Page:The American Cyclopædia (1879) Volume V.djvu/306

 302 COOLY a term of years, as in the case of the British colonies, or by force and fraud, as in the case of Cuba and Peru. The term is not commonly applied to the free Chinese immigrants into the United States, Australia, &c. Coolies, in the restricted sense of the term, may be di- vided into two classes, viz. : those from India, and those from China. The first attempt at the employment of Indian coolies appears to have been made in British Guiana about the time of the full emancipation of the slaves in 1838. A ship load of coolies was brought over in that year from Calcutta by private enterprise, but the experiment was not successful. The im- migrants suffered greatly from diseases incident to change of life and climate, particularly from the bites of the chigo and other insects, which from neglect produced ulcers affecting life and limb. The mortality became so great as to lead to public investigation of their case, which caused great excitement in England, and the British Indian government interfered to stop the emigration of coolies. The urgent solicita- tions, however, of the planters of British Gui- ana, Trinidad, and Mauritius obtained an order in council, Jan. 15, 1842, by which the emi- gration of Hindoos was allowed under certain strict regulations, including the appointment of emigration agents in India and the colonies, whose duty it was to look after the welfare and rights of the coolies. The vessels that transported them were also placed under strict control as to number of passengers, provisions, &c. The passage money was advanced by way of bounty from the colonial treasury, which sometimes obtained reimbursement from the planters. This branch of cooly emigration, occurring wholly within the British dominions, is under the restraint of law both at the point of embarkation and of landing. In speaking of the regulations and working of the system in the colonies, we refer particularly to Guiana, which may be taken as representing them all. In India the emigration is now governed by the Indian acts of 1864 and 1869, which pro- vide for a resident colonial emigration agent, by whom the recruiting agents who visit the country districts are appointed. These recruit- ing agents are licensed by the protector of emi- grants at Calcutta, who is appointed by the government. Each agent takes the recruits he has enlisted before the resident magistrate of the district to which he is assigned, for regis- tration ; copies of the register, stating age, sex, caste, former occupation, and the rate of wages in the colony, are given to the emigrant, and duplicates are sent to the colonial emigration agent. After registration the recruits are for- warded to the depot at Calcutta, where they are examined by the colonial agent and by sur- geons, to ascertain their physical fitness. A surgeon accompanies each cooly ship, who makes return of the deaths and sickness on the passage. These regulations, while they have done much to prevent injustice and imposition upon the ignorant emigrants, are said to be frequently evaded by the recruiting agents, who misrepresent the rate of wages in the col- ony, the duties that will be required of the coolies, and the laws to which they will be amenable. Before embarkation the emigrants enter into a contract with the colonial agent to serve 7i hours a day for a period of five years as agricultural laborers on any estate to which they may be assigned by the governor of the colony, in return for which they are to receive a house, garden ground, and medical attendance free of expense, and the same rate of wages as may from time to time be paid to unindentured laborers on the same plantations. After ten years' service they are entitled to a return passage. In the colony the coolies are under the control of the immi- gration department, which exercises a general supervisory and protective power over them during their term of service, and with respect to their indentures are governed by the con- solidated immigration ordinance of 1864, as amended in 1868. Upon their arrival the im- migration agent general and the health officer of the port are required carefully to inspect them, and to separate such as are not capable of agricultural labor from those who are. They are then allotted to estates by the agent general, under direction of the governor, ac- cording to the numbers applied for by the pro- prietors, the agent being enjoined by law not to remove children under 15 from their parents, nor to separate relatives. The coolies are then indentured for a period of five years to the proprietors to whom they have been allot- ted. At the expiration of this period they are in general at liberty to engage for themselves as independent laborers ; but the policy of the. law favors a reindenture, under the supervision of the emigrant agent general, which must be for another term of five years. For reinden- turing the cooly receives a bounty of $50. The local law of Trinidad, however, permits reindenturing only from year to year. The minimum of labor required of an able-bodied cooly by the immigration ordinance is five days' work or five tasks a week, seven hours a day if employed at out-of-door work, and ten hours a day if in buildings. For failure to perform the duties imposed upon him, and for various petty misdemeanors, he may be fined not exceeding $24, or imprisoned with hard labor not over one month. He is liable to summary arrest if found without a pass more than two miles from the plantation on which he is employed, and when his indenture has expired he must be able to produce a "cer- tificate of industrial service," importing the completion of his term, signed by the immi- gration agent; otherwise, though nominally free, he is liable to arrest and detention until identified. The remedies provided for the cooly against his employers seem to be inadequate, while the practical working of the law is still more unequal, since the immigrants possess no political power, which is in the hands of