Book Description

THE foregoing are but a few portions of the accounts published in Consul Casement's Report given by the Barbados men whose statements were taken. They have been here selected to show that the worst stories of almost incredible barbarity were more than confirmed. No apology is needed for setting them forth in this book. It is in the interests of truth and justice that one half of the world should know how another, remoter half lives. The history of the affair throws a light on the curious character of people of various nationalities connected with it. The Latin Americans, even those who committed the most appalling deeds, are such people as would under ordinary circumstances receive the traveller with high-sounding phrases of hospitality. Away from the restraining power of civilisation and public opinion, it is seen that men of certain character easily revert to primitive instincts of cruelty and oppression, and hold human life the cheapest thing on earth. The terrible indictment that has been made of Peruvian methods away from the influence of their cities shows how far from the principle of self-government the people of Latin America still are. It is to be recollected, moreover, that these poor forest Indians differ very little from the people who have formed the basis of Peruvian and Latin American nationality generally: whilst the Indians and Cholos of the uplands, who are still subjected to oppression and civic negligence, are those from whom Peru and others of the Andine republics draw, and always will draw, unless a strong tide of immigration sets in, the bulk of their citizens. The governing Peruvians and Bolivians of to-day are formed from that race. They bear its stamp upon their faces and cuticle. This brown race, which has, in Mexico and Peru, produced statesmen and law-givers, is nothing to be ashamed of, yet the mestizos, or people of mixed race, forming the bulk of the Latin American nations, are harsher in their conduct towards the Indian than are white men. Comparatively few women from Spain have entered the New World. The Indians have formed the mothers of the Peruvians and their neighbours, from Presidents and Cabinet Ministers downwards. These poor women, who have been outraged, starved, murdered, or burnt alive, are of their own flesh. What reparation will Peru make to expiate these terrible outrages against man and Nature? How will it compensate the relatives of the murdered, or the scarred and ruined survivors? Furthermore, what reparation will the European shareholders of the now liquidated company make? The pressing necessity for Peru-as for every other land and nation-is to awaken to the necessity for a new doctrine and science regarding the disposal of the resources of the earth and the enjoyments of its fruits by those who have their being upon it. Until this is done, commercialism and oppression will continue to go hand in hand.