The Daily News. THURSDAY, JANUARY 12, 1905. A CURIOUS INDIAN CIVILIZATION.
A German traveller, who has recently returned from an expedition into the trackless and unmapped "wayback" of Bolivia, brings a traveller's tale of a communistic settlement j amongst the natives of that land 1 which is borne out by several other existing records. In the tortuous forests of the rubber district he fell across a tribe of Indians, only a few thousand in number,. which was ordering its life on a communistic plan. Everybody works, not for himself, hut for the common good. . Tho people have a number of small settlements, and four large ones, and are ruled by a rod of iron by the caciquesd! They derived their' communistic ideas from the Jesuit fathers who lived amongst them sever- . al centuries ago, and' these ideas they have enlarged according to their own notions, in the belief that by, serving all each may contribute . better 'than in any other way to his own well-being. The settlements are divided into sections, each under a cacique, and there are also a number of superintendents of labour, one of them having under his direction the men who distribute;! the water, another the squad supplying firewood, and others attending to all the farm work. Every man detailed for farming has a plot of ground which he has to turn to the best account. The crops ho harvests go into the . common store to the last pound or bushel, and the -man is punished if it is decided that the yield from his patch is less than it would havolbeen if his industry had been greater. If the house of one of the tribe is burned, it is replaced at the public cost. In this way each shares the good and bad! fortune of his neighbours. The cacique is an absolute ruler, and disobedience to his will is - severely punished. Laziness is one of the worst of crimes, and the penalty inflicted is often severul hundred blows well put on the naked back with a leather strap. Even the women are punished in this way, receiving sometimes as many as' fifty strokes. Discipline is remarkably severe. No one may leave the section without permission, and no one may entertain a stranger unless the cncj-ijuo consents. No one may marry outside of the tribe under any circumstances, nor take a wife in another section of his tribe without the consent of the caciques of both sections. Jn its application this particular form of communism appears to have a good deal of despotism attached to it, but "it is an interesting illustration of how civilization I may be grafted on to savagery almost unconsciously.
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Taranaki Daily News, Volume XLVII, Issue 7710, 12 January 1905, Page 2
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448The Daily News. THURSDAY, JANUARY 12, 1905. A CURIOUS INDIAN CIVILIZATION. Taranaki Daily News, Volume XLVII, Issue 7710, 12 January 1905, Page 2
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