In all countries there are plenty of abuses; children are overworked, and women forced into coarse pursuits. Mexico is able to show as good a record as any country in these matters, and a strong public opinion is growing there against all forms of oppression of human beings.

All over the civilized world men are becoming humaner in sentiment, the fundamental rights of men are more regarded, and the struggle against selfish greed on the part of the minority of employers is making good progress.

Peonage never meant a low system of wages, as is understood in the United States. The prevailing impression in this country regarding the Mexican peon is an erroneous one. It is supposed here that peonage is, as a matter of fact, sheer slavery, and that it extends throughout the whole country. I have shown that it is not slavery, and now I will say that it exists principally in a comparatively reduced area where laborers are very scarce, and this fact shows that, while the system is liable to abuse, it has some advantages for the laborer.

Meantime our peons are not starving, and are, for the most part, a quiet and philosophic people, enjoying their frequent respites from toil, and complaining very little, while a patriotic Government has their interests at heart and is planning for their welfare, and especially for that of their children.

What follows will show how much the evils of the peonage system in Mexico have been exaggerated, and how they all are being now radically corrected; but before proceeding any farther, I will state what is the condition of the Mexican farm laborer, or peon, in the different localities of Mexico.

sea.

The largest portion of the Mexican population is located on the mountains, central table-lands, and other high regions, which enjoy a cold and healthful climate on account of their elevation above the Only the products of the cold zone can grow there, and these were formerly cultivated on a limited scale, solely for local consumption, as the high cost of transportation prevented their being carried to any distance. In this region labor is abundant, and until recent years it exceeded the demand; consequently, wages were low, and the peonage system only existed to a small extent; because of the number of working hands being greater than the demand, the laborers were exposed to disadvantages that fortunately are now beginning to disappear, as prosperity of the country increases the demand for labor.

The temperate region embraces the land situated at from three to five thousand feet above the level of the sea, and it is sparsely populated; but it yields valuable products, such as coffee, sugar, and other tropical fruits. It is very difficult to find in this region the necessary

hands to till the land on a large scale. For these reasons, and, above all, because of the high cost of transportation, tropical products could not be grown before the railways were built, except in a few places favorably located, and then in a limited quantity. This explains why some of these products commanded a higher price in some localities of the country where they are produced than in foreign markets, to which they are transported from great distances. Sugar, for instance, which is retailed in New York at 4 cents a pound, costs in the City of Mexico from 12 to 18 cents, and it is not so well refined as the article sold here, although it probably has for that reason a greater amount of saccharine matter.

The hot region, which embraces the coast on both oceans and the low valleys situated in the interior of the country, is very sparsely inhabited; labor is therefore very scarce, and wages are higher here than in any other region. While in the high and cold regions wages were often 12 cents a day and rations, on the coast they are sometimes $1 a day. The inhabitants of the cold and temperate regions do not like to descend to the warm zone, because they are exposed to maladies prevailing there, such as yellow fever and intermittent and remittent fevers, and because they are terribly annoyed by mosquitoes, and they can hardly endure the heat. If at any time they do go down there, it is only to remain a few days. It has been thought that as the lowlands are the most fertile and rich, and are almost uninhabited, they could be cultivated only by means of negro or Asiatic labor; and this idea has induced some Mexican planters to try Chinese immigration, as Article II. of our Constitution grants to all men the right freely to enter and leave Mexico.

The laborers living in the warm lands have, on account of the smallness of their number, advantages which are not shared by their fellow-laborers inhabiting the higher regions. The first of these advantages is, as I have already stated, larger wages; the second is that they can obtain advances, in reasonable amounts, for any needs they may have, as marriages, births, sickness, or death in their families, since the small amount of their wages does not allow them to economize for such emergencies, and these advances are willingly made by their employers and set to the account of future services, without interest or security.

Unfortunately, the very advantages which the laborers living in the hot lands of Mexico enjoy, and the smallness of their numbers, which I have just mentioned, are sometimes the causes of great abuses on the part of some employers, of which the laborer is the victim on account of his ignorance and complete destitution, on the one hand, and the influence and wealth of his employer on the other.

I speak of this subject from personal experience, because, having

spent several years as a planter in the District of Soconusco, State of Chiapas, where these conditions prevail, I saw the practical workings of the peonage system. It was not possible to obtain there a laborer, either as a domestic or a field hand, without first paying the debt of from one to five hundred dollars that he had contracted with his former employer; so that it is easy to understand what an expenditure of money was required before a large number of hands could be obtained. Lapse of time increases the debt instead of diminishing it, since the laborer asks each week, as a rule, for more than the amount of his wages. Whenever the hands are displeased with their work— either because they quarrel among themselves, because their employer does not treat them well, because they do not get all the money advances they ask, or for any other reason-they have entire freedom to offer their services to anybody else, who willingly pays their debt, as everybody is always in need of help; but often, and especially when the employer does not live permanently in the country, as was my case when I was in Soconusco, laborers whose debts reach a considerable sum conceal themselves, fly to another district where they are not known, or in some other manner evade the payment of their indebtedness; with the result that it is a total loss to their employer. The same is the case when the indebted laborer dies or becomes disabled for work.

These are the practical results of the peonage system, so far as my experience goes, although I do not deny that it is liable to great abuse on the part of the employers, who are favored in a few cases by the tolerance of the local authorities and by the ignorance and poverty of the laborers.

There are some places-especially in the States of Tabasco and Campeche, where mahogany, cedar, ebony and dyewoods are cut in uninhabited spots, which change as the wood is exhausted-where the employer assumes, in the absence of any magistrate or other authority, and generally through an overseer, for he himself seldom remains at such places, all the powers of government. Of course, opportunities for doing injustice are very much increased, in view of the fact that there an employer is hardly ever called to account for abuse of authority. In most of these cases the employer is obliged to set up, for the convenience of his laborers-as I have heard, though I have no personal knowledge in the matter-a store where they can provide themselves, there being no other near by, with provisions, groceries, and such dry-goods as they may need in the ordinary course of life, paying for them with the scrip issued to them by the employer over his signature in settlement of their wages. It is easy to see how greatly this system is liable to abuse, since the laborer has to purchase at the store of his employer everything he wants, and at such prices as the

owner may think fit to charge, thus losing all the benefits of competition.'

But the peonage system has no legal existence in Mexico, because Article V. of our Constitution of 1857, enacted for the purpose of abolishing it, provides that "nobody should be obliged to render personal service without proper compensation and his full consent," and forbids the issuance of any law to authorize any contract which might have for its object the "loss or irreparable sacrifice of the freedom of man through work, education, or religious vows." This article was amended on the 25th of September, 1873, chiefly with a view of prohibiting the taking of religious vows in Mexico, and also of making it more explicit, and it reads now, so far as work is concerned, as follows: "The state cannot allow the fulfilment of any agreement, contract, or covenant which may, in any manner, impair, destroy, or irrevocably sacrifice man's liberty, either through work, education, or religious vows."

Whatever abuses might have been committed under the peonage system in Mexico in former years when laborers were abundant and occupation scarce, and the laborers were ignorant and destitute, they have either disappeared altogether or been very materially reduced with the changing conditions of the country, as labor is now in great demand, so much so that in very many places the demand exceeds the supply. The laborers began to be educated with the restoration of peace. The local authorities vie with each other to enforce the laws which guarantee the personal rights of every inhabitant of the country.

Rate of Agricultural Mexican Wages.-The broken surface of Mexico gives us all the climates of the world, frequently at very short distances from each other, and enables us to produce the fruits of all the zones, while placing at our disposal, at the same time, an immense hy

1 It seems that something similar to this is done in the United States, as is shown by the following extract from Gen. Rush C. Hawkins's article, entitled "Brutality and Avarice Triumphant," published in the June, 1896, number of the North American Review, page 660:

One of the most facile means in the hands of avarice for cheating the poor and helpless is the corporation and contractor's' store. It is usually owned by corporations whose employees are the only patrons, and the rule is to sell the poorest possible quality of supplies at the highest price obtainable. In many instances employees are given to understand that they are expected to trade at the company and contract stores, or, failing to do so, will be discharged. This oppressive method of cheating is not confined to any particular part of the country, but prevails, with varying degrees of malignancy, wherever under one management, either corporate, partnership, or individual, any considerable number of employees are assembled together. Since the close of the Civil War many thousands of ignorant blacks have been made the victims of this common and heartless swindle, which has absorbed their scant earnings. At the end of each month, year in and year out, it has proved to their untrained minds an astonishing fact that the longer and the harder they worked the more they got in debt to their employers."

draulic power, of which for the present we hardly avail ourselves. But, on the other hand, this condition of things made transportation very expensive, and rendered the interchange of products exceedingly difficult. The obstacles to communication between the various sections of the country, and the diversity of conditions existing in each, cause a great difference in the wages paid in different localities.

The Department of Public Works of the Mexican Government has been for some time past collecting data regarding the wages paid to field laborers, and during one of my visits in 1891, to the City of Mexico, I obtained a summary of such data. It is very difficult to present it in a complete and correct form, because there are several systems of wages. In some places a fixed amount is paid for one day's work; in others, again, besides the wages, rations are given,' consisting of a certain quantity of grain, sufficient for the subsistence of the laborer and his family; the quality and quantity of these rations vary, as well as their value, for grain has different prices in the various localities; and all these causes render it very difficult to make an entirely accurate résumé of the official data.

The most complete that I was able to prepare, during my visit to Mexico in 1891, is the following, which embraces the maximum and minimum field wages paid in the different States of the Mexican Confederation, in cents and per day:

'This assertion is confirmed by the following statement from Mr. Ransom's (U. S. Minister to Mexico) report on Prices and Labor in Mexico, of September 26, 1896, published in vol. xiii., part 1, page 117, of Special Consular Reports, on Money and Prices of Foreign Countries :

"A large portion of the farming in Mexico is carried on under the 'share system.' The Government reports show that, in many instances, rations of corn are furnished to the hired laborer; in some cases we find that he is allowed a small amount per day for his board in addition to wages; again, he is furnished by the landlord with a small piece of land to cultivate for his own benefit."

These views are confirmed by a report on the condition of Mexico, dated at its capital city, on September 4, 1896, from Governor Thomas T. Crittenden, then ConsulGeneral of the United States in the City of Mexico, and published by the Journal of New York, in its issue of September 17, 1896:

"The wages paid laborers and artisans are largely improved. Formerly workmen, particularly agricultural laborers, were paid in ‘kind'; now they are paid in money. In the case of farm laborers, it is the custom of the country for the employer, in addition to the regular wages, to allow the laborer the use of a certain acreage to raise his own food. In many of the agricultural districts, instead of employing labor directly, the owners of haciendas follow what is known in the United States as the share system of cultivating their land. Those who were formerly practically serfs now receive half the crop they raise. Corn is the great staple of the country.

"In considering the labor and wage question it should be borne in mind that the American skilled workman possesses on the average a much higher degree of skill in his trade than the Mexican employed in a similar vocation. The American skilled workman also performs much more work in a day than the workman in this country."