"adverse to the employment of other methods of cultivation than those to which it is accustomed." The wages by this time, 1894, had risen somewhat, to an average of from 25 to 63 cents silver, but there was little immigration. The peons worked as little as possible. The natives of the interior refused to be attracted in large numbers to the coast, where they did not thrive, and the system of indebtedness was rendered almost necessary. In a later report, made in 1895, (a) the labor problem was still declared to be unsolved and native labor arraigned as scarce, unstable, and of low quality. Desertions of contracted laborers were frequent, and while free labor was of better quality and obtained higher wages, it was difficult to procure.

In the report made in November, 1900, on the "Trade and commerce of Vera Cruz,"(b) it was declared that, despite the low wages paid in silver, the results of native labor were so poor as to be dear even at that price. Labor was very scarce; there was not sufficient supply for the growing demand and "no legal redress for breach of contract nor means to enforce the fulfillment of contracts." The importation of Chinese had not been successful, as they could not be legally controlled as the natives were, and, upon the whole, the British representative came to the conclusion that the lack of labor in the tropical coast lands of Vera Cruz was particularly acute. A recent experiment of importing Italian labor for the construction of the Vera Cruz and Pacific Railway was unsuccessful, owing to the discontent and evasion of the contracted laborers.

It may be broadly stated that, taking tropical Mexico by and large, neither to the employers nor to the employees are the conditions of labor entirely satisfactory. The system of indebtedness and practical serfdom is not without its bad effects upon labor; it involves the planter also in great risk and large expenditure. The system results in the destruction of any desire on the part of the peon to be independent or to think for himself, and seems to lead to improvidence of all sorts. The debt incurred by the planter is frequently very large and may probably be many times in excess of the value of his land. It also necessitates a complicated and expensive system of labor agents and assistants to obtain new contract laborers, to prevent their flight, and to return them in the event of their running away.

As a general rule, the labor cost to the planter in tropical Mexico is considerably greater than the money wages received by the peons. This cost includes the price or labor paid for the rations, the cost of obtaining the workingmen or of bringing them back in case of flight, together with the interest on the money advanced in loans and the occasional loss of the capital so advanced, as a result of the death or successful flight of the debtor.

a British Foreign Office, Annual Series No. 1509, 1895.
b British Foreign Office, Annual Series No. 2539, 1900.

The low wages, however, appear to be largely the result of the ignorance and improvidence of the natives, and it is somewhat questionable whether higher daily wages would permanently benefit the peon, unless at the same time his standard of life rose. The experience of railroad companies and other employers of labor in Mexico has been that higher daily wages increase idleness, and that, if the wages for a day's work be doubled, the number of working days will be halved. It is also a fact confirmed by the experience and observation of many employers that the amount of labor performed bears no direct relation to the wages, and that even where work is done by the task instead of by the day the promise of additional remuneration will seldom result in an increased output.

Another feature of the labor situation in Mexico, and above all, in tropical Mexico, which proves the inertness and ignorance of the laboring population, is the tenacity with which conventional rates of wages and conventional methods of payment are adhered to. The amount of land or the amount of cotton cloth given to the workman remains constantly the same for long periods, and the amount of work which makes up a day's task remains the same, although the conditions themselves may have changed. The depreciation of the currency appears to have little effect upon the rate of wages of the agricultural population, although, in view of the fact that the articles consumed by the workmen are so few and so exclusively of home production, the effect of such a depreciation upon prices may perhaps be exaggerated. The quiesence and inertia of the population, in view of the depreciated currency, may be witnessed, however, in the district of Soconusco, in the State of Chiapas, where wages both of the free and of the indebted laborers are paid in Guatemalan currency called cachuco, which is about 25 per cent less in value than the Mexican silver.

In the same district the indebted workmen are obliged to buy from their wages, which usually amount to 50 cents Guatemalan, equal to about 19 cents gold, their food and that of their family. This food, however, is sold at entirely traditional prices, and while considerable profit, averaging from 50 to 100 per cent, is made upon certain articles such as beans and meat, the chief article of consumption, corn, is always sold at a slight, or occasionally even at a very considerable, loss to the plantation. Another proof of the conventional character of the labor contract is the fact that small sums of money must be paid to the peon at each fortnightly or monthly settlement day, even though the payment is in excess of actual wages. As a rule the peons appear to desire no other arrangement than that which is actually in force, and while they occasionally evade the contract by flight, it is only for the purpose of incurring another considerable debt which will again place them in the position from which they sought to escape. The labor problem in tropical Mexico is more likely to find its solution on

the Isthmus than in any other place, owing to the settlement in that place of American planters with ample capital and considerable initiative. The temporary work of preparing the land for cultivation, however, has been performed through conventions with contractors of labor, on an agreement for the payment of a stated sum per acre prepared for planting.

AGRICULTURAL LABOR IN TEMPERATE MEXICO.

In the temperate parts of Mexico the question of agricultural labor, from the point of view of the employer, is not nearly so difficult as in the more tropical portions of the country. The population in the temperate regions, as before stated, is considerably denser and wages are lower. The chief advantage, however, from the point of view of the employer, is to be found not so much in the cheapness of labor as in its greater steadiness and reliability.

The clearest idea of the state of labor on the Mexican plantations situated in the temperate climate is to be found on the large haciendas where corn is raised. The production of grain is carried on by small farmers to a certain extent, but it is chiefly raised on large plantations, which are usually owned by absentee Mexican or Spanish proprietors and operated by an administrator. The corn is raised, however, not so much by employing farm laborers as by letting out certain portions of the land to be worked on the metayer system. On these plantations a large proportion of the hands live on the haciendas in huts assigned to them. They are usually paid from 25 to 37 cents Mexican currency per day or per task, which is calculated on the basis of a day's work. They are attached to the soil either by an advance of money, by an assignment of land, or by an offer of joint cultivation on the metayer system.

In the States of Jalisco and Guanajuato, where, in the year 1898, 9,777,484 hectoliters (27,745,566 bushels) or almost one-fourth of the total corn in the country was raised, the system of cultivation is chiefly on the metayer contract based on the indebtedness of the peon. A cultivator receives from a planter a portion of land, as well as seed, oxen, necessary implements, and a certain advance in corn, amounting to about 71⁄2 bushels per yoke of oxen. This seed is not returned until after the harvesting of the crop, when it is paid for either in money or kind. The cultivator performs all the work of the farm excepting that of harvesting, which is divided between him and the planter, or, where it is performed entirely by the employees of the latter, one-half of the expense is charged to the cultivator. Sometimes this charge is a fixed conventional sum and not the actual cost of the work or in definite proportion thereto.

The conditions described above may be considered as typical for the

States, although in some cases, such as that mentioned by Kaerger, (a) the proportion received by the cultivator is only 40 per cent, and the general conditions more onerous.

The same form of contract exists, with slight changes, for the cultivation of beans, though in this case no advance is made excepting for seed. The money wages of such farm hands in the States of Puebla and Mexico as are indebted are less than those who are free. The former receive 18 cents in the vicinity of Toluca, in the State of Mexico, instead of 25 cents paid to free workmen, while in Puebla, where wages are higher, owing to the demand for laborers in the cotton and other factories, the remuneration of the resident workers (called acasilados) average about 25 cents, while those of the free workmen range between 37 and 50 cents. The resident workers sometimes receive countervailing advantages as in the neighborhood of Toluca, for instance, a hut, fuel, the use of a piece of land and that of oxen and implements.

In some cases, however, no such advantage is granted, and on some plantations the peon who can not resist aggression, owing to the fact of his being indebted, is obliged to buy from his landlord the corn which he consumes at a fixed price of $4 per funega, or about $1.56 Mexican currency per bushel. In such cases as the latter, the farm hand appears to be absolutely at the mercy of the hacendado, or planter, who, by means of low wages and high charges for food, is able to constantly increase the indebtedness of the peon, while giving him barely sufficient food to keep him alive. It is not known to what extent the power of the planter is thus abused, but the conditions are such as to render a most intolerable cruelty, at least occasionally, possible.

MINING LABOR.

The early history of Mexican labor under the Spaniards was closely associated with the work in the mines, and no one can truly appreciate the history of the Indians of Mexico without taking into account the metal hunger of the Spaniards. During the middle ages the supply of silver in western Europe had been diminishing, and at the beginning of the era of the conquest of America the demand for silver had reached an unexampled intensity. The prevailing trade theory of the times, moreover, laid a great and perhaps not entirely unjustifiable stress upon the importance of obtaining specie, while the ease of transporting the metal was an added reason for an extension of mining. Finally, it seems probable that the industry of mining, which, with its high chances and occasionally enormous returns, has always attracted adventurers, appealed with unexampled force to the imaginative conquerors.

a Landwirtschaft und Kolonization, etc., quoted on page 44.

Be that as it may, the immediate result of the conquest was a transference of a vast body of labor from agriculture to mining, and, in a great measure, a removal of Indians from the hot lowlands and the temperate mountain slopes to the colder lands of the plateau.

Unlike in Peru, where the mines were chiefly found near the region of perpetual snow, the principal Mexican mines known to the Spaniards were on the great central table-land at an elevation of from 5,600 to 6,600 feet. The region of the mines was thus habitable, but it would have been difficult to obtain laborers of their own accord, and recourse was necessarily had to force. Accordingly, the Indians were taken from their farms and obliged to work in the mines, where the excessive labor under the most trying conditions and with insufficient food and sleep caused a tremendously high death rate. To this was added the effect of the new employment and of the colder climate upon the Indians, whose "flexibility of organization" was probably less than that of the European race. In Peru, where the mines were situated at a greater altitude, this policy resulted in a depopulation of vast sections of the country and the survival of the policy, although with no great output of the mines. In Mexico, on the other hand, there grew up towns and villages in the fertile lands about the mines, the severity of the "mita" was lessened, and the mines became established and prospered on the foundation of free and well-paid labor.(a)

At the beginning of the nineteenth century the conditions of labor had vastly improved in Mexican mines and the miners formed a body of free, highly remunerated laborers. But even then the conditions under which they worked were extraordinarily hard, owing to the terrible heat and the bad ventilation of the mines, as well as the onerous and exacting nature of the labor. At that time the tenateros, or Indians and half-breeds who carry minerals on their back, frequently remained "continuously loaded for six hours with a weight of from 225 to 350 pounds, and constantly exposed to a very high temperature, ascending eight or ten times successively, without intermission, stairs of 1,800 steps." Yet, despite their very excessive work, the men appeared to do well, and, according to Humboldt, the mortality among the miners was not much greater than among other classes. This is no doubt to

a There is some conflict of opinion among authorities as to the exact knowledge possessed by the ancient Mexicans of the art of mining. Prescott goes so far as to say that they opened extensive galleries into veins wrought in the solid rock, and that the early Spanish miners obtained indications from traces of their labor. On the other hand, other authorities, basing their views on the language of Bernal Diaz, Sahagun, and other contemporaries of the conquerors, believe that they obtained their metals entirely by gathering detached masses found on the surface of the ground or in river beds. At all events, the small amount of silver obtained as booty by the conquerors and the small necessity for silver by the Indians show rather conclusively that if there were subterranean mining it was on a very small scale.