate, and questioned fifty or sixty men and boys. One had worked for nine months on a plantation under government authority. After three months he received a pano (a sheet of 3^4 yards of un¬ bleached muslin) ; after six months more he received his tax receipt for the year. Another man had worked on a plantation for a year and received nothing but a pano and his tax receipt. At that time the ordinary wage was a pano a month. Another testified that six years ago twenty-five or thirty men from his village were taken to San Thome and had never been heard from since. All agreed that in recent years much more service has been exacted of them than formerly. They are Ambaca people and these people, who were converted to Christianity and became acquainted with letters more than two centuries ago and who formerly were impressed only as soldiers, are being crushed down into compulsory labor along with other blacks. The Songo district, not far from here, was so nearly depopu¬ lated by the Government recruiting for the plantations that in 1923 the High Commissioner decreed that for five years the Songos should not be recruited for work outside that district. As we shall see, however, this order has not been obeyed. Village No. 1 Songo people. Forty were present besides a swarm of boys and girls, few women. The interview took place in the shade of the mango grove about noon of a bright day. A very intelligent and attractive young man took an active part in the proceedings. Case 1 .—Went to a Government plantation for four months; then eleven months on a Government coffee experiment station. He got two panos during this period, his tax receipt for 1923 and food—no money. Case 2 .—After serving three months on a Government plantation where the workers were beaten, and three months as carrier for a government engineer, he was advised to enlist as a soldier. When he declined they would give him no tax receipt, so he had to catch fish in order to get the money with which to pay his head tax. In 1922 he served as carrier under heavy burden on a three- months’ trip to Loanda. Within a year he was sent with a heavy load to a point 85 miles from his home. He got neither money nor tax receipt. Case 3 .—Government recruited him in 1920 and “sold” him to the petroleum company. He worked for it seven months, at the end of each three months he got a pano worth three escudos (at this date the escudo was worth perhaps a No wages for nine months. Deportation— Increasing exactions. Depopulation. 4 No pay. Carrying without pay. 5 Sold to a company. Well fed, not beaten, no pay. Page 7 Deported. 6 Labor, not taxes, wanted. 7 Commandeering men and women. 8 Taxes plus labor. Children included. Flogging. shilling). At the end of seven months he was told that he had seventy escudos due him, which would be paid him at the station where he had been recruited. However, he got nothing there but the receipt for his head tax. He asked about his wages but was told there was nothing for him. Under the petroleum com¬ pany they were well-fed and were not beaten. Case ]*.—The village chief declared that eight years ago the officials took from his people eighty-four persons and forty-four from the people of the ad¬ jacent chiefs. Nothing has been heard from them nor of them. He supposes that they are at San Thome. After three years the two chiefs were called by the local authorities and told to be patient. “We will send for these men and have them brought back.” But none have ever come back. Case 5 .—In September 1923 the tax collector called for the taxes (40 escudos a head), but when cash was offered he would not take it and the “tax delinquents” were all recruited and sent to work on a private plantation where they still are. The planter accompanied the tax collector, who refused to accept cash from such natives as the white man said he wanted to work for him. In February 1924, 80 more men were taken from this “area.” Those who had the cash and paid their taxes at once were let off, but those slow in getting their money together were recruited and their money for taxes was refused. They were advised to take the money along with them to buy food with; but they were shrewd enough to send their money back to their families. They are still on the plantation. Case 6 .—Beginning with June, 1923, this village was required to furnish men and women for Government work. They go for two weeks at a time, some of them on the Government grange near Malange, others on the Malange-Bie highway. Both men and women are requisitioned and they must provide their own food. In three towns about five miles apart one hundred and fifty persons have thus been commandeered. This has been going steadily for thirteen months, rain or shine. They get no rations. Those who had paid their head tax were not let off from this labor. The villages at the greater distances from the road were harder hit. Those living near the work have means of getting on the good side of the bosses. Village No. 2 In the late afternoon we sat in the shade of big trees and interrogated about seventy Ambaquistas. They are of a superioi type, and I saw many faces of worthy, mild and excellent men. Case A—Had to labor two weeks at a stint on the Government plantation, supplying his own food. This in addition to paying taxes. Since December 1st this village has been furnishing workers on this plantation. Generally the recruits worked two weeks out of six, i.e., in the six months this lasted the average villager worked two months on the plantation. They were under the hippo-hide whip and came back thin. No pay. Case 2 .—Some have been taken from here to work on routes leading out of Malange. They are worked two weeks at a time and get nothing. This has lasted eight months and the family still have to furnish members for this work. The soldiers come, catch the people, children included, and tie them up. They take about half of the family, leaving the other half to change off with it. Case 3 .—Was working as mason for a building contractor in town, left him because he was allowed but six cents a day for food—which was insuffi¬ cient—and he got no pay on the ground that he was a learner. The contractor retaliated by giving his name to the Government, so he was recruited. After two months as carrier on Government jobs in Malange, he was sent to Benguela where he worked six months on street work for which he received rations but no pay. He had already paid his head tax. On both jobs he was maltreated. They would flog a man until he could hardly stand up and then send him to work just the same. Some died, but none from this village. Page 8 Spokesmen of the village say that from fear of rebellion the Government keeps ammunition from the people, so that they hunt only with bows and spears. They cannot get ammunition for their old muzzle-loaders. In recent years, much greater care has been exercised in keeping powder and cartridges from the natives. In practice forced labor works out as follows. A laborer works for the coffee planter and at the close of his term of service the planter says, “I can’t pay you anything for I have deposited the stipulated wage for you with the Government; go to such and such an office and you will get your pay.” The worker applies there and is told to come around in a couple of months. If he has the temerity to do so, he is threatened with the calaboose and that ends it. It is all a system of bare-faced labor stealing. They think that the planter has really paid for their labor, but that the official does them out of it. It is frequently observed that the official comes suddenly into prosperity and this is suspected to be the source of it. If a private employer wants to retain a worker, he advances the man’s tax and the man is unmolested. If, on the other hand, one has worked for a private employer for months but for any reason leaves that employment, he is liable to be recruited by the Government. Past employment affords him no protection. The villagers insist that times are worse for them than they used to be under the king. More unrequited toil is exacted now than a few years ago. Other Evidence From natives passing our place of entertainment we learn’ that at K—, forty miles away, the Government recruits many natives and puts them at the disposal of the planters. They work six months for food and 60 escudos ($1.50). Forty escudos are kept back to pay their taxes, so that for their six months work they net only 20 escudos (half a dollar). Four years ago a large number who were tax delinquents were sent to San Thome and have never returned. Since then the forced labor of these people amounts to six months a year. Their wives have to work on the roads, but are not recruited for the plantations. The men are carried off as far as one hundred miles to work on the road, for which they get their food and their tax receipts. When they work on the road near their home they have to furnish their own food. On the plantations some die from being made to work after having been weakened by flogging. I talked with a man whose two neighbors were taken to work a year on a plantation a few miles out from Malange. They received nothing, not even a tax receipt. Their taxes being unpaid they cannot get a pass. Not having a pass, they cannot venture outside of this district without running the risk of being jailed. Work Gang C From our headquarters we make excursions in all directions, sometimes to a distance of sixty miles, so that a considerable terri¬ tory is sampled. At one point we pass fifty clearing the ground for the highway. They have to work two or three months without Arms taken away. 9 A summary. Labor stealing. 10 Recruited for planters. Forced labor six months each year. No pay for a year’s work. 11 Similar conditions over wide area. Page 9 rations or pay and this service does not absolve their head tax. They work in two-week shifts so that the service of the individual comes to from four to six weeks. To obtain money for the head tax they either sell produce or work from two to three months for some planter. 12 Work Gang D No end to road work. Women at work. Forty miles away talked with a road force of thirty. They said there is no end to road work, it goes on all the time. They claim that three or four years ago certain members of their village were recruited for work on distant coffee plantations and have not come back. These workers have no proper tools, no spades, picks, shovels, wheelbarrows—nothing but their footy native hoes and round baskets. Among them are women with infants on their backs, women nearing their time of delivery, and children as young as twelve years. Their work is not of a heavy type. They hoe together a little dirt, draw it into a basket holding about a peck, walk to the side of the road and dump it. 13 Village No. 3 Fifty natives stand about us as we sit at high noon under the Taken far from home, deep eaves of the thatched mission school. Thirty are passing wayfarers who have been working for six months on cotton planta¬ tions two hundred miles away. They have been on the road ten days and are still two days’ journey from home. They are the last batch of two hundred such workers who have been passing through here lately. They are bound for D— to get their pay for the last four months, the first two months of service having gone to pay their head tax. They were told they would receive 50 escudos a month, which would come to 200 escudos apiece. One of them says that he has been requisitioned three times. The first time, four years ago, he worked eight months on a plantation in order to absolve his head tax of ten escudos; the second time he was on Government work and got 21 escudos for eight months’ work, out of which ten escudos went for head tax. The third time he was getting out railway timbers for a planter about 200 miles from here. Ten of his fellow workers lost their lives by falling from tree tops or by cutting themselves with the axe. The first month the planter gave them fish to eat with their manioc mush, after that they were given nothing but manioc meal, so they went out into the bush and collected herbs to make their mush palatable. On arrival they got each half a pano, a blanket and a cheap cotton jersey. After that nothing. They could have gotten home quickly by railroad, no transportation was provided, however. For the ten days’ trip home they received mouldy flour and no fish. Other wayfarers state that in the village they come from all the men were requisitioned and only women are available for road work. Page 10 On a Farm We stop at the farm of two Germans from East Africa who Voluntary labor, have hired land from a Portuguese. They pay their blacks sixty centavos a day and their keep. They engage them directly, being convinced that nothing is gained by hiring them from the Govern¬ ment. The cost comes to about the same and they can pick their blacks, whereas the planter who contracts with the Government has to take such as the Government sends him. The contract period of the blacks is six months which, however, may be extended by fines for misconduct, breakages, or pretenses of the same. The Germans do not know whether or not the blacks actually receive the wages the planter pays the Government for them. Other Evidence 14 The white residents testify that the natives are now not nearly so well clothed as they were ten years ago. During the war the price of cloth rose rapidly, while money wages went up slowly. In 1917 a European woman going out in hammock from Malange found the first day out that the natives were wearing one pano instead of three; the second day out, rags; and the third day, leaves. The women complained that they had no cloth in which to tie their babies to them, so that “their backs felt lonesome.” The foreman of a certain estate told us that in 1921 he worked six months for a sizal planter who told the workers that he had “bought” them of the Government. He daily got enough food for one noon meal. At the end of his service he received a pano and a shirt. He asked for more and was told to apply to those who sent him. He did apply to this official, but was told that he had already had enough pay. He did not have to pay head tax that year, but his wife had to work on the road. Afterward he worked as a free laborer on a plantation, where he got his food and ten escudos a month. Every year his family works two months on the highway. He says that the lot of the black has been getting harder. Unless he is working for a white man unpaid service will be required of him for half a year. The chief is called to furnish so many men from his village and will be jailed if they are not forthcoming. A mulatto woman tells how a sugar planter at Alto Dondi asked for workers, so the authorities sent for them up to her district and the officials scoured the country for them. The men got bad food and were beaten. Their term of service was to be six months, but near the end of this period some machinery broke and the blacks were required to work long enough to pay for the breakage. They stayed a year and were sent back empty handed. Some returned to find their families broken up and gone. Increasing poverty. Contract laborers unpaid. 15 Village No. 4 Fifty villagers are gathered—Ambaquistas. They say that in 16 the time of the monarchy (before 1910), although they were slaves, they were better off and got more for their work. Their lot is \ Page 11 Worse than slavery. Wages withheld. Contracts! 17 A village scene. Government carriers. getting harder. Things got abruptly worse for them 1917-1918. The Government makes them work but gives them nothing. They return to find their fields neglected, no crops growing. They would rather be slaves than what they are now. As slaves they have value and are not underfed, but now nobody cares whether they live or die. This Government serfdom is more heartless than the old domestic slavery, which was cruel only when the master was of cruel character. Now they are in the iron grasp of a system which makes no allowance for the circumstances of the individual and ignores the fate of the families of the labor recruits. There are 140 huts in this area, which extends five miles by two. For fifteen months not less than 50 have been required to work on the roads, and some months more than one hundred. The quota is maintained by shifts. When a white man applies to the administrador for workers a soldier is sent with him to the village who calls out the chief and notifies him that so many men must be forthcoming from that village. When men are taken for distant plantations, they are pro¬ vided with a thin jersey, a patio, and in the cool season a blanket. Two months ago thirty from this area were taken to an unknown destination. In 1922 twenty from this area were requisitioned to work as carriers between L— and P—. Their taxes had already been paid. For six months’ service they got the equivalent of $1.80. They think that the Government gets twelve dollars for every man who works for the planter six months. Somebody keeps most of it so that the laborer gets no pay. The law contemplates that the laborer shall enter into labor contracts with a free will. These Ambaquistas say that they put their thumb prints on some papers, but do not know what these papers contain and would be flogged should they dare refuse to sign them. The Government keeps all these contracts. They are para Ingleza ver, i.e., “for the English to see.” Village No. 5 When we reach such a village with its huts of grass, or of wattle-and-daub, scattered about in the bush, its little corn cribs, its pens for pigs, goats and chickens, its tiny banana plantations and gardens, the people hasten to put on their best and soon they assemble about us as we sit on chairs in the shade of a tree, some sitting on stools or benches, some on mats, while others stand patiently. They are clad in panos, bed blankets, old coats, overcoats, jerseys, shirts, undershirts, overshirts, cast-off uniforms, rags and in nothing at all save the G string. The elders wear skull caps, bear staffs and drape their pano or blanket about them with much dignity. They listen most respectfully while the boys and women sit perfectly quiet. In this case seventy Ambaquistas are present of whom twenty are men. They state that six years ago five requisitioned by the Govern¬ ment from this village were taken to San Thome and never came back. Last November four had to be sent to Catete to serve six Page 12 months. Six weeks later, these four having run away, the police came and required four others in their place. In such cases it is the chief in council who decides who shall go. Every few weeks a requisition comes for Government carriers and the service lasts from two weeks to three months according to the distance they are sent. For a short trip they get nothing but rations; for a long trip they get also a tax receipt. Forced labor began in 1914 and has been worse since 1917. The new highway was begun three years ago, and the twenty families of this village had to keep eight persons constantly at work. The last year the quota has been five. They feed themselves. Native Evangelists An evening with three young native evangelists brought out significant testimony. At a place thirty miles away ninety natives were charged with building eight miles of good road. Those who had nobody to “spell” them went home Saturday noon for a week’s supply of food and returned Sunday evening. The native bosses had been on this work for over a year and yet could not leave it. The one white boss was the only one who got pay. In a county seat, outside the regular Government officials only two men got any pay—one a white man and one a black linesman from Loanda. All others working for Government there got noth¬ ing, not even their food, and they were in rags. Five weeks before, two hundred natives arrived from N— headed by a white, escorted by three soldiers. They had been sold by the officials at N— to a coffee planter who had paid 27,000 escudos ($675) for them. They were quite thin and eleven died on the three days’ march. If they dropped on the march no one was allowed to stop and cover them with earth. “Why waste time on these worms?” Of the two hundred, thirty were sick at the county seat and four died. The married sister of a native evangelist testifies that a planter at R— pays the taxes of tax delinquents, who then have to work for him gratuitously for six months. One evangelist tells how in 1922 he was in P—, county seat of the Songo country and found many poor women who had nothing to eat or wear. They had been sent to Loanda and elsewhere to work for the whites so that they had no chance to make gardens for themselves. Here he saw three hundred women carrying clay to make bricks and asked them, “What will the Government pay for this work?” “Nothing,” they answered, “but they will pay us with a stick if we don’t furnish clay.” In other villages he found the people starving because the able-bodied had been sent far away, while the women were required to do so much unpaid public work that they had no time for growing their own food. In some parts he found that the people had no cloth and had to cover their naked¬ ness with bark cloth. The women even tied their babies on with this. Highway maintenance. 18 Road work L no pay. Deaths on the march. Work six months to pay taxes. Forced labor of women. Page 13 19 Continuous road work. 20 Tax delinquents. 21 Women with babies. No tools. Road Workers In leaving this part of Angola we talked with natives working on the road. One told us his village has been working on this piece of road for years. Formerly those who rendered military service were exempt from industrial service and head tax; but this is no longer so. Our informant, who has been working steadily on the road for two years, can tend his garden only on Sundays and evenings. The Commandant of the Post made him responsible for a certain stretch of road. He gets neither food nor pay and has to find his head tax besides. No one from this village is taken for the plantations; the road is all that they can do. Village No. 6 Natives called out from this village, which we reach a little further on, report that a gang of men taken away to labor nine months ago are not back yet. Taxes here are collected in such a way as to create as many delinquents as possible. Those who do not produce the money when summoned are “delinquents” and they never know when they will be summoned. No one is given a chance to go off and catch fish or market his produce in order to obtain tax money, for lately it has been ordered that no one may have a pass to go into another township unless his taxes have been paid. From a neighboring village in 1921 tax “delinquents” were taken away for six months’ service. Some have never come back. Those who did had nothing to show for their work but a tax receipt. Women Working On Roads Where a highway crosses the swamp I count ninety-nine per¬ sons, nearly all women and girls, carrying earth in baskets on their heads about three hundred yards to make a huge fill. There are thirteen babies on backs and twelve of the gang are too young to be mothers. A mile further on I find twenty-nine women carrying earth, of whom fourteen have babies on their backs. Five men are on their job, one a foreman. Some have been three months on the job alternating with a member of their family. The foreman says he is under orders not to beat those who do not appear regularly. Those who run off and hide in the bush he reports to the Chief of the Post. The regular force is fifty, but twenty-one are sick, mostly of influenza. Cutting Trees It is a shame that when a road must be cut through a hard wood forest, the Government furnishes no steel axes with which to fell the trees. From the stumps I judge that five times as many strokes of the little native iron ax are needed to fell a tree as of a good steel ax. I picked out a hard-wood tree, eighteen inches through at the base, and asked how long it would take to fell it with their iron axes. They said four people would require half a day. With a good ax I could do it in two hours. Page 14 . Village No. 7 This village has forty-eight huts sheltering about four hundred. At least a hundred were about us and, as it was noon, wore nothing save the loin cloth. They reported that two of their fellows after having worked two months at the county seat on public buildings were sent to work for planters in the coffee region. At the outset each was given three pieces of clothing. After working six months they received 30 escudos ($.75) from the planter and on returning to the county seat the administrador gave them 60 escudos ($1.50) each, out of which 40 escudos head tax had to be paid. Their “net” then was 50 escudos ($1.25). Two months ago five men were taken and “sold” for six months to a planter. We meet here the chief of five villages including this one, with a total population of about 2,500. Six years ago a hundred of them were taken away to San Thome and none ever came back. A requisition for twenty-six persons for road work stands against this village. It is under obligation to ferry across the river gratis any soldier or government people who come by. It also has to furnish men to carry lime and tile for building at the county seat four days from here. They get only their rations. We pass the military post for an area which furnishes at least 1,500 workers on roads and plantations. A road foreman showed us certain berries and the seeds from certain pods with which his workers eke out their food from home. They dare not eat too much of these lest they become sick. Conditions South Of The Quanza We now pass in motor car to a part of Angola about 300 miles distant. On the way we are impressed with the extravagance of motor-road building. The road runs straight for many miles and at the crown of a hill we can see it before us dropping into the valley and rising to the crown of the next hill two or three miles away. Some heavy grades could have been avoided by swinging around the hills instead of driving straight ahead regardless of topography. The road is at least seven meters wide when it might have been made five meters wide and afterwards widened as traffic warranted it. To clear of trees, grade, smooth and surface with ant-hill clay these broad strips imposes a crushing burden on natives without picks, spades, shovels, wheel barrows or road scrapers. The road never swerves for an ant hill, although the removal in baskets of an ant hill as big as a house is a huge task. That road building has been overdone is evident. For many hours we ride through a wilderness with herds of game frequently in sight and the uptrack on our car is the only track visible on our return. On this trip and in 146 miles of travel in the next two days I see but one vehicle on the road and it is a car filled with officials, including the highway engineer, going to plan for addi¬ tional roads! I was told of a good motor road which leads only to a fine view on a hill top. Months after its completion my in¬ formant drove up and his was the first wheel track in it. 22 Six months’ work for taxes. None return from S. Thome. 23 Road making overdone. Roads not used. Page 15 24 How The Labor System Works Labor wanted for nothing. 25 Police persecution. 26 Children taken from school. Forced labor for planters. 27 Skill discouraged. Slavery ceased with the downfall of the Portuguese monarchy in 1910 and the new system began about 1918. In the interval when Republican principles were supposed to prevail, the Portuguese landholders constantly complained that the natives were lqopelessly lazy, that the planters could not obtain workers for their farms; yet all this time blacks thronged the mission estate delighted if they could earn five cents a day, skilled labor ten cents. Most Portuguese thought they ought to get labor for noth¬ ing or at most for twenty cents a month, with perhaps two cents worth of food a day. Moreover, on the plantation labor is ruth¬ lessly driven. If a mother lays a baby under a tree and rises up from her work when it cries, she may get struck for it. Much of the brutality from which the natives suffer is inflicted by the native police ( cipaes ) who are given virtual carte blanche by their Portuguese superiors. A year ago the police came to the mission, collected the men, went to the pounding rocks where the women pound their manioc and had their meal spread to dry and took them off to work on the road without even giving them opportunity to gather up the meal and carry it to their homes. The natives are much worse clad than before the war. As always with a depreciating currency, wages are slower to rise than prices. Children had to quit the mission school saying, “Father has been taken to work on a plantation, mother and the older brothers are working on the roads, so I must stay out of school to hoe the fields, pound the manioc into meal and feed my little brothers and sisters.” Furthermore the child will have to pound the meal and carry it to mother working on the road with the baby on her back. While I am at the mission a former pupil comes in and tells how fifteen men of his village have been commandeered by Gov¬ ernment to work on a private plantation. They get 15 escudos a month. The village changes the force every five weeks. The substitutes answer to the names of the men replaced, so the planter is not aware of this substitution. A carpenter questioned tells that he has given three months unrequited work on the buildings at the Post. No rations. He was assisting a first class native carpenter who worked for months and months without wages or rations. For the industrial depart¬ ment of a mission school to make a native skillful is a doubtful kindness, for the skilled worker is likely to be kept working for nothing for the Government a longer time than the unskilled. It is harder to replace the carpenter when his term is up than the hoe man; so they keep him on. 28 Village No. 8 Interviewing an intelligent man from it, we learn that it has about two hundred inhabitants of whom sixty pay poll taxes. The village is obliged to maintain six on road work the year around. The elders decide who shall go. Eight have to be kept on the Page 16 plantations where they get 50 escudos ($1.25) for three months’ work. No pano or blanket is supplied. Their food is a quart of meal a day which they must cook themselves. This being in¬ sufficient, they have to obtain food from home. They work from Road work, no pay. dark to dark with two short intervals for resting and eating. The work is very hard and the stick is freely used if one straightens up or takes a moment’s ease. The overseer is a white man. After working three months some leave without asking for the 50 escudos due them, because those who do are at once given another time card and required to work another three months’ period. How¬ ever, this seems sheer imposition, for when they have taken their Cheated on time cards, time cards to the Post and asked whether they have to work a second three months the official has said “No.” But only those have gone to the Post who took no pay. A man may have to put in four months before he gets three months “written” on his time card. The planter seizes all manner of pretexts for not “writing” a day that has been worked. He will write on four days a week when six days have been put in, saying “I can’t write every day you work for then your period of service would come too quickly to an end.” All Government work yields no pay and carries no rations unless the laborers are sent far from their homes. If the official gives them a shilling or two a month each it is understood as a tip rather than a wage. A Sizal Plantation 29 We find 230 natives working on a certain fazenda while 400 Forced labor for more are coming to help care for the crop. They are obtained planters directly from the Government for a three months’ term and are paid directly from 15 to 18 escudos a month. As ration they get a kilo of corn meal together with beans and dried fish. The manager, a Boer, says the system smacks of slavery and he would prefer voluntary labor. Work Gang E 30 Thirty six miles from-we pass a road gang drawn A1I year obligation. from four villages. Two have a quota of five workers each, one of six and the other of seven. The obligation is year-round, or until their ten kilometers of highway is finished. They work from sun to sun but are not driven. The quotas of these villages for plantation work are ten, five, five, four; the term of service is three months and the rations are insufficient. Village No. 9 31 We remained overnight in this village which has 173 in- J t a ^L &nd W ° rk habitants of whom sixty pay head tax. It must keep five on road work and four on plantation work, while eleven are in Loanda on Government work. This is the third batch which has been fur¬ nished to Loanda. They get 30 escudos ($.75) for their six months’ service but have to pay their head tax besides. Their food is poor. One who has been a term in Loanda may be required Page 17 32 in the same year to work on a plantation, but his village will see to it that someone “changes off” with him. On the plantation few seek any pay, for if they ask for their pay another three months’ time-card will be forced upon them. Plantation work does not exempt them from the head tax. To raise this they have to sell the corn, or pigs, or chickens their wives have raised. The work on the plantation stretches from dark to dark and is terribly hard. The road work sometimes interferes with their putting in their crops. In recent years the burden of obligatory work has been getting heavier. Most of the thirty present have about exhausted their store of food, although it will be yet some months before a new crop is made. Several have not paid their 80 escudos head tax and to raise the money will have to sell some of the food needed to sustain their families. Worse than slavery. We are told that life is getting harder for the natives. So much of their time is taken that they are not able to look after their gardens, houses and village improvements as formerly; nor do they have the income they had when they worked for real wages. They are less able to buy cloth, tools or utensils. They are becoming more impoverished, less able to sustain schools and churches. Their lot is nearly that of slaves. One foreigner of long residence in Angola says “This is worse than slavery. The Portuguese have the benefit of the natives’ unpaid toil without the slave owner’s responsibility of feeding, clothing and caring for the laborer.” Skilled labor, no pay. On the road we pass a bridge under construction. The builder, an elderly native Christian of noble appearance, is so useful that the Government keeps him at work for it without rations or pay for as much as five months at a time. 33 Village No. 10 This village which has sixty-three payers of head tax, must keep three men regularly on road work, five men are now working for the Benguela Government and five are on Government work at G—. Those at Benguela may be there six months or a year and will get nothing but a tax receipt. Those at G— have been called for a month, but when they come back others must take their places. They supply their own food and will not get even their tax receipt. The men at Benguela work from dark to dark and are given wormy meal which often brings on dysentery. Labor exactions are on the increase and it is now six years that the pressure has been getting worse. This district once produced tons and tons of rice, but this branch of cultivation has all but died out because the labor requisitions made it impossible to care for it. Villages deep in the bush suffer as much from labor exactions as those near. More is required from villages with skilled workers than from those without schools. Hence parents hesitate to let their boys learn a trade. During our palaver we ask eleven men sitting in a row “How much forced labor have you performed in the last twelve months?” Agriculture discouraged. No trades. Page 18 The replies are: two months, seven weeks, nine weeks, three months, two months, twenty weeks, nine weeks, four months, eight weeks, seven weeks, six months—in all thirty-three months or an average of three months. In no case were there rations, pay or tax receipt. Their wives not only did road work but had to carry on their heads to the Post, forty miles away, the boards and planks their husbands had sawed in the woods. Village No. 11 This village, which has one hundred twenty persons who pay the head tax, keeps fifteen on the road force, twenty-nine work at the Post, and thirteen are maintained in Loanda on Government work. Six had just returned from six months’ plantation work having got nothing although they toiled from dark to dark. Their food, a plate of meal a day, was not over half of what was necessary. The Loanda workers got enough to pay their taxes, but not the others. Those on plantations had to take a second three months’ time¬ card, although they applied for no wages on the first time-card. The planter says he has paid the Post for them, but never tells how much. Not a little of their labor is stolen from them by the plantation. They get credit for only three or four days work in the week even when they have put in six days; so it takes four or five months to fill a three months’ time-card. If a man asks why yesterday was not “written,” he gets a cut of the whip with the remark “What business is it of yours? I’ll write what I please.” On Sundays they work until noon, although this is never credited on the time-card. I ask twelve men as to the amount of forced labor they have performed in the last twelve months. No. 1, having lately finished a six-year term as a soldier, is not on the service list but he helps on the road work; No. 2, has put in thirteen weeks; No. 3, seven weeks; No. 4, nine weeks; No. 5, seven weeks; No. 6, eleven weeks; No. 7, six months in Loanda and four weeks on the road going and returning; No. 8, six months as mason, receiving for service 35 escudos and four yards of cloth. Then he put in two months on Government work and on the plantations; No. 9, twelve weeks; No. 10, eleven weeks; No. 11, nine weeks; No. 12, thirteen weeks. All had to pay the head tax besides. Those who report a short term—such as seven weeks—may have been sick or in the employ of a white man. Omitting the discharged soldier, the eleven men had 156 weeks of unrequited labor, or an average of 14 145 weeks each. The Chief of the Post here demanded workers for plantations. Among those who responded were two skilled workmen. They said “We would prefer to work for the Government at our trade rather than wield the hoe for the planter.” He replied “I did not send for skilled workmen and I don’t want them. I want only men who can hoe.” How much incentive can a native have to acquire skill when the authorities take this attitude? An elderly carpenter and early mission convert, remembers well when some of the planters had hundreds of slaves. I ask “Are Average three months’ forced labor. 34 Taxes. Labor stolen. Periods of forced labor. 35 Skill not wanted. Page 19 Better off as slaves. No trades. No escape. Beatings. 36 Cheated on time cards. Unpaid toil for two or three months. conditions for your people better than they used to be or worse?” He replies: “Twelve years ago when there was slavery the slaves had all the hardships while the free negroes were not badly off. Now we are all slaves. The slaves were better fed than we forced laborers are for we are not property.” There is little effort on the part of the authorities to spread their exactions evenly among the native males. The skilled are retained at unpaid labor much longer than the unskilled. Hence boys shrink from learn¬ ing carpentry and masonry for fear of being kept longer at unpaid labor. Migration affords no relief to the blacks for the headman of a village will be jailed when any of its inscribed tax payers are not produced. The Chief will say “Where is Josia?” “He’s moved away.” “Well, you find him or someone to take his place. He is on my books and he had no permission to leave.” So the headman is jailed until Josia appears. The natives are held in a net of strong mesh. I saw the hands of the village headman all swollen from the infliction of the palmatorio. For hours he has been holding them in hot water to reduce the swelling. He was beaten yester¬ day because he failed to present at the Post the leaving road gang at the same time he presented the new road gang. On the plantations the labor recruits sample the palmatorio and the chicote, or hippohide whip. They get the lash even if they straighten up a bit to rest their backs; the hoes must be in action all the time. Village No. 12 The population is 382, one hundred pay head tax. For the moment these villagers are not on road work. Their job has been sawing out boards for the Government by hand. Six were kept on this for four months. Four men have been on the six months’ term in Loanda, while a quota of four must be kept working at the Post. These are “spelled” every month. None are on planta¬ tions now but five was the village quota. Plantation work is so hard that these are “spelled” every fortnight. On the plantation the day is from dark to dark. Half a day’s work is exacted on Sunday but not credited. They work six days a week but never are the full six credited on the card. Hence, it takes five or six months to fill out a three months’ time-card. When they get their time-card they work the first week for nothing to pay for the “cost” of the time-card. Only one of the five Portuguese planters in this region “writes” every day worked. After the time-card is filled the planter requires the man to work an extra fortnight. If the victim protests, the planter will tear up the filled time-card and give him a new one which must be worked full. Their rations are very insufficient—a handful of meal and one of unhulled rice. They do not more than half suffice, so that the men have to obtain sup¬ plies from home. One planter, however, gives each worker eight yards of cloth. The headmen judge that the unrequited toil of a year averages two and a half to three months, feeding and clothing themselves and paying their taxes besides. Page 20 The Region About Silva Porto The field of inquiry now shifts to villages 150 to 250 miles away, reached from other centers. From inquiries we learn that the traders influence powerfully the conduct of the officials. The native will do anything, pay anything, rather than take his cause into court. However good his case, he will not seek justice unless he has the support of a white man. His experience makes him regard Government and courts all as a white man’s affair, in which he has no faith. Count¬ ing on the native’s distrust of the officials and judges, the trader feels safe in venturing on almost any outrage and extortion. One trader burnt a village at night and tied up all the people he could catch supposing (mistakenly) that a man of this village had robbed him. None of his victims will complain of this at the Fort. They fear being sent to San Thome. They simply have no confidence in the Government. Although the law makes praiseworthy provisions for the acquisition and conservation of property by the native, he has in fact no property rights as against the white man, because the Government affords him no protection. Although the law will reserve five hectares for any native family, the white man can take a concession which engulfs a native village and all its holdings. Decree No. 40—was prompted by the feeling that something must be done here to placate outside public opinion. The decree exists only on paper, not in reality. On one occasion I talked with a group of intelligent black men from villages as much as 150 miles apart. Village No. 13 This village, which has three hundred inhabitants, of whom one hundred and ten pay taxes, has to maintain at the Post three carpenters who work six months, each furnishing his own tools and food. They asked for wages but got nothing but receipts for their taxes. Their successors did not even get that much. This illus¬ trates the caprice of officials. The village must keep going two sawyers who furnish their own saw and food, get no pay and are “spelled” every fortnight. Then they have to provide the Post the year round with twenty common laborers who get nothing. For a month twenty men had to be furnished for building bridges. The Chief petitioned for pay for them but without result. Again, the village was assigned a stretch of road and all hands worked on it six weeks from dark to dark under a native policeman who used freely on them his hippo whip. They fed themselves and some were too tired at night even to get fire-wood to keep them warm through the night. Again the policeman took thirty men from this village for work on the railway. For their year’s work they get a blanket and 10 escudos each. The village paid their taxes for them. Being under an Englishman they were well fed and well treated. Finally the village had to furnish two policemen for whom is provided food, clothing and taxes. The Chief remarked “because we are connected with the Mission schools, we have 37 No faith in courts. Government no protection. Paper laws. 38 At the mercy of officials. Page 21 been much better treated than the heathen villages.” He says the past year has been the worst he has ever known, nor are they so well fed and clad as they used to be. He recounts that a trader came and built right by the village with no regard to the owner¬ ship of the land. Although he has no authorization he makes them furnish him with carriers and pays them nothing. The Post affords the natives no protection from such labor thieves. 39 Village No. 14 Brutality. Inhabitants 150, taxpayers forty-four. The Chief says that the village had to furnish a skilled worker for six months, then two had to be provided. The man who was the best carpenter in the district furnished his own tools and food and got nothing, not even a tax receipt. Informed that his wife was sick he obtained a day’s leave to go home. Finding her in childbirth and with no one but a little girl to help her he outstayed his leave one day. A cipaio came, tied him up, and brought him to the Post where the Administrador had him given a severe beating with the pal- matorio and thrown into the prison. Next morning early the Chief saw them bring this man out of prison with his hands too swollen to close, give him a hoe and set him to work on the road. An armed cipaio stood over him and kept him steadily at work. He was weak from lack of food and could hold the hoe handle Hunger. only between thumb and palm. The village was required to keep seven continuously on road work, “spelled” every two weeks. Both men and women worked under a cipaio who had a chicote, days very long. Besides this the whole village was out about a month working on the roads. This corvee is one of the chief reasons why in some villages people are dying of hunger. The authorities pay no attention to the re¬ quirements of the native crops. They may be called out just when the rice is ripe so that in their absence the birds get it. 40 In 1923 two traders near here wanted carriers to convey their goods to railhead at Chinguar. They simply sent to the Post, each asking for ten carriers. The loads they gave out were forty-five kilos each, so the village had to furnish double the number of carriers and divide the loads. The carriers were taken to the white Laws a dead letter. man by a cipaio. No food was provided. They asked for pay and were told “This is on government requisition and no pay goes with it.” Thus forty carriers were done out of their time for thirty days each, for they made two round trips. The law lays down that forced workers shall be paid. Foreigners are required to pay the wages in the presence of the Administrador but for the Portuguese this clause of the law is a dead letter and they help themselves freely to native labor. Some good fortune. Village No. 15 Inhabitants 300, tax payers seventy-three. It lies 75 miles to the south in a newly opened territory where there are no important traders or planters. For three months it had to keep eight men felling and sawing trees for the Government. This year no road Page 22 work has been required of them and no service for private in¬ dividuals. Neighboring villages are equally fortunate. Village No. 16 41 The horn was blown when we reached this village at high noon and soon the people came trooping into the school house each with his little stool. About thirty were present besides children. The inhabitants are about 200 in number, tax payers sixty-six. A policeman will come to the village with an order for so many men to work at Silva Porto, the Post. There they are assigned to various people who wish servants—hotel keepers, traders, residents. They serve six months, get their food but no clothes and are paid enough to equal their head tax. Generally the work is hard, the hours are long, and the whip is used. At the end of six months the village sends a replacing gang. The year around ten must be maintained in this service. Then six, chiefly boys and girls, work from dark to dark on the highway under a policeman with a whip. They are changed every three or four weeks. Ten men from this village serve for a year on a plantation, at the end of which they get six yards of the cheapest calico. No money, no tax receipt. No time-card is used. This plantation work is a recent development and has been worse this year than ever before. In general the skilled worker is not let go at all from forced labor. Just now no one from the village is on Government work. Following the abrupt abandonment of the ambitious construction policy of the late High Commissioner Sr. Norton De Matos, there has been a great reduction in public work. Inquiry reveals that the men in the front row have worked altogether forty-nine months in the last year or an average of nearly 5 months. One got two yards of cheap calico; two got six yards each; two got tax receipts and one was paid about two shillings. I asked, “Why don’t you protest against such treatment?” The school teacher stated that he had complained to the secretary of the administration of the blackmailing of the villagers by the policemen. That official promptly flared up and said, “Get out of here! It’s none of your business what the authorities do.” Al¬ though these policemen are under no supervision in their dealings with the villagers, the authorities will harken to no complaints against them. Thanks to this the cipaio sometimes makes money faster then a successful trader. He is given an order to comb out so many men from the district, but it is within his discretion how many shall be required of a particular village. So under threat of being tied up the villagers compete in bribing him not to hit them too hard. He demands men even of villages all of whose able-bodied men are away on duty. In order to avoid being beaten they will have to pay him. Thus a cipaio rakes in money, corn, sheep, goats and chickens until sometimes not a domestic animal is left in the village. The cipaio is often a criminal or a bad character and his field of operation is always a strange tribe, pre- Work at the Post. Recent reduction in public work. 42 Pay for five months. Police oppression. Page 23 43 Depopulation. 44 An exempted village. Forced loans. ferably one with which his tribe is at enmity. The Portuguese have been very skillful in playing off one tribe against another so as to use the black man in carrying out the white man’s evil pur¬ pose. We were told that in the eastern part of Angola the un¬ expected appearance of a strange white man in the village is a signal for the precipitate abandonment of huts and firesides. Across the frontier in the Belgian-Congo such panic is unknown. The Rhodesian and Belgian-Congo borders of Angola are becoming depopulated. Last year within ten miles of Chisamba there was a shrinkage of 600 taxpayers (1,500 inhabitants) owing to the natives striving to put themselves out of reach of the Portu¬ guese. Most moved east and northeast into the less “civilized” areas where they would be less harassed by taxes and requisitions. According to law a native working for himself is not to be called upon to render service. I have never heard of a case of exemp¬ tion on this account but now I come upon such an instance. One village engaged in market gardening and growing wheat and rice is so esteemed for its excellent produce that it is not called upon to furnish workers for the state. Some administradors, on the other hand, in planting time call out the whole village on highway work with the express intention of making the native come to depend entirely on employment by the white man, of converting him into proletarian. The time of payment of taxes plays into the hands of the white trader. The tax is due just before the natives’ crops are ripe; so that the greatest possible number are obliged to borrow under extremely hard conditions. Some traders require six months labor for paying a man’s tax. February last, a missionary met on the road a body of 400 natives going down to the coast to work for the planter who had paid their taxes and given each a “cloth.” About the same time he met 700 men, tax delinquents, being conducted to Malange to work for these planters who had advanced the money for their taxes. Such work does not in the least exempt them from the regular annual stint of unpaid work for the government. 45 A mission physician states: No medical service. The Colonial Medical Department has a very comprehensive plan for meeting the medical needs of the natives, but it has not been put into effect. There are only a few Portuguese medical men in the interior, and these are very widely scattered. Their attention is chiefly taken up with white practice and in general medical help is not available to the native. There are very few dispensaries where medicine is available for pay and almost no free medicine. In recent epidemics of smallpox and influenza with a high mortality rate no relief measures were undertaken that I know of on the part of the Government. Heavy duties are charged on medicines imported by the missions for their free dispensaries. One day in January I visited a native village in the famine district. While I was there two men died of starvation, and at the same time a cipaio was there collecting laborers! Page 21* Village No. 17 In this village owing to the presence of a native policeman we made no inquiries as to forced labor. However, we came upon a recent instance of the authorities dealing out justice. A policeman came to this and other villages and made them give him two pigs for his clothes. The village head man took the matter to the Post, the Commandant called the policemen in and they picked out the guilty man, his extortions were proven on him and the villagers got their pigs back. Village No. 18 This is a village containing eighty taxpayers about which we learned from the native teacher. Policemen constantly come to the village for workers and keep adding to the number demanded. Then if the people do not provide as many as they demand the policemen blackmail them or maltreat them. Some of these work¬ ers are taken to the Post to make roads or to build houses and get neither food nor pay. Some are worked by traders or planters from whom they receive not even food. Forty people at a time are called for road building and this quota is kept at work until the job is finished. This year the work lasted three months. The policeman is given a warrant for a certain number of workers, but the apportioning of this burden among the villages is left to him. By gifts the villages compete to ingratiate themselves with the policeman. Near the village are two plantations. Some work on the plantations voluntarily but if not enough volunteers show up, others are requisitioned. If they find themselves, they get four yards of calico for six weeks’ labor; if fed, they get the calico in ten weeks. They are well treated and not beaten. A requisitioned laborer has to serve three months on the planta¬ tion. There are no time cards except for tax delinquents or those who are working out a debt. Those with time-cards have labor stolen from them, because not all the days worked are “written.” One who has toiled three months on the plantation is not exempt from taxes or road work. The teacher judges that the average man has to give three months of forced labor in the year. Only labor on plantations is remunerated. Village No. 19 Inhabitants, ISO; taxpayers, forty. The Christian elder says that thirty men requisitioned by the Post were turned over to work six months for a neighboring planter. They were, in fact, worked thirteen months and got only 25 escudos, no tax receipt. Last June the authorities made inquiry at the village with regard to the food and the wages of these men. Then the planter left the men free to go home and began to pay 30 escudos a month. It was his practice to compel the men, by threatening them with the pal- matorio, to work on Sunday—which is against the law. Nineteen men are constantly at work for another planter to extinguish their Justice! Police exactions. On plantations. 47 48 Peonage. Page 25 A happy village. 49 Labor stolen. 50 Outrages unreported. indebtedness to him. Their wages do little more than to pay their head tax, so they make no progress in extricating themselves from debt. Their lot is pure peonage. The village regularly supplies three men for highway work under a cipaio. They are changed every month. Village No. 20 Inhabitants, 800; taxpayers, three hundred. Our informant, a Christian elder, declares that, owing to a certain powerful local influence, which it is best not to describe here, these villagers are practically exempt from forced labor, and there is little road work. “We have a peaceful time, we are able to work in our gardens without interference, and the village is making improvement.” Village No. 21 Inhabitans, 100; tax payers, twenty-five. From this tiny village eight men were called to the Post. Two worked nine months on the road—and found themselves; two helped build the new Post. The work lasted three months and they were changed every month. Two worked two months for traders; no food, but 10 escudos pay. Two worked for the wireless station five months—one getting 9 escudos a month, the other 5. When those workers who had received nothing asked for pay, they were cudgelled. The Chief of Post was allowed a certain sum for labor in building the Post, but he put it into his pocket and the workers got nothing. Sus¬ picion was excited by his acquiring a motor cycle and an auto¬ mobile in the same year and he was dismissed. Village No. 22 Inhabitants, 200; tax payers, fifty. According to our inform¬ ant, a Christian elder, they had to provide men on the road gang for two months. Five were requisitioned for private work at L— about three hundred miles away. The term was to be nine months, but eleven months had passed and they had not returned. Occasion¬ ally they furnish a carrier, but this is all. When the policeman comes for men, they bribe him to let them off. Sunday we attended religious services in a large native village, about 600 being present. In the after-conference thirty-six men from nine villages were present and the following facts came out. Village No. 23 Inhabitants, 120; tax payers, thirty-five. This year the Post has made no call for workers and there has been very little road¬ work. But the local trader required ten men to build for him a month. He provided no food but paid each 25 escudos. He beat the elder of the village with the palmatorio if there was not prompt replacement of any of the ten who did not show up. When the job was finished he maliciously burned the goods of the men who had been working for him, because some had dropped out of the gang. Their failure to bring these outrages to the attention of the authorities shows how little faith the natives have in official justice. Page 2G So often have they been insulted and beaten when they made com¬ plaint that they bear their wrongs rather than report them to the official. We are told that if the native has the knowledge and means to get his cause before a regular court, he may get justice, for the judges are often more or less at odds with the administrative officials. Village No. 24 Inhabitants, 110; tax payers, twenty-five. Five men must be kept on the road work all the year. They are changed every month and are constantly beaten by the black foreman. At times many women and girls are called out to work on the highway. The sur¬ veyor of the Angola States Company has an order from the Post which enables him to have three men regularly from this village, ostensibly for road work, but actually working for the surveyor on his private possessions. One worked seven months for a tax receipt and four yards of thin calico, the other two are changed monthly. Village No. 25 Inhabitants, 300; tax payers, eighty. Four are maintained on road work, changed every month. The local trader requires two men to work for him three months. He promised them food and 30 escudos a month to the stronger and 25 escudos to the weaker. At the end of the month one of the workers found a substitute. No wages were paid him and it is not yet certain that there is any pay in this job. Village No. 26 Inhabitants, 300; tax payers, fifty. Only three are at the Fort working out their taxes. One man has to be kept on the road force and he is changed every month. No plantation work. Two months ago an investigator was sent down from Loanda to look into affairs here. Probably this investigation was instigated by the traders and directed against the humane Administrador. But the traders and planters were themselves investigated as to their treatment of the natives. The investigator, an army Captain in civil service had the idealism of Decree 40 and talked to the chief as man to man. He told the chief that they had better work on their own fields of rice and corn if they had any. If they had none by all means let them work for the planter, but the planter must provide good meal, fish and palm oil and clothe the workers. As soon as the investigator’s coming was known some of the alarmed officials began to pass out blankets and clothes liberally in order to make the natives’ testimony friendly. The Captain advised the chief to give no workers save misdemeanants to the coast or other remote centres. It was the great number from this quarter sent to Loanda which made the higher officials there suspicious of con¬ ditions in the Bihe region. The outcome of this investigation is not yet known. Labor stolen. No wages. 51 An investigation. Page 27 52 A Plantation A planter’s ideals. 53 Exactions. 54 The planter’s practice. Three villages die out. We visit Sr. M— who has an estate of upwards of 25,000 acres, much of it in a high state of cultivation. He has five hundred workers on his place and says he pays 20 escudos a month and food. He urges the universal education of the blacks, largely along industrial lines, as the best means of uplifting them. Until this transformation has been effected forced labor will be necessary but it should not exceed one hundred and twenty days a year and it should always be paid for. Village No. 27 In conference here with about forty men we learn that this “country” has eighteen villages inhabited by from 3,000 to 4,000 people. A year ago the assistant secretary of the administration, who was going about listing tax payers, selected at random thirty- five men from this “country” to be sent to L—, two hundred miles away for six months’ plantation work. A year has passed and none have come back. Eighty from this “country” are required to work at the Post and they change every three months. Some get food, but many do not. Then the exactions of road work are very heavy. When Mr. W— was here last January the policeman had a warrant for one hundred to work on the highway. Then along came an¬ other cipaio with a warrant for thirty more. These, of course, got nothing save the lash. Village No. 28 Six men from this village have for six months been working for a planter at the Post. They got a pano, a shirt, a blanket, a tax receipt, and expect some escudos when they are through. Their rations being insufficient, they have to be supplemented by the village. When they return, others must take their place. As for road work it does not amount to much. From the fourteen villages from this “country” (5,000 inhab¬ itants), one hundred men have to be furnished to that Sr. M—, the planter, we called on yesterday. They are worked at a hard pace from sunrise to sunset with from one to one and one-half hours rest at mid-day. For twelve months of this they receive food, shirt, pano and tax receipt, but no money. Many run away but are caught and brought back to work out the value of the goods they have received. Ten years ago conditions were much better then they are to-day. Prices have gone up much faster than wages. The requisi¬ tions do not leave them enough time properly to irrigate and till their fields. In two years the three villages in this area nearest the planters have died out. At the time of wheat or rice harvest the planters obliged even women and children to work in their fields for a little salt or a present to the village headman. This amounts to about a month of labor. Page 28 Village No. 29 55 Inhabitants, 200; tax payers, forty. The head man says this village is not required to furnish workers at the Post for the head¬ man is close to the chief of this “country.” Their road service is not heavy. Six villagers are working voluntarily for planters, and are satisfied with their pay. The easy conditions in this and other villages of this district are due to the favorable attitude of the last two ad mini str adores. When complaints are brought to them they give the native a hearing. They treat the natives with such respect that they are not liked by the traders and planters. The chief of a “country” explains to us how labor is em¬ bezzled. When a man runs away from a planter, his village, of course, must provide a substitute. The weeks that the absconder has worked are not credited to the village. The substitute is bound to serve six months. Should he quit before the term is up, his substi¬ tute has to serve for six months. Here is one more trick of the labor thieves. The native foreman steals labor by having some of the men under him work on his garden or field instead of for his employer. This working time does not lessen the amount of service that the planter exacts. The victimized laborer does not know that his toil is being embezzled by the rascally foreman. In 1923 the secretary from the Post summoned this chief and another and said, “You must give Sr. M— one hundred men, the other chief must furnish one hundred and fifty.” The chief replied, “One hundred is all the men I have in my ‘country’. If we send them, who will ‘spell’ them?” After some bickering he was told to supply eighty, but he could supply only fifty-five. They were set to work under a native overseer who with his whip worked them so fast that many of them lost their strength and decamped. Then the headmen of their villages were beaten with the palmatorio and set to work with swollen hands until the runaways were re¬ placed. This endless round of fleeing and coming, fleeing and com¬ ing, chastising the headmen, etc., is almost an inevitable accompani¬ ment of forcing labor under the harsh conditions of the plantation. Village No. 30 Inhabitants, 150; tax payers, twenty-four. It has one worker sent to the Coast eight months ago. At the outset he was given clothes and his tax was paid. No more is known of him. Another worked at the Post for six months receiving food, tax receipt and 13^4 escudos. Four workers were kept on one road for six months and two worked on another road for four months. Occasionally a neighboring planter calls for laborers, but since he pays them well and treats them right there is no complaint. The easy conditions prevailing now in this region are due to the effort to restore native confidence and courage after the terrible harrowing the natives were subjected to by the ferocious Zink who was administrador three years ago. Under him, when natives fell dead at road work their bodies were callously rolled to one side and buried on the spot. He started the practice of the natives fleeing across the frontier to settle in the Belgian Congo. Zink was dismissed and spent two years in Some good officials. Embezzling labor. Forced labor for planters. 56 Unjust official dismissed. Page 29 Portugal but afterwards he obtained a subordinate position in Malange where he has just died. 57 Village No. 31 Few honest officials. Trader’s demands. Traders cheat. 58 Chief protects own village. Little trouble with planters. Roads, no bridges. Inhabitants, 80; tax payers, twenty-four. They tell us that the under-secretary came to this village last August to list the tax payers. Without the knowledge of the administrator he picked three men to work for a planter two hundred miles away, representing that the work was only thirty miles away. When with others they were being brought out by a side-road, they were caught near the Post, taken before the administrador and the man-stealing scheme was exposed. Nevertheless, thirty-five natives were sent on down and nothing was done to the rascally under-secretary. Out here, honest and efficient men are so scarce that crooked civil servants have to be put up with. Under authority from the Post a local trader demanded three men from this village. Because they were not furnished quickly enough to suit him soldiers came and tied the headmen. The three were sent and have now been working four months. So far they have received only a blanket worth 40 escudos. The village has been called upon for very little road work and has no complaint on this score. Mr. S— states that the traders regularly cheat the natives. He personally has measured hundreds of panos sold as four yards and has found none that is not short by from eight to twelve inches. The trader treats the native worse than he does his cattle. He re¬ gards them as his animals but does not realize that maltreated natives have more means of escaping from him than maltreated cattle. Village No. 32 Inhabitants, 500; tax payers, one hundred and fifty. They re¬ ported five from this village working at the Post. They received nothing but food. Five requisitioned men are down at the Coast working for planters. One has returned after seven months’ service, but it is not known what he got. Four have served six months but have not yet returned. There is no complaint as to roadwork. Thanks to its being the chief’s village it comes off well when requisi¬ tions for carriers are made upon the villages. The chief sees to it that the other twenty-one villages in his jurisdiction bear most of the burden. As regards the “country” (twenty-two villages), it has very little trouble with the work for planters. The chief difficulty is that if any of the requisitioned men run away the village headmen are personally responsible for immediately getting them back or furnishing others. It is now nearly four years since this area was so terribly oppressed by the infamous administrador Zink. At one of the stations we meet a foreigner, out here nearly thirty years, who says that beyond the Zambesi, 500 miles east of here, there are miles upon miles of splendid roads, ten meters wide although there is no bridge over the river, so that they con¬ nect with nothing and no wheel turns on them. He knows of at Page 30 least forty natives who died on that road building. They were not provided with food, were worked under the lash, and were made to toil when sick with “flu” or pneumonia. Only two miles from his residence, a native got his back broken from a blow with his stick by an overseer and was left to die. A missionary saved him but he was a cripple for life. From certain residents of long experience in the country we obtained statements as to compulsory labor which are worthy of close attention. Statements of Mr. A— In all the villages around here a certain number of hoes are placed by the planters. Those hoes have to be kept at work, if one workman falls sick another from the village has to take his place, the hoes must never lie idle. At L— if one be absent from work others belonging to the same village as the absentee are beaten. The people declare that they receive a merely nominal pay, amounting to about four days’ work for one penny, and have always to supply their own food or additional food. Forced unpaid labor is em¬ ployed on all the roads and it is becoming common now among the natives to purchase a boy or girl so that the owner can send the slave to do the road work. Almost weekly calls are made on the villages for people for roads, bridges, work at the posts and for private firms. What the natives feel most is that no food is pro¬ vided, and those remaining in the villages have to spend a great part of their time preparing the meal and carrying it to the work people, and nine times out of ten the cipaio, a black put in charge of the gang by the government, demands a share of it. Beating with whips by the cipaios and whites is very common and much resented by the natives. During the past few weeks there has come to my knowledge a number of cases of people having been beaten on the road and on a farm. These people were beaten because their food being finished they went home to get more. In some cases the road work is fifty miles from the village, especially new roads. At K— there are eighteen tax payers, of these five are employed building a bridge over the river, two on Senr. S—’s farm and three at V—. The three latter are working for the Governor where they are provided with food and well treated. This Governor has the well-being of the natives at heart, and I know of a case where he sternly reproved a white man for ill-treating the people. Though there are ten of the eighteen men in this village thus compelled to work regularly, cipaios are con¬ stantly calling to demand more people. They cannot let more go as there would not be sufficient left in the village to provide food for those at work, so they are compelled to bribe each cipaio as he comes along. The cipaes are the real rulers of the country. If one be sent out to seek twenty carriers, he demands forty or fifty, and those among the people who have money can bribe the cipaio to be set free. Their usual procedure is to catch all the women that they can in a village, and for each woman set at liberty they demand a carrier or a bribe. 59 Forced labor. Little pay. No food. A good governor. Cipaes are the real rulers. Page 31. Chronic semi-starvation. Increasing mortality. Frequently I have asked people to go with me to V—, to com¬ plain, but they have begged me not to do so, as the cipaes in future would make life harder for them. In the village where the cipaio sleeps for the night, he takes whatever woman he fancies and no one dares say him nay. They have the power of life and death. This year the uncle of one of our church members was beaten to death by one of them six miles from here, and I suppose there is scarcely a village around us here that did not lose one or two people about three years ago beaten to death by cipaios during the making of the road through O—. At present there is a bridge being built over the river, the cipaio in charge demanded from each village so many boards, when the boards were provided he said they were unsuitable for the purpose, but he had boards which they must buy from him with corn. The boards brought by the natives were then sent to V—, to make doors and windows for his own house, where he keeps working a number of the men, provided for the building of the bridge. Though the crops are very poor this year the people supplied the corn demanded. The number of cipaes has greatly increased in recent years and also the number of calls made upon the people. The chronic state of semi-starvation, in which the majority of the people now exist, I attribute to the excessive demands made on them for labor, leaving insufficient time for cultivation of their crops. Often they are called away at planting time which means a year of hunger. In past years they could rely on rubber and bees wax to provide what was necessary for taxes and clothing, but today everything depends on their crops. Taxes fall due about two months before their crops are ready, and the people borrow money from the traders to be repaid in corn. When the native is pressed for his taxes he will promise anything and the trader sees that he keeps his promise. Each year, during the early part of the dry season, epidemics of chest troubles are rife, but the mortality is about three times as great today as it used to be years ago. I judge this is due to mal-nutrition. These epidemics mean heavy work for us, and in the treatment of the cases I depend more on suitable nourish¬ ment than on medicine, with the result that those who recover return to their villages appearing better than they did before they took ill. This dry season the percentage of fatal cases has been higher than ever before, and in some villages the people were panic-stricken by the constant and numerous deaths. Early this year there were many deaths in the country from starvation, and we fear a repetition of this next wet season. Recently ,the administrador of A—, demanded, from the mis¬ sions and out stations laborers for the diamond mines. These Were furnished but the laborer sent from K— by S, the elder in the school there, being unwilling to serve, ran away. For this, the elder who is an old man, was made prisoner, sent to C—, and there put to work. With the yoke on his neck, he is doing the work of an ox, puddling the clay for tile-making. About a week ago, I sent a young man to see if we could find out anything concerning him, but he has not yet returned. The elder has no one to send in the place of the one who ran away, as the remaining young men Page 32 are being compelled to work for Senr. M—, a planter. Last year, the people of two of our out-stations had their fields taken from them by white planters. This is of frequent occurrence in other parts of the country. During the past eighteen months about twenty missionaries who live further inland have left Angola for British and Belgian territories. There must be weighty reasons for this as some whom I know personally lived in Angola for 25 years. Needless to say many natives have followed them. The administrador who wishes to give the natives fair treat¬ ment soon finds the traders and planters against him; and if the official does not carry out their wishes they seem to be able to have him removed. Statement Of Mr. B— Some eighteen months ago, a native in charge of a certain number of men making a government motor road 10 metres wide was beaten by a chefe named H—, with a big stick across his back, whilst two other natives were told to hold him. The cause of it was that not enough work had been done by the natives under his charge. As a matter of fact they had to cut through huge hard anthills (about fifteen to twenty feet high) and were not provided with tools by the government. With their own little tools the work could not progress quickly. After having been severely beaten he was left out in the bush without attention and would probably have died had not a lady missionary found him shortly afterwards, he was then unconscious. It was many months before the man could stand. About the same time a native working also for the govern¬ ment ill with pneumonia was found alone in a camp without at¬ tention or food, although a white official was in charge of the work. He was carried in a hammock to the mission station and his needs attended to but he died two or three days after he was found. Whilst a motor road was being made along the Congo boundary some forty-five miles north of K—, the official in charge, with the assistance of a native cipaio beat one of the native workers to death. The dead man’s relatives, not expecting to get justice if they re¬ ported the case, preferred to leave Angola and to flee to the Congo. Another official is also reported to have killed some native work people whilst building bridges etc., and the administrador evidently had some knowledge of it, but refused to take action as the said official is reported to have threatened to expose the wrong doings of the administrador. At a certain part of the motor road, after cutting it through the bush in a straight line it was found that rather a long bridge would have to be made over a river, so the plan was altered and the road was made to go round the head of the river. Some seventy to eighty men were commandeered for that purpose and worked about two months. When at the completion of the work they went for their pay, they were told they might walk over the road but they would get no pay. Missionaries leaving. Traders and planters oppose fair treatment. 60 Beaten for slow work. Beaten to death. Surveyor’s error, no pay for workers. Page 33 Distrust is cause of shortage of labor. Confidence, then plenty workers. Reasons for scarcity of food. One reason for the so-called scarcity of labor is the lack of confidence of the natives in the Portuguese, because in many in¬ stances their pay has been withheld from them, and so they are not trusted any more. As an example I may mention that some years ago, when the government had decided to move the Mexico Post to a higher site, one hundred and fifty natives were sent from K— to do the work. They worked for eleven months, and at the end of each month when asking for pay were told that they would get it in bulk when the work was finished. At the completion of the work they were told that they had eaten their food and no pay was given to any of them. The captain, however, told them that he was going himself to their homes and he wanted some thirty of them to carry his loads and that they would be paid for that. To each of these men thus engaged he gave a cheap cotton shirt worth about V —, as an advance on their pay. On reaching the neighborhood of Lake Dilolo they found that instead of taking them to the K— district where their homes were, he proposed going with them along the Congo boundary past their homes. So they left him in a body and went home. Orders were at once sent to have every one of these men arrested, and each one was made to pay either an ox or a load of rubber. To several of these men I lent oxen myself to help to release them from this unjust imprison¬ ment. When the Captain eventually reached K—, he was detained forty days there as he could not get carriers to take him away, all the villagers in the vicinity of the Post had deserted and were in hiding in the bush. During that time a party of English prospec¬ tors in the employment of the B— railway company, all wanting carriers, arrived on the scene and no difficulties were experienced in providing all the carriers required by them, probably more than two hundred. One batch of about thirty men coming through the bush at night to be engaged by them. They had confidence in the Englishmen’s word and knew that they would get pay. When some years later Robert Williams sent an agent to the same district to collect labor for the Katanga mines, large numbers of natives presented themselves voluntarily, again trusting the Englishman’s word, and this was only stopped when the govern¬ ment refused to renew the contract. Last year, especially at the latter part of it, there was great scarcity of food in that district, and the new administrator asked me privately to frankly give him my opinion why it was so. I gave him two reasons. First—The construction of the motor roads took hundreds of natives for months away from their homes, which in some cases were twenty to thirty or even ninety miles away from the scene of their work. As they got no food, their wives or other relatives were constantly employed either preparing food or carrying it to the workmen, so that for all that time their own field work had to be left undone. Secondly—Large numbers of people were so displeased with the administration of the former administrator, that I knew of Page 3U several villages that had been deserted, the inhabitants going off to the Congo, and others were prepared to follow them, meanwhile using up the food in their fields without cultivating fresh fields. On the change of administrador hoping for better things from the new man, they decided to remain on, and were of course short of food until the new crops arrived. Under ordinary circumstances the natives in the district are cultivating largely, and some years have had many tons of surplus food, such as manioc meal, rice, beans, potatoes etc. With a little encouragement from the govern¬ ment the same conditions would obtain again. Statement Of Mr. C— Our chefe has been sitting in the next village for a month gathering workers with both hands. There has been an orgy of raising of people everywhere. Nothing like it has happened in this region before. The Governor of Benguela asked for 1,500 men from the small circumscription of Elepi. The administrador of Elepi has seemed little in favor of these things and has so far fur¬ nished only about half. In Ganda there have been a great many raised—250 for Mossamedes, 200 for Catombela and 450 for Loanda from the Posto of Chinjenje within six weeks. In the “Journal de Benguela” for October 17 there is a letter saying that from a region having 8,000 enrolled for taxes there are 1,200 away at work. “Unless something is done the region will be depopulated.” SILVA NS & o. M@s c LOPES L A.AZ1A ie de DA CO 7r \ 8c c. Mes a LOPES, L a.A3jA \e de DA 192^f Nome Nome /? A A? > A A A A ft yf k A A a aa vf A A /z /? A A A X, A a fdr A < y A A Af AT /? 7f • A 'f A % /t A T Ar WA lr Bl A it h A A A y 7r. - * 7 I had two work letters from the chief of police of C—, show- ^ork Letters 1 ing how he writes for a month (these letters show that thirty-six showing 36 days worked days are required to constitute a “month” of labor). It shows to a month - what all sorts of petty officials can do. No native is going to go and complain for they say that this chief of police is a bad one. For this “month” (36 days) of work the boy got the equivalent of 35 cents, i.e. a cent a day. I gave the head of the village this amount for the two letters. He said that they had to take up a collection to get the money to pay the boys’ taxes. 61 An orgy of conscription. Page 35 In the fisheries. Stealing labor. Official evidence. Reason for uprising. 62 Ways of stealing labor. Recently a lot of men came back from Mossamedes where they had been for a year working in the fisheries. When they went they received a cloth and a blanket the whole of which could be bought for from $1.60 to $1.75. I cannot say how long exactly they were away but roughly a year. When they got back they received eighty escudos each, just the amount of their poll tax which was just due. Their last year’s tax had to be paid by their wives and families. One of them who could read a little said that he saw their work-letters and that they were written for six months. This is a good scheme, to take them for six months after they are written for taxes but have not yet paid, work them thirty-five days to the month and send them back just before the next tax. They said that they were well fed and on the whole well treated, that one patron who caused the death of a boy by drowning was severely dealt with. They complained of the cold at night. It appears that they had no sufficient shelter and the region of Mossamedes and Tiger Bay is desert and very little or no fire wood, the ones who were at Tiger Bay said that they did their cooking with fish heads. One of these said the worst hardship was the rotten atmo¬ sphere in which they lived. These complained that many were troubled with sores. In the last Benguela Journal there is an open letter by the Governor of the district of Benguela, Antonio Eduardo Romeiras de Macedo written on the 8th of October. He is explaining why a hospital was not built in Ganda. “Excuse me for saying to your Excellency that to build this same single ward would cost much more than the 60,000 escudos authorized even though one took advantage of the materials in the condemned building, free rough labor, etc.” That gives you unintentional official evidence. In the D iario de Noticias, Lisbon of August 6, 1924, there is a telegram from Guine about a native uprising in the circunscricao of Mansoa. Natives to the number of more than 1,000 had as¬ sembled, armed and refused to work. I pondered over this. Why did they refuse to work? A week or so afterward I saw in the Benguela paper that ever since Norton de Matos refused to let laborers go from here that the island of Sao Thome had been getting its labor from Guine. There now appears to me a reason for the armed strike. There are many ways in which the planter steals labor. They work nearly all day and then the boss says, “It is going to rain,” and they knock off and that day is not counted. Men are fined for all sorts of things. He makes a month six weeks long. He begins to abuse the man or accuse him just about the time his time is up and the man runs away and that settles his account. They tell the man when his time is up that they have contracted him for another term. Some men lie in wait for run-away workers and blackmail them into working for them a while gratis. Some men make the workers work on Sunday “for their food.” This is so much graft. Just today I hear that a large number of people have been imprisoned, beaten, etc., because they complained over Sunday work. They are working in Government service without pay- Page 36 Local whites call out people and have them work for them on pretense of having government authorization. Some of them get away with it and one supposes that they square the official. Over¬ loading carriers is general. Promising big wages and not paying them is a regular procedure. The Cipaio — Very often the government is government by cipaio. They beat and rob without limit, for the most part the native is afraid to complain, and with reason. He usually stands in with the interpreter and squares him so that the man who goes to make the complaint probably ends up in jail. One Chefe who asked me to report cases of this sort, imprisoned and was about to deport a man who went with a letter to make a complaint against a grafting cipaio. The interpreter took the letter and kept it, ordered the man to be seized, brought him before the chefe for lese-patriotism or something of that kind. The chefe says “Ask him what he means.” The interpreter says in Umbundu “What do you want?” The man says, “I brought a letter and want to know if I am to pay the cipaio two dollars.” The interpreter says to the chefe “He says that he does not have to answer your questions, he belongs to the American mission, where he has two children. (The man’s great grief was that he was childless).” The great fact in this country is that the native has no place where he can lodge a complaint. Some men think that the way to get good service is to back their cipaes. To treat a cipaio with disrespect is treason. Some cipaes have been known to make 300 escudos a day in blackmail. They go and pretend to be gathering laborers and let them off 1 for 20 escudos a head. One fellow would eat nothing but goat livers. Requiring women is a routine. More labor is required for Angola than formerly. The time to which people are subject is shorter. The old contract system was slavery in every sense of the word but only slaves and some unfortunate half-wits and incorrigibles were subject to it. Under the present method any one is liable. There are plenty of instances of skilled workmen, men in regular employment, etc., being taken. There is less cloth in evidence, more wearing of skins and bark. The price of cloth has increased out of all proportion to the wages and even out of proportion to the price of products of the country. Where formerly a tin of corn would buy two yards of cloth it buys scarcely a yard. Where formerly a day’s rough work got a yard of cotton cloth it now takes from three days to a week. The tendency of forced labor is to get rid of free employment. There are many instances of this. Very often the officials and the traders stand together. I find no instance of road work being paid for. Villages furnish from two to fifteen people all the time. Other villages only furnish on occasion and they turn out men, women and children. I find that about half of the people who pay taxes are away in a year. In one village of eighteen tax payers ten had been away practically all the year to the plantations. In another village of twenty tax payers, ten had been away to the plantations and they had furnished two more for work on the road for about six months. The large village of C—, probably about 100 tax payers, they 63 Government by cipaio. Worse than slavery. 64 Half of the people away on forced labor. Page 37 Cipaes a curse. Hostages. Traders cheat. Traders become could not give me the numbers, had furnished carriers as follows during the current year: to Loanda, six; Nganda, ten; to place unknown, ten; Mossamedes, twenty-eight; Cuma, five; Road, ten, for about six weeks, no pay; recent levy, unknown destinations, six; Government work, received no pay. The men from Loanda only are back. It is said that they were well paid and well treated. If I am not mistaken this makes sixty away, seventy-five that have seen considerable service. They say that there are no men left in the village except old men. Several of these were taken from service of white men and they did not receive the balance of the wages due them on their free labor. This village has everywhere a reputation for the vigorous way in which they have been push¬ ing their own cultivation. No one has been so prejudiced as to say that they were lazy. Statement of a European Resident One of the curses of the country is the cipaes, virtually legal¬ ized brigands, let loose upon the people. Ninety-nine times out of a hundred the Portuguese official stands by the cipaio and any com¬ plainant gets beaten. The cipaes asks a village for double the num¬ ber of soldiers he has been sent out to get. Then he lets off the half who bribe him the more heavily. The authorities admit that these fellows are rascals and that they blackmail the villages to the limit. On a recent ten days’ journey toward the rail head he met a great many carriers carrying loads and was struck with their poor physical condition. Many of them were old men unfit to carry burdens. He found a man lying unburied by the road and another who was said to have been beaten to death by the cipaes because he could not get on with his load. The cipaes are very free in raping the young girls. Another bad system is that of hostages. They punish a man for the misdeeds of his kinsmen. If they cannot catch a thief, the officials punish his nearest relative. So they make the headman responsible for everything that happens that they can’t get directly at. To get men as soldiers and prevent them escaping by running away, they tie up all the women in the village, so that the men give themselves up in order to get the women released. The trader gets the native into debt by persuading him to take something he can’t pay for at the time. They require him to work it off which means he will work enough to pay for it three or four times over. Often he doesn’t even know the value in escudos of what he has taken. Later, the trader can name any sum he pleases as its value. Thus the man is kept working for the trader as long as the latter has any shadow of justification in case the matter were inquired into from the Post. chefes. The chefes are recruited from the traders and many are men of bad character. Page 38 State of Mr. E —, a Railway Executive No white man from Portugal ever comes here with the inten¬ tion of doing a day of manual labor. It never enters into the head of any Portuguese out here to gain his living by work. He always expects to live by a government job, by trade, or by making the native work for his benefit. The Benguela railroad is so loaded down by appointees forced upon it by the authorities that it cannot make any money for its English shareholders. It has twice or thrice the traffic it had in 1914, yet its net income is no greater. By its contract with the authorities for its native workers the Wages embezzled, railroad pays the men directly, in addition to food and a blanket, one-fifth of the agreed-on wages and at the end of the period of service (either three or six months, but usually three) the remain¬ ing four-fifths of the wages is sent to the chefe of the Post where the men were recruited, to be paid to them on their return. I have never yet heard of any of this money being paid to the native who earned it. I do not know what becomes of it. Statement of Mr. F — of a Large Contracting Firm Engaged on Harbor Works at Lobito Bay This firm has at work a thousand natives who have been ob¬ tained from the Government. It gives them a blanket, a loin cloth and a jersey and they serve for six months. At the end of the term the firm gives them one-fifth of their wages and pays the remaining four-fifths to the Government, which remits it to the chefes de posto where the men were recruited. We know that the money is actually transmitted to the chefes, for we see their signatures; but we don’t know what becomes of it then. Page 39 PART II Women workers. Government requirements. Taken far from PORTUGUESE EAST AFRICA During its sojourn of twenty-four days in Portuguese East Africa, the Commission secured data in Lourengo Marques, while Professor Ross made a journey of about eight hundred miles, chiefly by motor car, from Lourengo Marques to Inhambane and return, visited Beira, and journeyed by rail and motor car from Beira to Umtali in Rhodesia and return. In the following, conscious effort is made not to disclose the identity of the person supplying the information. 65 Mine Laborers at Johannesburg .—Before leaving the Rand we conferred for three hours through an interpreter who possessed their confidence with thirty-one native mine workers from Portu¬ guese East Africa, most of whom had served three or more terms in the mines. They were largely from the Manjacaze district. They are troubled because their women, even pregnant or with a nursling, are taken for road work by the Cipaes. In out-of-the- way places the Government builds little barraces to house them. No pay nor food. According to the circumscription the term of service is from one week to five but a woman may be called out again in the same year. Others in the village bring food to them, in some cases a day’s journey away. Girls as young as fifteen are taken and some are made to submit sexually to those in charge. They work under a black foreman who uses a stick. They begin work at six, stop an hour at noon, and work till sunset. There are some miscarriages from heavy work. 66 Labor on Government requisition ( shibaru) varies with the circumscription. In some places every man they get hold of must work six months. For this service they get two and one-half pounds Portuguese which is paid by the Government at the posto and not by the employer. They do not know what the employer pays the Government. If they work at the posto their stint is two months and they get nothing. Work on Government docks, etc., is done under contractors, so the men get their two pounds ten each. One man had to work seven months to get six months’ credit. The master of another would refuse to “write” a day whenever he was cross with that worker, so he had to work about two weeks home, extra. Sometimes they live one hundred and fifty miles from their home, must walk both ways, carrying their own food. In one case they had to go from Inhambane to Louren^o Marques, four hundred miles. At the completion of one year they were faced with the prospect of walking this distance back. Six joined in a protest and for this they were taken again and sent up to Mozambique to serve as policemen, have been there now nine months. For their service they received no clothes nor blanket, only their two and one-half pounds. They get rations if they work in Lourengo Marques for the Government but on the plantations they have to provide their own food or buy it. If they buy it, Page UO there will be no money coming to them. A sugar factory will provide mealies, meat and salt. They get no tax receipts for their six months’ work. To pay their hut tax takes one and one-half of their two and one-half pounds. If they possess two huts, they must work extra to get the. tax money. If they work for nothing for the government they must pay the hut tax besides. After six months of service one may have three or four months at home but may then be taken again unless he hides out in the jungle and has his wife bring him food. Of those present five have been required to render forced labor, the others have missed it by being on the Rand. Three out of the five have been beaten by foremen. All but six out of thirty-one have seen laborers beaten. Thirteen out of thirty-one have seen women at forced labor beaten. Three have had a female relative abused sexually by the white man; one a sister-in-law, one an aunt, one a betrothed. Five others know of women so treated in their village. Some here have altogether missed forced labor by hiding out, by being in constant employment, or by being in school. Their main protection has been work on the Rand. A Sugar Estate A compound manager of a big English sugar estate told us that four thousand natives, three thousand on contract, there get a pound a month. Four-fifths is kept back to be paid at their home station but he goes and pays it to them himself in the presence of the administrador . Otherwise they wouldn’t get it. He under¬ stands that on the sugar estates along the Zambesi there is virtual slavery for they get only five shillings Portuguese (less than a dollar) a month. A few years ago the men were getting six escudos a month and as the money depreciated they were not earning more than twelve shillings a month. Hence there was a lot of desertion. A hundred boys would be delivered to him but in a few days half would have slipped away, lying out in the bush or else gone over to the Rand. The manager got the London directors to raise wages to a pound a month, Portuguese. The industries here all have to respond to the influence of the pay and treatment on the Rand. Missionary Station 1 At a mission more than two hundred and fifty miles from Lourengo Marques the missionaries tell us that in their district the highway work required of women is fifteen days a year. How¬ ever, some of the women on the roads are working out the hut tax of their husbands. The standard term of compulsory labor (shibaru) is six months of thirty working days each, which will require eight or nine months to perform, for the laborers lose Sundays, rainy days and days when they have worked in the forenoon but it rains in the afternoon. Men sent far from home get five pounds Portuguese ($18.75) for their shibaru. Those serv¬ ing nearer get from twelve to fifteen shillings Portuguese ($2.25 to $3.00) a month according to their work. The employer pays Hut tax. Flee to the Rand. 67 Contract payments. Influence of the Rand. 68 Compulsory labor— eight or nine months. Page J^l Work on the Rand no exemption. 69 Hut taxes. Court of appeal. 70 Office holding for gain. 71 Colonial service. only at the end of the term and in the presence of the administrador. A native employed by a white man on a six months’ contract witnessed before the official is exempt from shibaru, but this does not hold for the 75,000 blacks from this colony working on the Rand. This year every one over fifteen years of age has to pay his hut tax up there. There is in fact no way by which a Rand mine worker from here can terminate his responsibilities to the Portu¬ guese Government. If there is a hut a tax must be paid on it even if the occupant is a widow. If a hut is burned down, it has to be “killed” on the books of the administrador or the tax for it will be exacted year after year. The Secretary of Administration who goes about list¬ ing the huts gets a percentage of the tax receipts, so it is to his interest to decide every doubtful question in favor of the Govern¬ ment. Each administrador is a law to himself. Some are quite con¬ siderate of the natives, while others are very unsympathetic. The Intendencia (native affairs’ office) is a court of appeal open to natives for complaints of any kind. Without cost to themselves they may complain against the administrador or even the Gover¬ nor. Their practical value to the natives varies greatly. Under the monarchy (up to 1910) there was greater perman¬ ency of tenure than there is today. Some officials learned the native tongue and became very efficient. Now the tenure is shorter and the officials are much shifted about. The colonial service is far less a career than formerly and the official is much keener to make money quickly. This latter observation is emphatically confirmed by a thoughtful merchant in one of the towns. In his judgment none of the Portuguese office holders comes out with any other thought than gain. Neither officials nor traders create anything; they only squeeze. He has shown them ways in which the natives might be encouraged to till the rich soil of the bottom lands of the Limpopo, but they only shrug their shoulders. Why should they look ahead and plan to promote the economic upbuilding of the country? They do not care for the country, they never expect to settle there. They care not even for the future of the Government which they represent. Their controlling thought is to make money before another is given their place. They realize it is theirs to “make hay while the sun shines.” So they take no trouble for the future of the country, or of the Government, or of the natives but persist in their policy of wringing money out of the natives. The administradors never explain anything to the natives, justify their treatment of them, tell them why forced labor is necessary, or hold out to them a promising future. They never learn to speak or even to understand the native language. » A Roman Catholic Ex-missionary A former missionary, a Portuguese, met near Inhambane hundreds of miles to the north, confirms this judgment. He says that the officials sent out are here for money and take little interest in the permanent welfare of the natives or of the colony. Page U2 Colonial administration is less a career than formerly. Staying now a shorter time than under the monarchy, the functionaries are more in a hurry to make money and identify themselves less with the colony. Moreover, the basis of selection of men sent out as officials is not personal merit but politics. The places are “plums” to reward past or future services to the party. Hence the ruling purpose of the official is not to do his utmost for the colony and for Portugal but to stow away the greatest profit during his brief incumbency. A Native Preacher 72 A native preacher reports that in his district the blacks fear Fear> an d mistrust. shibaru because they know not where they are to be sent to work, nor for how long. A number of them were required to work in a deep railway cut near Louren^o Marques and were killed by a cave-in. Not knowing what dangers they will be sent into, many desert their huts and lie out in the bush, while members of their family bring them food. A Portuguese Lawyer A Portuguese lawyer of an old aristocratic family criticises severely the labor system for giving no credit for work done on one’s own plot. No credit for work on own plot. A Group Of Native Laborers 73 From eight natives questioned it appears that those just back No rest, from Johannesburg are allowed to “sit” a week before being taken for shibaru. The police do not disturb a native employed by a white man, but he may be caught and sent off for compulsory service the day after his employment ceases. One who has served his four months’ term may breathe easily for only a week or two. After that the police will take him off if there is a call for laborers. Hence, many who have performed shibaru hide in the bush until they are tired of that life and willing to return to their hut and take their chances. As soon as a report circulates that a hundred men are to be seized for shibaru in a certain district, there is a rush to the recruiting office of the W. N. L. A. (Witwatersrand Native Labor influence of W. N. L. A. Association) for after a native has signed with them the police dare not touch him. The Association will spend any amount of money to prevent their recruits being taken by the police, for this would lower their prestige in the eyes of the natives. Village A.— Eight men are present, very bright looking. The superiority of these East Coast people over those of Angola is very pro¬ nounced. Regularity of features, shapely heads and bright faces are quite common. The labor experts at Johannesburg pronounce the East Coast people to be the most valuable native element on the Rand, distinctly superior to the Zulus and Basutos. It is supposed that the fine quality of these natives is attributable to Asiatic blood (Arab or Phoenician) introduced in the remote past. 74 Superiority of East coast people. Page t+3 Escape to the Rand. 75 Women earn taxes. Method of collecting taxes. 76 No men left. 77 Paid. Paid not enough. Of the fifty odd hut tax payers in this village twenty-two are on the Rand and most of the others are employed by white men. Hence, none have been called upon this year for shibaru . Four of them have rendered such service for 1, 2, 3 and 3 months respec¬ tively. Since there are no industries in this district they were em¬ ployed about the administrador's premises. The one who served two months was paid nine shillings, but none of the others received anything. Only the one-month man was given any food; the others had to have food sent from home. It is only when they are con¬ tracted for by a private employer that they get rations, and these are poor and short. The fear of shibaru is a great inducement to enlist for mine work on the Rand where one is sure of good food and good pay. When the police catch a man they tie him up. If the man is dilatory or tries to hide, he is likely to be brutally beaten by the police. The women have to work unpaid for at least fifteen days; and each must bring another woman in her place. If her hut tax is unpaid a woman must work on the highway, or other public work, even if she is a new widow. She may even be sent to work for a planter. She works till the time comes to pay her next hut tax. Then they consider her last year’s tax paid and release her to give her a chance to find the money for the new hut tax. If she can’t find it she becomes a state serf for another year. There is no rate of commutation between hut tax and day’s work. You can not pay your hut tax until the policeman comes and notifies you it is due. But you cannot pay the policeman nor can you go straight to headquarters; you must traipse around with him while he makes his rounds, lasting one, two or three days, as if you were in custody and end up with him at the office of the Secretary where you pay the tax. The system is contemptuous of human dignity. Village B.— Forty huts, thirty-nine men, twenty-nine working on the Rand, four working as volunteers, while only this morning six have been seized for shibaru . So now in this roomy, pretty Christian village not a man is visible and there is no one to question but the women. They have no highway work, for in this sandy country no road¬ building has been attempted. They say that a widow unable to raise the money for her hut tax will have to remain in prison until some one pays it for her even one or two years. Mission Laborers Interviews with these gave the following results: Case 1 .—Has had five shiharus, three in one year. For example, some years ago he spent two thirty-day months laying sleepers, for which he got ten shillings a month and plenty of food. Case 2 .—Served three months on a rum estate three or four years ago. Owing to the fluctuations of the escudo it is impossible for us to figure the value of his pay. He was worked hard and his rations were so scanty that he had to have food sent from his home twenty-five miles away. Case 3 .—Was “sold” to a man in Inhambane who put him with masons. After three weeks they gave him six shillings and let him go. He got no food Page 4-4 but was given twopence a day to buy his food with. In his own words “How can a man get a bellyfull on twopence?” The same year he worked a week in the administrador’s garden. No pay, no food. Case U -—Worked two thirty-day months contracted to a black farmer about forty miles away making cane beer, got ten shillings per month. Food eked out from home. Case 5 .—Worked a year helping the police catch men; ten shillings a month and insufficient food. Case 6 .—In 1922 worked six thirty-day tickets on a sugar estate where he was driven very hard. Although there was plenty of food they became very thin. If they got sick they were not allowed to come home, they died right there. He was paid three pounds but the hut tax took half his wages. The hut ^ hulTtax W ° r ^ tax had to be paid in British sterling, but the wages were always paid in Portuguese. At one time it took a man’s wages for six months to pay his hut tax. Then the Indian traders would hoard gold and when tax-paying time came sell it for Portuguese money at from twenty-five per cent, to fifty per cent, advance, sometimes even two-to-one. Last year for the first time the hut tax could be paid in Portuguese. Case 7 .—Worked a thirty-day month on a rum estate where he got mush and ten shillings. As soon as he got home he enlisted for the Rand. Case 8 .—Served three thirty-day months on a distant rum estate, getting nine shillings a month. Case 9 .—In 1922 worked for twelve months in Lourengo Marques, for which he got food and six pounds. Stayed at home three months and then, fearing to be caught again, obtained work at the mission. The Portuguese farmers about here try to get volunteer labor but they so maltreat labor that they can get it only on requisition. Case 10 .—Seven years ago worked three months sawing timber for the railway; got nothing, not even food. Since then he has been working on the Rand most of the time. Case 11 .—Some years ago worked three months on a sugar estate, getting ten shillings a month. I asked how long they feel safe against another shibaru. They No security, reply unless you are clever and hide out you are liable to be taken again within a week. So they sleep unprotected in the bush with only a blanket. They complain that each year the hut tax is in¬ creased and that their pay is so small that after paying the hut tax they have little left for buying necessaries. They say they wouldn’t mind working for nothing three months in a year provided they were treated decently and could then feel themselves secure for the rest of the twelve months. Theological Students 78 Tapping the experience of seven young native pastor-teachers studying theology, it came out that one of them some time ago served three months on a rum estate where he was worked hard, got no pay and little food. On his return he enlisted for work on the Rand. Returning with eleven pounds saved he reached home with only three. The others having been steadily in school or employed about the mission had not been molested. They say no law restricts shibaru to once a year. Why doesn’t the administrador keep books, or give out passes, so that a man who already has worked the term will feel safe for the rest of that year? One native said “Wives in an advanced state of Page U5 pregnancy or with new-born children are caught and put to heavy Women suffer. carrier work. I have seen a woman with a young child bound to her back and balancing a heavy load on her head, lose her child by drowning when, in crossing a river, the water grew deeper than expected and the woman was not free to use her arms to save her child.” Exactions at the Border. Another complaint is that at the border those coming from Johannesburg are robbed of their savings by being made to pay an exhorbitant duty on everything they bring with them. When a man brings in a little cloth they demand, “Why did you buy your cloth of the English? Why didn’t you wait and buy it here? With this duty we’ll make you buy it a second time!” The native is discouraged in trying to improve his stock be¬ cause if he rears a fine specimen of chicken the administrator or Demands of officials. official will see it and say, “Here, I want that chicken,” take it and allow the owner the price of a scrawny Portuguese fowl, say sixpence. I have heard of an official who took a fancy to a donkey much finer than his own. He seized it and allowed the owner the value of an ordinary donkey. 79 Mission No. 2 A missionary of long residence, well acquainted with the native languages, who has been in every part of the province, recounts many cases of the conscienceless behavior of the authorities. Robbed of cattle. A few years ago the government allowed a gang of Portuguese to go about the country pretending that the cattle were sick and must be exterminated. They didn’t molest the mission herds, only the natives’ cattle. They offered a few shillings a head and if this offer were rejected they would shoot the cattle in the kraal; so naturally the natives took what was offered. The cattle were driven together, shipped and taken up to Johannesburg to be butchered. The thing was a big robber game put through with the connivance of the government officials. indifference to famine. He told of the indifference of the Portuguese authorities when there was a famine here ten years ago. The governor went over the province and reported to the Lourenco Marques Guardian that there was very little suffering and no deaths by starvation. The missionary who had been all over the province, gave the grim facts to the editor and their publication raised a great storm. The Portuguese authorities tried every means to make the editor divulge the source of his information. Realizing that they were expected to do something, the Portuguese sent to Brazil for a shipload of corn. It arrived three days overdue on account of bad weather and the authorities refused to accept delivery. The matter was fought out in the courts and eventually the ship’s delay was found to be justified. In the meantime the corn unloaded on the docks had all rotted while the natives continued to perish of hunger. 80 A Native Pastor A Christian pastor says that the full term of work on the sugar plantations is four thirty-day months, but at such a distance Page 46 Terms of forced labor. as Lourenqo Marques, six months. After one has been let rest a month, one will be taken again if they can catch him; so quite often the men serve two or more shibarus in a year. Men caught hiding are sent to Mozambique as police for three years. Some¬ times when the police observe a man run away they beat his wife. Ordinarily for a thirty-day month one gets twelve and one-half escudos (30 cents). It may be that the employer pays the govern¬ ment the man’s hut tax besides. A Mission Workman In 1923 this man for four thirty-day months carried planks and stones for white artisans who were building a house. The work was heavy but the day was that of the whites, viz. eight hours. He got fifty escudos (then $1.50) for the whole time and the employer did not pay his hut tax. Three others with him got the same pay. He raised his hut tax by working for the mission at 75 cents a month. Mission 3 81 Interviews with natives settled near the mission gave results as follows: Case 1 .—Three years ago served two months in Inhambane, no pay. Worked on the Rand and on returning he and everyone else in his party was taxed three pounds at the frontier. Case 2 .— (A woman) was required for a month to cut and carry grass Women work, for the horses and mules at the government post near here. Home every night, got nothing. Case 3.—A woman belonging to a “Banian” (Indian trader). She was caught by the police but owing to his intervention was released after a day. Otherwise she would have had to work a month about the headquarters. As soon as the rains begin the farmers will be sending up for men and women to hoe for them and they will be kept at work for four thirty-day months, getting fifty escudos ($1.25) in all. “How we would rejoice,” they said, “if there were no shibaru!” Case U -—(A woman) has worked on shibaru many times, in some years three or four times, at the post near here. Never longer than four weeks, got nothing. Case 5 .—A man who has worked on the Rand was mulcted two pounds when he crossed the frontier into Portuguese East Africa. A woman missionary says that widows and deserted women g2 live most of the year in little shelters made of plaited cocoanut tree fronds in the shape of a dog’s kennel. When the time of assessing the hut tax comes, the poor creatures tear them down so Hut taxes, as not to make them liable to the $5.00 hut tax. They live for a while with relatives or friends, then rebuild. They have to give money to the chief to keep him from telling on them. The hut tax bears with crushing weight upon the poor and the mission is swamped with petitions to loan money to pay the hut tax. Of course they can not make themselves the milch cow for the Portuguese Colonial Government, so they lend only in very special cases. One who can not pay the hut tax, for example a woman, will be kept in jail indefinitely, but if after a year or so it becomes apparent that no money is forthcoming they give her chances to run away and she runs. Page U7 88 The tax assessor goes to the chief and asks him how many huts there are. If there is an old man or woman in a hut the chief may not report it, especially if the person’s children tip him. An Agent Of The W. N. L. A. Relieved of money at the Border. This man doubts if the “boy” from the Rand reaches home with much money. He may leave the Transvaal with a tidy sum but he is robbed by the official money changers at the frontier and by an extra high fare on the trains, while the Banians get his money from him by enticing him with all sorts of gimcracks and stimulating the reluctant buyer by making him a gift of this or that. Then women hanging about the compound where the men are cared for on their return, offer themselves to sex appetites long famished, get their victim drunk and rob him. The agencies separating him from his savings are many and effective and the negro reaches home richer in experience, but not in much else. However, new wants have been implanted which will urge him to enlist for the Rand again and again. He says that the pay for compulsory labor about Inhambane is by no means as much as ten shillings a month. Summary. The Exploitive System From focusing testimony from various persons at various places it appears that the savings of the returning mine workers are separated from them in the following ways: How Rand laborers lose money. 1. High duties on everything bought on the Rand, even well-worn articles of clothing. 2. Exchange. At the border money is exchanged pound for pound when the Portuguese pound is worth perhaps three-quarters of the sterling. 3. Besides the hut tax, the native returning from the Rand is mulcted for the privilege of earning money outside the country. Testimony on this point is conflicting and is not clear whether this payment is always demanded, is authorized, or is uniform in amount. 4. On the government railways the Johannesburg “boy” pays several times as much as other third-class passengers. Thus from three responsible parties I was told that for the sixty miles on the Inharrime-Inhambane Railway the returning “boy” is charged a pound for riding in an open truck. My first class place cost me 8/4. From Chai Chai to Chicomo they pay one pound, whereas first class fare is ten or twelve shillings. 84 A Sugar Estate Manager Contract and voluntary labor. The manager of a sugar estate informs us that along the Zambesi, Hornung’s Sugar Estates (English) pay nine shillings a month for Nyassaland contract laborers, six shillings for Mozam¬ bique men, five shillings for their own men (a Portuguese shilling is worth about 19 cents). The manager, who has a thousand working for him, got permission to pay his men one-fourth down and three-fourths at the end of six months, this last paid through the administrador. The volunteer laborers get ten shillings at the end of the month. It takes seven months to do a six months’ term. This gentleman is extremely guarded in his statements but he Page 48 said enough to indicate that not infrequently the wages the em¬ ployer pays to the official in trust do not reach the workers. He is impressed by the way the returning Rand worker is Rand laborers, despoiled on his way home. The railroads charge him more than double. The natives who feed or lodge him on his way home or carry his baggage charge him four prices and he cheerfully pays it to show he has money. He is plucked at every turn and reaches home well stripped. Highway Labor 85 The construction of the great trunk highway, Chai Chai to Inharrime, through the wilderness, must have imposed a huge burden upon the natives of this region. Dr. Loram, Commissioner of Native Affairs of the South African Union, who passed through here four months earlier, told me he never saw a native smile. I can not say as much for I have seen plenty of signs of cheerfulness. Now that the problem is merely one of repair, perhaps the burden on the natives is much lighter. Compared with Angola 86 In this province forced labor seems to gain a real wage much wages and taxes oftener than in Angola. On the other hand, think of the hut tax of $5.00 as against the Angola poll tax of $1.50! Compared with Transvaal When we resumed inquiries at Lourengo Marques, a European resident testified that on a Boer farm in the Transvaal last summer he saw the blacks treated with a harshness which he has never seen here. The Dutch do not allow the blacks to own land. Their lands were all forfeited and became white man’s property. For a chance to occupy a bit of the white man’s farm and raise food for his family, he has to pay a perfectly preposterous rental in labor. Here at least the land has never been taken from under the natives’ feet. He is of the opinion that the great contrasts in the pay of requisitioned labor between places is due to differences in character among the administradors. Another resident testified that he had seen a large party of men returning from Johannesburg on the train from Lourengo Marques to Xinavane, laughing and singing, joyous at the prospect of meet¬ ing their wives. But they were all arrested as they got off the train and had no opportunity to visit their homes before entering upon a seven months’ term of compulsory labor. At Moamba only about forty miles distant from Lourengo Marques, he was assured that such laborers are paid only five shillings a month. Ownership of land. 87 Arrested on arrival at home. On a Plantation 88 A young South African cotton planter, plantation about sixty miles away from Lourengo Marques, has 110 laborers, all volun¬ teers. The farmers prefer voluntary to contract laborers because the latter do not wish to work and have no fear of losing their Page 49 Voluntary and contract labor compared. 89 Can these not be realized. 90 Sugar company. Testimony of an American business man. jobs. He pays twenty-five shillings a month and provides corn and beans which cost him about 10 cents a day a man. The Government will contract laborers at twelve shillings a month but these will soon run away and seek a job in Lourengo Marques. If you pay fifteen shillings some will stay. If you contract to pay a pound a month you get pretty fair men. He is not allowed to pay more than one shilling per month direct to the shibaru men. The rest must be turned over to the Department of Native Affairs to be paid to the laborers. He thinks very little of it reaches the boys, at least they say so. It depends on the character of the admini¬ strator. This, together with the practice of the Portuguese farmers of kicking the volunteer worker who after two or three months of service asks for his pay, spoils labor. They are suspicious and unwilling even when they are assured they will receive a pound a month. He thinks that in the circumscriptions about Lourengo Marques perhaps nine-tenths of the boys get their stipulated pay. But off at a distance it is possible that nine-tenths of the boys get only a part of what is due them or nothing at all. Ideals In Lourengo Marques we are told that the distinguished Col. Freire d’Andrade, who when he was High Commissioner of Portu¬ guese East Africa about fifteen years ago took the position that not more than three months of labor should be required of a native in a year, that labor on one’s own farm should count, that forced labor should be properly paid for, that the native who has rendered it should feel secure for the rest of the year and that work on the Rand should be taken account of. Mozambique The scene of investigation now shifts to Beira and its tributary territory 650 miles north of Lourengo Marques. A visit to the plantation and mill of the Busi Sugar Company three hours up the Busi River, brings out that the company has 3,000 natives in its employ. The German chemist who has been here a year says that three-fourths are contract laborers, one-fourth volunteers; the latter paid a pound and a half a month, the former a pound. Their contract runs from nine to twelve months and they are paid directly by the company. The sugar expert, a Mauritian who has been here four years, says that the volunteers get ten shillings a month and that the contract laborers are signed up for three years with the Mozambique Company, then are exempt for five years, after which they may be required to work another three-year period. (It may be that the laborers he refers to are natives settled on the land embraced in the concession of the Busi Company.) An American business man of Beira, very familiar with con¬ ditions here, declares that the natives on the Busi Sugar Estates, virtually have to work all the year. Exercising the old prazo rights the owners require them to work six months in the year and this period is of course the period when the cane is to be put in and tended. But this is just the time when the native ought to Page 50 be putting in and tending his maize. And, since he has no chance to grow a food crop for himself, he has to feed his family on bought food, so, when he has finished a six months’ term of com¬ pulsory service, he is practically under the necessity of signing on for another six months. Nevertheless, if he wants to knock off and spend a month with his family he will be allowed to do so. It will not do to drive the native with too tight a rein. Recruits at Villa Machado 91 While proceeding along the Beira and Mashonaland railroad, Recruits neglected, we interviewed at a station about seventy miles up a lot of blacks being hauled in open trucks on a goods train from Beira to Macaquece, a hundred miles further on. They are the same whom we saw debark yesterday at Beira from the packed launches in which they had been brought down by sea from Sofala. They rolled into this station at five in the afternoon. At six they inquired of my interpreter, when they would go on. We inquired and learned that they are to lie here until midnight when they will be picked up by another train. Nobody had informed them what was to become of them. Promptly they leave the trucks, build fires and proceed to cook their own food, for they have eaten nothing since morning. This neglect of them, indifference as to whether they eat or famish, sleep or sit up, is the treatment of slaves. They are contracted by the Government for a year and expect to receive ten shillings a month as others from Sofala have done. They complained of such wages in comparison with the three pounds ten a month they might earn on the Rand. The in¬ terpreter asked them why they didn’t go to the Rand to work and they replied that they are registered, each in his own circumscrip¬ tion, and are called out by the commandant to render labor service. They have no idea whether they are to work in the mines or on the farms. These poor fellows, torn from their families and carried to an unknown destination to perform they know not what work, left out in the open trucks with darkness coming on and no instruc¬ tions given them as to their opportunities for drink, food or sleep, impress one as very forlorn. The Views of British Planters For fifty miles along the railway about half way from Beira to Rhodesia stretches a belt of excellent cotton soil on which perhaps sixty planters have settled, about half of them being British. It happens that at the very time of our visit the abhor- p ro t es t of British rence of the British planters for the Portuguese labor system has planters, come to a head. The British have united in an association and are making certain representations to the Governor, who happens to be traveling through, on the very day we visit Villa Perry. Thus it happens that we are able to get from the leading planters every aspect of the question of native labor. Mr. C—, a British planter at Cafumpe, 117 miles up from 92 Beira, says that their contracted laborers cost them a Portuguese Page 51 Desire to abolish forced labor. Recruiting. Railway workers. Farmers. pound ($3.75) a month. The wages are turned over to the Mozambique Company which contracts the boys and by it is paid to their families every month. He believes they really get the wages. The British farmers find the system of forced labor too much like slavery and wish the Government to abolish it. The Portuguese farmers, are not with them, for they cheat and impose upon the volunteer laborers so much that they could hardly main¬ tain their labor force without compulsion. The shibaru laborers work some for a six months’ term and some for a year and are free for an equal length of time before being taken again. 93 Mr. T—, who was for some years warder of convicts at Johannesburg, says that the “recruiting” of the W. N. L. A. in Portuguese East Africa consists often in bribing the chief to furnish them the desired number of men. He sees that they are caught and delivered, sometimes tied up. He insists that the Portuguese system of obtaining native labor is at bottom not different from that of the British and South African, who pay the chief to use his authority to get them the recruits they want. From the point of view of the native laborer, however, his work is not so compul¬ sory as that of the shibaru laborer. 94 Working Groups The railroad track workers are volunteers who receive from seventeen to twenty-five shillings a calendar month and their food. A culvert gang on the highway stated that they were recruited by the Mozambique Company, have worked six thirty-day months and must work as much more; get thirteen shillings sterling a thirty-day month. After they have been at home six months they will be liable to be called again. Four workers whom we met on the road say they get eight shillings sterling a month. They would rather not work, prefer to be at home, for their wives are troubled to have them away. Men from Sofala near Macequece will have to work a year. The farmer will pay for them twelve, sixteen and twenty shillings Portuguese a month, of which four shillings will go to the Mozambique Company for recruiting expenses. The rest will be paid every month to the worker by the head of the recruiting office. The farmer pays the money to this head, who deducts the four shillings fee and any sums which have been advanced to the man when he is recruited. In this district, owing to the ease of decamping into Rhodesia where compulsory labor is unknown, the term of shibaru is only six months. We passed five volunteers employed by a Portuguese farmer and found they had a dozen labor tickets with them. These were for thirty days each and the pay ran from fifteen to twenty shillings, Portuguese, for simple hands, to four pounds for drivers and four pounds four shillings for foremen. 95 A Greek Farmer Mr. K— says he gets his labor for a year (thirteen months), paying about a pound a month. He pays the money to the official Page 52 and the official is supposed to pay it to the native; the native gets only ten shillings a work-month, the rest of his wages to be paid Wages not paid in full, him when he gets home. Mr. K— thinks that often the blacks get only a portion of what is due them, sometimes only ten shillings Portuguese for six months’ work. After a year’s service the man, when he returns home, has absolutely no protection against being taken again soon. He calls up a native who says that he has worked ten months and has three months more to work; had \y 2 pounds advanced to him and has had 2 pounds paid him. He should get sixteen shillings (pay¬ ing four shillings to the Mozambique Company for recruiting charges) for each month worked. But the natives complain gen¬ erally that they do not get it. Mr. K— does not care to inquire into it lest the Company should “get back” at him. It is significant that the volunteers, who really get their pay, work for less wages than the contract laborers. If the latter really got what they are supposed to earn, why should anyone take ten or fifteen shillings a month as a free laborer when as a contract laborer he could get sixteen shillings? Views of Planters The blacks here tell the planters that they are just slaves of the Mozambique Company. On the Zambesi the terms and system are the same as here, but the pay runs less. A young Englishman working in a maize mill says that the contract laborers here come from a considerable distance, Sena on the Zambesi. They put in 360 working days, which means four¬ teen calendar months. For the ordinary worker the employer pays a Portuguese pound ($3.75) a month. He thinks that of this pound the worker gets ten shillings. To him the system appears much like slavery. It is his impression that a native who has put in fourteen months will be unmolested for six months thereafter. A cotton planter, Mr. B—, judges that in recent years 50,000 natives have left this part of the country for Rhodesia, so that the evil of compulsory labor is curing itself. Mr. S—, a cotton planter, says that the blacks are leaving for Rhodesia and Nyassaland in great numbers. The British farmers want the pass system, so that a native who has worked six months for a white man shall be exempt from being taken again in the course of the ensuing six months. The worker gets an advance of one, two or three pounds when he is recruited. After two or three months the paymaster of the Mozambique Company comes round and pays the boys ten shillings Portuguese a calendar month and at intervals thereafter. But the last two months of his work are not paid for until he reaches home. Then he ought to receive ten shillings for each of the last two months and six shillings for each of the whole twelve months less the original advance. The question in the mind of the British farmer is, does he get it? The British farmers want to do away with forced labor and in its place establish voluntary labor subject to a pass system. 96 Wages deducted. 97 Depopulation. Are wages fully paid? 98 Page 53 A pass system wanted. 99 No complaint. 100 Continuous compulsory labor. Children substitutes. 101 Charges against Greeks. Every native should bear a pass and when he pays his tax his pass should show that he has worked for somebody six months in the course of the fiscal year. If his pass doesn’t show this, he should be required to work six months directly for the Company but not let out to farmers. The farmers would need to make a contract of say three months, registered at the nearest office, which would entitle them to have the volunteer worker arrested and returned to the service in case he quit without due cause before his contract had been fulfilled. At present if a contract laborer runs away the Mozambique Company sends to his circumscription and has him sent back to work out his term; but he is not beaten, jailed, or fined. If a worker runs away from a farmer who has the reputation of being a bad master, the company may do nothing or it may send the man to a different master. The Mozambique Company sees that the men get some justice for they are worried by the emigration of the dissatisfied natives to British territory. Mr. S— lined up his fifteen contract laborers in his yard and had the native boss question them as to their experiences with contract labor. They say that when they contract they get three pounds in Sena, but only two pounds at Gorongoza which is nearer. The further they have to come, the more they can get in advance. When they return home they get two, three or four pounds accord¬ ing to what is coming to them after deducting the two or three pounds advanced. None of them complain of any of their earn¬ ings being withheld. They say that after a man has finished his contract he can ordinarily stop at home unmolested only up to about four months. The police may call for workers several times a year and some¬ times so many are called that men have to fill the requisition who have only recently completed a term of service. Thus compulsory labor becomes almost continuous. For example, a native who returned in December was called here in April. Their women do not have to work on the roads or otherwise for the Mozambique Company unless the men have run away. The hut tax is one pound Portuguese. If the man has two wives and two huts he pays two pounds. They say that the workers on the Zambesi sugar estates are as well treated and paid as here. When there is a shortage of workers, lads as young as 13 years are taken by the chief to do contract labor. The father gets the money advanced, passes the physical examination and gets booked, then sends his son in his place. This is how mere children get into these labor groups. Mr. L—, a British cotton planter, says Greeks are a curse to this district. With the British farmers the laborers are generally contented. The Greek farmers and the Banians are the worst, then Italians, then Portuguese. The Greek can’t bear to see one of his blacks unoccupied. He works them on Sundays and gives them poor food. Volunteer laborers get 15 shillings a month, the forced laborers net 16 shillings. Mr. L— has at least 30 families settled Page 54 on his estate which have their own huts and gardens. The men work only part of the year and get 15 shillings a month. Some Greeks and the baser Portuguese will kick off their place the volunteer who is so bold as to ask for his pay. Mr. L— mustered five Sena laborers and we questioned them as to their receipts from past terms of compulsory labor. Each should have had 192 shillings for his stint of twelve 30-day months. What they actually received was as follows: 120 sh.; 140 sh.; 120 sh.; 120 sh.; 140 sh. The men say they can stop at home for six months after they have done a term. They walk here, spending 14 days on the way. For this they get food but no pay. Questioning a group of laborers on another farm we learn that five are from Chembe near Nyassaland. They are brought here on steamer but have to spend a month walking home. The company gives them food for the trip. An English railway foreman told that when he was working for a big construction company down near Villa Machado he had some trouble with six of his blacks and turned them over to the Portuguese authorities. Sometime afterward he saw from their labor cards that each of them had 15 shillings coming to them. He sent the money and names to the commandant at Villa Machado. Presently some of these blacks called upon him and he learned that none of them had received any money. So the superintendent told the foreman to pay them again. He, as well as another fore¬ man with him, considers that a part of the wages is regularly held back by the officials. Mr. W—, an English planter, thinks that in the last five years 70,000 negroes have filtered out of this province into Rhodesia and Nyassaland to escape forced labor. He would not abolish forced labor at once, but would announce its abandonment after two years in the hope that many of the emigres would return and thus replenish the supply of free labor. If the government should adopt the suggested policy of dropping the requisition of laborers and instead require each native to do four months’ labor a year, he fears lest the natives nearly all apply for jobs in the cool season and leave the farmer short-handed when the planting season arrives. D—, a Greek store-keeper, opposes doing away with forced labor and substituting the pass system on the basis of four months of labor each year, pass to be submitted when taxes are paid. He anticipates there would be a surfeit of labor in the cool and dry season when the farmer is not in great need of labor and a dearth of it in the hot rainy season when the crops must be got in. He fears lest the farmer who in December finds himself short of labor, would succumb to the temptation to furnish a pass (certify¬ ing to four months’ labor) to the native who would consent to work for him for two months. Mr. C—, an English planter, says that the blacks on the Mozambique coast get now only 3 or 4 shillings sterling a month; if brought here, they would get 15 shillings. Eight thousand of 102 Short pay. 103 Officials retain wages. 104 Depopulation. Labor seasons. 105 106 Page 55 Competition. 107 Charges not substantiated. A long view. 108 Food. A native rising. Treatment of prisoners. Sheer terrorism. these are now available for a year contract. The peak of farmer need comes in the reaping season, April to August, which is cool and dry. The Greeks and Portuguese have been giving their workers long hours and poor food; hence, they fear that without compulsory labor they are likely to be left in the lurch. They are not ready to come to the British standard of treatment and compete with the British planters on their own terms. The Mozambique Company brings in the distant boys by rail, lest they should get away. They can trust them to walk home, so they let them walk. Mr. C— and other Britons have investigated the charges of wages stealing and they find few of the charges substantiated. They hesitate to make any general statement that the officials do not pay over to the workers all the wages due them. He observes that last year the Zambesi sugar estates turned over to the officials wages to the amount of 75,000 pounds sterling. He does not base the case of the British cotton planters about here chiefly on humanitarian sentiment, but on the long distance view that so many of the natives of this part of the country are migrating into British territory in order to put themselves beyond the reach of Portuguese labor exactions, that labor famine around here is inevitable unless the odious system of compulsory labor is done away with. They insist that the Greek and Portuguese farmers are short-sighted. Another British farmer, Mr. B—, says that the kind of food some of the farmers furnish their laborers is a shame—corn meal nearly black with dirt, beans unmarketable. The native rising about here during the war sprang from the fact that a lot of forced laborers, having fulfilled their contracts and expecting to be taken home, found themselves in Beira harbor on a steamer taking them to serve in German East Africa. Some who jumped overboard and tried to escape by swimming were shot from the boat. While the Portuguese about here fled, the British all stayed on their farms and were unmolested. He believes that wages robbing by the officials of the Mozambique Company is almost universal. He saw a big batch of black prisoners being taken in chains to Beira after the crushing of the uprising in 1918. The food of the natives had been so systematically reduced that the legs of the prisoners were no bigger than one’s wrists. While in custody these prisoners were given nothing to eat and were dying all the time. A band of British soldiers on a train were so incensed by Portuguese cruelty that they came near starting something. From mistaken kindness they gave of their hardtack to the famishing wretches and some of them died of it. On my return to Beira a Briton interested in the economic development of the colony and extraordinarily well acquainted with conditions (in order not to identify him we may not describe him farther) declared to us that the Portuguese who brag that they have solved the native problem maintain a system of sheer terror¬ ism. They are extremely heartless and cruel in their treatment of Page 56 the natives. He points out the iniquity of their treatment of the volunteer. He may have worked steadily for a white man for a year as a volunteer. Yet when he returns to pass a while with his family—as who wouldn’t?—his past labor gives him not the least immunity from being seized for shibaru any time, even on his way home. Page 57 PART III Aim to assemble evidence. Impressions. State serfdom. Fields neglected. Wages embezzled. Skill discouraged. Road making overdone. Labor stolen. Conclusion In our investigation our single aim has been to draw out and assemble the pertinent facts. In gathering facts our policy has been to interrogate, first of all, the natives themselves—who more than any others are deeply concerned with the system of compulsory labor and have their significant individual experiences to contribute —and secondly to question those whites who are in a position to know the facts and may be presumed to have no private interest in concealing or distorting them. While the evidence we have amassed may seem to justify a severe condemnation of the system under which native labor is exacted in Portuguese Africa, there is much evidence in our report which shows that we have been as willing to set down favorable statements when we could do so, as to set down unfavorable statements. Since the foregoing embodies substantially all the relevant data we were able to secure, anyone who studies it attentively will be in a position to arrive at conclusions for himself. However, inasmuch as we shall be expected to communicate the impressions made upon us in the course of our ten weeks of investigation, we offer the following, which applies particularly to Angola. 1. The labor system—virtually state serfdom—which has grown up in the Portuguese Colonies in recent years often claims so much of the natives’ time and strength that they are no longer able to give adequate attention to the production of food in their own gardens and fields (See paragraphs, 2, 3, 7, 10, 14, 16, 18, 26, 32, 33, 41, 53, 54, 55, 59, 60, 61, 63, 64, 66, 73, 76, 78, 87, 90, 91, 100, 108, 109.) 2. There is little evidence that any considerable part of the wages turned over in trust to the officials by the employers of natives hired from the Government actually reaches the hands of those to whom it belongs. It appears that the typical thing is for the earnings of these commandeered laborers to be embezzled. (See paragraphs 3, 5, 9, 13, 14, 16, 34, 49, 67, 84, 88, 92, 95, 97, 102, 103, 107, 108.) 3. The amount of unpaid labor exacted of skilled natives is not infrequently so excessive that the young men see nothing to be gained by their acquiring skill in the missionary schools. (See paragraphs 27, 33, 35, 41.) 4. Motor roads have been extended far beyond the needs of the Colony and the construction of such roads by conscripted, unpaid, unrationed natives—for the most part women—with only the most primitive implements, imposes in some cases an almost crushing burden. (See paragraphs 7, 10, 11, 12, 18, 19, 21, 23, 39, 44, 46, 53, 58, 60, 64, 65, 85.) 5. There appears to be wide spread labor stealing, i.e., the planter arbitrarily refuses to give credit or pay for certain days or half-days of labor which have been rendered him. We heard Page 58 of no effort made by any official to curb this despicable practice. (See paragraphs 15, 28, 32, 34, 36, 47, 55, 62, 66.) 6 . The official does not appear to be in a strong position with respect to his fellow nationals, the traders and the planters, and hence rarely ventures to stand up for the rights of the natives as against the claims of a white man. The blacks feel that the Portuguese are leagued against them and that there is no re¬ course against the white man’s violence and injustice. (See paragraphs 6, 37, 38, 40, 48, 50, 51, 55, 57, 59, 62, 70, 71, 79, 101 , 106.) 7. The native policemen ( Cipaes ), utilized among stranger or enemy tribes, grossly abuse their authority for purposes of lust, spite or extortion. There is no regular channel provided by which the complaints of the natives thus wronged may be brought to the attention of the officials. (See paragraphs 25, 42, 46, 49, 59, 63.) 8 . The Government provides practically nothing in the way of schools, medical care, emergency relief or justice against the white trader, for the people of the villages as recompense for the heavy burden of unrequited toil it lays upon them. (See paragraphs 37, 38, 42, 45, 50, 59, 60, 78, 79.) 9. The treatment of the natives in Portuguese territory com¬ pares so unfavorably with that experienced by the natives in Rhodesia or in Belgian Congo that there is a strong tendency to emigrate across the frontier. (See paragraphs 43, 56, 59, 97, 98, 104, 107.) 10. In Portuguese East Africa the amount and manner of collection of the hut tax impose severe hardships upon the natives. (See paragraphs 66, 69, 75, 76, 77, 82, 85.) Alternative Lines of Colonial Development Before the whites came these African natives had made con¬ siderable progress in the industrial arts. They smelted iron and native smiths made tools, implements and weapons of iron. They had chickens, pigs, goats, sheep, cattle and dogs. They grew various crops. They were backward chiefly in making cloth. Now for such people one path of advance is the development of cultivation by the natives themselves. Mission schools may implant new wants—for clothing, better homes, cleanliness, sani¬ tation, decency, chairs, tables, raised beds, cook stoves, schooling for children, eventually perhaps newspapers, books, amusements. At the same time the mission schools will show how to produce the means of gratifying these new wants. The brighter youths will learn carpentry, masonry, tailoring, iron work, brick-making, weaving, gardening, farming, poultry raising, bee keeping. The girls will learn to cook, sew, keep house, spin, make garments, weave baskets. The natives will be made acquainted with better methods of farming, better types of implements, improved varieties of domestic plants, fowls, animals. The world outside will obtain the cotton, sugar, coffee, rice, cocoa, palm nuts and sisal which this part of Africa is fitted to produce. But from them the blacks Opposition of traders and planters. Police abuse authority. No medical care, or justice. Depopulation. Hut taxes. Development of native peoples. Page 59 Barbarism. The choice. will obtain a due equivalent so that here a decent Christian civilization will develop. On the other hand, the Government may by grants create great estates of from 10,000 to 30,000 acres, tilled by unpaid conscripted natives working under the hippo lash. Cowed and discouraged the natives will have no incentive to acquire skill. As life becomes harder for them, the shoots of the higher civiliza¬ tion among them will wither. They will take up with vices which help them to forget their hopeless lot. The dominant whites will object to the missions teaching the “niggers,” “putting notions into their heads,” making them “uppish” and “above their station.” The fazendas (estates )will come eventually into the hands of the more ruthless whites, for they can make more money out of them than the humane sort can, and will be able to offer more purchase money for them than the humane can afford to refuse. These unscrupulous and cruel whites will go about in motor cars, snatch comely black maids to gratify their lust, in¬ timidate the blacks with palmatoro and chicote, and maintain handsome motor roads, plantation homes and government build¬ ings with unrequited native labor. In the use of machinery, the applications of science to industry and the adoption of luxuries, this regime will look like civilization; but in reality it will be but a veneered barbarism. Which of these two types will prevail depends upon things which are yet to happen. It is certain, however, that one type or the other will win. An African colony cannot persist half the one thing and half the other. Free labor and forced labor will no more mix than oil and water. Provide the planter with as much forced labor as he requires and the hours, pace, treatment and pay of labor will become such that no free laborer in his senses will take employment with him. Edward Alsworth Ross Madison, Wisconsin, U. S. A. Page 60 APPENDIX Angola or Portuguese West Africa has 480,000 square miles and a population estimated to be three millions at least. The number of whites is said to be from twenty to thirty thousand. On the North and Northeast its boundary marches with that of the Belgian Congo. On the East it has Northern Rhodesia for a neighbor, while on the South it borders on Southwest Africa. The interior is a plateau rising to 6,000 feet above the sea so that, although it is well within the tropics, the climate is not at all trying to whites. In the uplands the chief food crops of the natives are manioc, maize, beans, millet, ground nuts, potatoes, sweet potatoes and rice. Prominent among the plantation products are coffee, cocoa, cotton, palm nuts, sizal and rubber. The coast of Angola was traced by Portuguese navigators in the fifteenth century and Portugal has had some effective population for three and a half centuries. During the days of the slave export to the Americas great numbers of slaves were brought out from Central Africa by trails which led down to the slave markets of Loanda and Benguela, where slave ships awaited their cargoes for the West Indies and Brazil. All such trade was cut off in the nineteenth century and in 1876 the King of Portugal pro¬ claimed the abolition of slavery. Portugal signed the Berlin Act of 1885 and the Brussels Act of 1890 binding the signatories to employ every means possible to put an end to the slave trade and to punish those who engage in it. But there came a great develop¬ ment of cocoa growing on the islands of San Thome and Principe, lying in the Gulf of Guinea and belonging to Portugal, so that great numbers of “contract laborers” were shipped from the mainland to these islands. Between 1888 and 1912 there is record of 67,000 black laborers sent to the islands, but presently it was noticed that none returned and the suspicion grew up that the contracts supposed to be entered into by the laborer of his own free will were a “blind” and that the laborers were really slaves. In 1901-1902 a British officer, Col. Colin Harding, traversed Angola and in 1905 pub¬ lished “In Remotest Barotzeland” in which he records how again and again he came upon gruesome evidences of a slave trade. In 1904-5 the well known English journalist Mr. H. W. Nevinson penetrated Angola, followed the routes (to be traced by skeletons and shackles) by which slaves are brought down from the interior, took passage on the ships carrying these slaves to the Cocoa Islands, where they were transmuted into “contract laborers,” and investigated the details of their life on the plantations. His findings, pub¬ lished in part in Harper’s Magazine and afterwards in his book “A Modern Slavery” reached a large public. In 1908-1909 Rev. Charles Swan, a British missionary of long residence in Angola gathered impressive evidence of the existence of an organized slave trade in the Colony, which he published in a little book called “The Slavery of Today.” Shortly after the veteran English missionary Dan Crawford, to whom Angola has been known since 1888, in his brilliant and widely read book “Thinking Black,” set forth his observations on the slave trade at its sources in the distant interior. Another ray of light was shot into this dark business by certain cocoa firms—Messrs. Cadbury, Fry, Rountree and Stellwerck—which came to have misgivings as to the methods by which much of their raw cocoa was produced. In 1905 they sent out a representative, Mr. Joseph Burt, who spent nearly two years in studying conditions on the Islands and on the mainland. The facts he assembled became the principal basis for Mr. W. A. Cadbury’s book, “Labour in Portuguese West Africa.” Impelled by public opinion and the Anti-Slavery Society the British Government, which for centuries has been bound by treaty to guarantee Portugal’s African possessions, began to use its influence with the Portuguese Government against the further recruitment of natives of Angola for the cocoa plantations and for the repatriation of the tens of thousands of laborers who had been brought to the Islands and kept there against their will. The whole story of these efforts is found in the series of White Books (Africa No. 2, 1912; Africa No. 2, 1913; Africa No. 1, 1914; Africa No. 1, 1915, and Africa No. 1, 1917) entitled “Correspondence Respecting Contract Labour in Portuguese West Africa.” It comprises 355 official communications and dispatches between July 15, 1909 and February 27, 1917. It should be said that the state of slavery brought out in the voluminous literature just described appears to have passed away. Not one of our informants so much as breathed the word “slavery” or “slave trade.” We never heard the slightest suggestion that in Portuguese Africa now there is any ownership of a black by white. The rise of the system of state requisitioning of native labor and state leasing of this labor to private parties frees the white man of all temptation to acquire ownership of the labor he needs. Area. Population. Climate. Crops. Slavery abolished. Contract labor. Abuses exposed. Cocoa traders. British government reports. No slavery. Page 6 DATE DUE fTB 1 0'<$ GAYLORD PRINTED IN U.S. A.