THE QUEENSLAND PLANTERS DEFENDED.

Globe, Volume XXIV, Issue 2681, 10 November 1882, Page 3

THE QUEENSLAND PLANTERS DEFENDED.

The author of the article -which appeared in the June number of the " Fortnightly Review," entitled "Troubles in the Pacific," has a right to be astonished at his own success. It really would appear as if there is a demand among a section of the British population for atrocities, committed by Englishmen upon the blacks or upon inferior races —as if there are humanitarians so gentle by nature as to be convinced that their fellow countrymen, immediately that the opportunity presents itself, will revel in cruelty. Otherwise it is difficult to account for the cordial reception given to an article which gravely —and graphically relates how slavery has been established, and murder is encouraged by law in Eastern Australia. The only other* explanation that suggests itself is that some confusion exists in the public mind whereby the labor traffic in the Pacific is associated with the treatment of the islanders on the Queensland plantations. The two subjects are of course remote. The abuses in labour traffic are real enough, but it does not follow because a master hailing from Fiji and New Caledonia is brutal in his conduct, that the Queensland planter is. guilty of defrauding or illtreating his hands. Led away by some influence, however, many of the London daily papers founded leading articles upon Mr Wisker's narrative, reproducing the alleged facts and throwing in artistically additional touches of blackness. Questions were gravely asked in the House of Commons. The incredible tale was readily and greedily accepted. In the September number of the " Fortnightly," however, an article appears, " Queensland Planters : an Exculpation," by Mr R. J. Jeffray, in which the other side of the case is stated, and the colonists of Queensland may be congratulated upon the skill and ardour displayed by their defender. It cannot be said that Mr Jeffray's defence lias been as well received as was Mr "Wisker's attack. The demand appears to be for atrocities. But we may expect that the article will do its work, and that the calumnies, if they are not apologised for, will at least not be xq-. peated, Mr R. J. Jeffray is the ex-president of the Melbourne Chamber of Commerce. He 13 entitled to write with authority about Queensland, because, in association with others, he is the owner of sugar plantations there which now represent half a million of money, and for ten years past he has had annually to inspefct these estates. Offering himself as a " credible though interested witness" on the subject, Mr Jeffray affirms that the Polynesian labourers are treated in every respect in a most humane and kindly manner; that they are not overworked ; and that, as regards housing, clothing, medical attendance, and food, they are amply provided for. It has, he says, been an invariable, remark by visitors in no way concerned in sugar planting how happy and contented "the boys" look, and how docile and pleasant they always seem to be. During his last visit to Mackay, not many months ago, Mr Jeffray specially inspected the Kanaka quarters at a new estate, just formed at a cost of £50,000, and had an opportunity of seeing their food, the kitchen where it was cooked, and the apartment allotted for their meals, and he remembers exclaiming, " What a blessing it would be for some of our poor countrymen at home if they had such quarters and such food!"

Regarding the Mackay district, Mr Jcffray speaks of his personal knowing'.;.

And'he rdmarks that the laborers m the southern districts near Brisbane are no more likely to be subjected to cruelty and injustice with impunity than if they were in the county of Middlesex. The truth of this remark will be appreciated by all colonists. Feeling, runs high here about disputed issues of policy. There is a strong party in Queensland violently opposed to the introduction of coolie labor in any form, and every incident that can be raked up to the detriment of the system is duly presented to the public ; every molehill is transformed into a mountain. There may be nothing to complain of in this. But any assumption that the Legislature and the population of Queensland are prepared to connive and to wink at atrocities upon the islanders must necessarily be wholly incorrect. On the contrary, many of the statements made about the labor system in Queensland do not require to be exaggerated, but to be materially toned down. It would be as reasonable to accept them in their entirety as it would be to believe in the assertions of the extreme radicals hero, that the working man is ground down to a debased condition by the conspiracy of landowners and banks. The notorious fact that the working man is probably richer, happier, and more independent in the Australian group than in any other portion of the world, does not prevent such scandals being uttered. The same detractors are present in Queensland, and consequently what has to be guarded against is not concealment of Kanaka " atrocities," but exaggeration. The sting of the attack, which Mr Jeffray answers, was that the Queensland " slavery " is worse in one important particular than the slavery of sixty years ago in the West Indies. Why ? "It was j to the interest of the West Indian to keep i his slaves alive at least until they reached I decrepitude. It is the interest of the Queensland planter to kill off his Polynesians towards the end of their term ; and we have the plainest official evidence to the effect that he does not hesitate to consult Jj his interest." Mr Jeffray puts with much force ' the reply which has already been made in the c olony. The law which prescribed that the wages should be paid at the end of three years' engagement, and which thus rendered the charge possible, was repealed in 18S0, and the wages are now made payable monthly or quarterly, in the presence of a Government inspector, or of a magistrate, while in the event of death accrued wages .revert to the Government. There was a difference of opinion about this provision. The great mortality anaong the islanders is during the first year of their term —white they are being acclimatised—and not, as is insinuated, towards the end of the term; and when a laborer dies thus early the planter is a heavy loser. The cost of importation is .£l2 per bead, and the first year is practically spent in instruction, so that if the laborer dies at an early stage of his engagement, the speculation has been an unprofitable one to the planter. Therefore some thought it was not unreasonable to place, as against this loss, the accrued wages of a laborer dying at a later period, instead of paying the amount into a Government fund,where it would be merged with other unclaimed balances. Other planters, on the contrary, strongly ap proved of the amendment, because the payment of wages monthly was fairer to the islanders, and was calculated to make them more contented, by giving them the enjoyment of their wages as earned, with the ulterior advantage that at the end of their term they would have less money to invest in guns and powder and shot, which might possibly be used in acts of violence affer their return to the islands. " But," says Mr Jeffray, "there was not a man among them who ever conceived the horrible idea that the amendment was bad because it would prevent them from ' making a profit,* as some of the London newspapers put it, with a light heart, by managing that the islander should be " done to death' before the expiration of his term of service." Mr Jeffray points out that the returns in the " Government Gazette " show that even before the Act of 1880 balances due to deceased islanders were paid over to the curator of intestate estates. He believes that an indiscriminate labour trade would be a curse to the islands, and that no doubt the traffic has been grossly abused in the buccaneering pist, and is perhaps still abused by vessels from places such as New Caledonia. But he also believes that " under the sanction and precautions of the Queensland Act of Parliament, the trade is calculated to confer a benefit upon the islands in the Pacific, by furnishing an outlet for their surplus population, by habituating the laborers to industrial pursuits, and by infusing into their minds the germs of civilisation, viz., a knowledge and a feeling that they have rights, and are protected by law, an education which they are not likely to receive if left alone in their native savage condition." Queensland, as he says, ought not to be subject to odium in consequence of the conduct of traders from other quarters. As one who is not unfriendly or unsympathetic towards missionary enterprise, Mr Jeffray makes the suggestion that instead of railing indiscriminately against all and sundry directly or indirectly connected with the importation of Polynesian islanders, the clergy should endeavor to co-operate with the reputable agents of commerce. It is impossible for Polynesia to be managed as a secluded Paradisaic region. The late Bishop Patteson discovered that work is no less a necessity of life for these children of nature than worship—just as it is with dwellers in other climes. And this very business of importing islanders into Queensland might be made a channel for the most effective and hopeful Christian work. Missionaries might profitably concern themselves in the . collection of islanders suited for labor in the colonies, in the arrangements for their emigration and return, in their treatment. during the period of service, and in all questions affecting their welfare both at home and aboad. The hearty co-opera-tion of the Queensland planters could be assured. Mr Jeffray deals severely with the state" ment that but for the intervention of the British Government Queensland would be ultimately " peopled by hordes of Kanakas, officered by white capitalists." The absurdity and extravagance of such statements, he says, are flagrant—although they have been generally accepted in the London press. If it be true that the parliamentary majority consists of men who are bent on extending the " labour traffic," how comes it that the Polynesian Act of 1880 is exactly in the opposite direction ? Mr "Wisker asserts and reiterates that "the Legislature is largely composed of traders and other employers who profit by this waste of human life. The few legislators who are guided by principles of justice' and humanity may be described as ran nantes in gnrgite vasto, who xmist either gvfinj with the current, of Corruption or be carried along with it." Mr Jeffray asks —Is there such a Pandemonium on earth ? As a matter of fact there is but one planter in the House of Assembly, Mr M. Hume Black, of Mackay, a magistrate, and a man of unexceptional character. Mr Jeffray affirms, " without fear of contradiction from any well mrViCed °r man, that the whole weight of public opinion, whether that of planters or BquitJWrsV or persons engaged in commerce, is decidedly opposed to the supply of island labor to all departments of industry, and it is a matter of coiumon and every day remark that it i 3 fast and expedient that this labor should be limited to tropical agriculture." The frilcts of the case are tolerably well known to most- of us in Melbourne. We have a familiar' acquaintance with the men who have promoted' the Queensland plantations. They ino\e to and fro amongst us. They obtain their clerks and overseers from our ranks, and these nwn return and tell their tales. And we may say that the true defence of Queensland is this—that since the commencement of the sugar trade and of the labor traffic she has been steadily engaged in securing the welfare of the islanders. To say that there have been no mistakes and no injustices would be absurd. But Queensland can claim that as she, has acquired experience she has applied it, and that she has done all to protect a weaker race that we should expect from a humane and liberty-loving Australian, uolouy..