The tax per hut is one pound a year, and these holdings
are leased to any Portuguese who promises to pay the combined taxes
of all the huts. He also engages to cut new roads, to keep those
already made in repair, and to furnish a sufficient number of police
to maintain order. The lessees of these holdings have given rise to
many and terrible scandals. In the majority of cases, the lessee,
once out of reach of all authority and of public opinion, and
wielding the power of life and death, becomes a tyrant and
task-master over his district, taxing the natives to five and ten
times the amount which each is supposed to furnish, and treating
them virtually as his bondsmen. Up along the Shire River, the
lessees punish the blacks by hanging them from a tree by their
ankles and beating their bare backs with rhinoceros hide, until, as
it has been described to me by a reputable English resident, the
blood runs in a stream over the negro's shoulders, and forms a pool
beneath his eyes.
[Illustration: The Ivory on the Right, Covered Only with Sacking,
Is Ready for Shipment to Boston, U.S.A.]
You hear of no legitimate enterprise fostered by these lessees, of
no development of natural resources, but, instead, you are told
tales of sickening cruelty, and you can read in the consular
reports others quite as true; records of heartless treatment of
natives, of neglect of great resources, and of hurried snatching at
the year's crop and a return to the Coast, with nothing to show of
sustained effort or steady development.
Pages:
135
136
137
138
139
140
141
142
143
144
145
146
147
148
149
150
151
152
153
154
155
156
157
158
159