No. 271.
Mr. Langston to Mr. Evarts.
Legation of
the United States,
Port au Prince,
Hayti, May 10, 1878.
(Received June 1.)
No. 54.]
Sir: On the first day of this month the fête of
agriculture was celebrated in this city. The approach of this celebration
was announced, on the evening of the 30th of April, by the firing of cannon,
and the dawn of the following morning, the day of the fête, was saluted by
the firing of the same great guns. At seven o’clock in the morning of the
1st instant, the various functionaries of the government, national and
local, present at the capital, assembled at the national palace, and, at
eight o’clock, the President, supported by the several ministers of his
cabinet, and accompanied by a large escort of troops, repaired to Place
Pétion, where, in the presence of a large gathering, the products of
agriculture were exhibited and the addresses delivered. Subsequently the
assemblage, forming in line of march, led by bands of music and soldiers,
accompanied by the President and his cabinet, repaired to the cathedral,
where a Te Deum was chanted and high mass celebrated.
At the close of the exercises here the competitors to whom prizes had been
awarded, accompanied by the secretary of the interior and agriculture, went
to the Hôtel Communal, where they were served with a sumptuous dinner. The
conduct of this celebration seemed to give general satisfaction.
The present constitution of Hayti (the one of 1867) provides for two national
celebrations. One occurs on the 1st day of January, and commemorates Haytian
independence and the character and deeds of its chief hero, Jean Jacques
Dessalines; the other occurs on the 1st day of May, and is intended, at
present, to be an agricultural exhibition with competition for prizes
awarded to those who excel in cultivation of quality and quantity of
agricultural production. The language of Article 201 of the constitution
reads as translated: “The national fêtes are that of the independance of
Hayti, and its hero, the 1st of January, and that of agriculture, the 1st of
May. The legal fêtes are determined by law.”
On the 21st day of September, 1877, the government, through the department of
the interior and agriculture, provided that the administrations of communes
and arrondissements should arrange for local agricultural exhibitions; and
at the same time and through the same agency provided for a national
exhibition to take place at the capital on the Ist day of May. In accordance
with such regulation there was held in this city, as already stated, on the
1st day of this month an agricultural exhibition.
The products had on display were neither numerous nor various. A few
specimens of coffee, sugar-cane, and fruits constituted the sum total of
what was to be seen. There were no horses, no sheep, no hogs, no cattle, no
fowls on exhibition. Neither were cereals exhibited, nor such vegetables as
potatoes, Irish or sweet. Corn, as grown in this country, is sometimes very
good, although very inadequately cultivated generally, and very good
specimens of it might have been produced. Horses, especially those used for
saddle purposes, donkeys and mules used for draught, sheep and cattle,
especially bullocks used in teams, are very abundant, and many of them of
excellent quality. The sheep, of course, are valueless for wool, but furnish
excellent mutton. Beautiful specimens of such animals as are here enumerated
might have been put on
[Page 447]
exhibition.
It is not to be understood that improved breeds are referred to in this
connection.
There was, however, no suitable provision made for exhibition, for anything
like agricultural display. Every one presenting products held them in his
hands. Neither table nor platform was provided as places of deposit and
display; and yet, in spite of this very great inconvenience, the earnest
attention given by those in attendance, both at Place Pétion and the
cathedral, discovered intelligent interest and improving understanding as to
the subject of agricultural advancement.
The address of the Hon. Em. M. A. Gutierrez, the secretary of state of the
interior and of agriculture, delivered on this occasion, herewith inclosed
as translated, marked A, was received with intelligent appreciation and
approval. As a representative of the government, presenting its purpose with
regard to agricultural improvement in the country, this utterance of Mr.
Gutierrez is worthy of special consideration. Other addresses were
delivered; one by the magistrat communal; another by the president of the
conseil of the arrondissement; but that of the secretary is the one which is
significant. His views with regard to improving the machinery and implements
of husbandry used in this country are correct and wise.
There is the largest room for improvement, for all the agricultural
implements used in this country are rude enough. The chief ones are the
common hoe and the machete; sometimes plows are seen, but I think never
used. The ax is used for cutting and hewing timber and wood. But it is not a
common instrument, and the style is by no means the best. Some machines of
the smaller sizes and less improved styles are used in some localities for
cleaning coffee and cotton, and grinding and pressing sugar-cane. But, in
the main, the laborer here does not use improved implements. As far as the
cultivation of the soil is concerned, its preparation and tillage, the
harvesting of crops, the thrashing of grain, the cleaning of coffee and
cotton, the preparation of rice, sugar, sirup, and taffia, the implements
used are primitive and crude; they are faulty and inadequate to prosperous
and advantageous tillage. It is not because they cannot be obtained that
improved implements are not used; but because the people do not know about
their value and are not disposed to learn. They prefer, as at present
informed, to follow the old ways, cultivating industrial habits and methods
which seem to be more easy because better understood, if they are less
remunerative and advantageous. Of the methods of cultivation adopted it is
only necessary to say that, as far as the tillers of the soil are concerned,
there is not only a general lack of intelligence, but an indisposition, as
already stated, to adopt new ones, with improved implements as required. It
is hardly true that they are indisposed to labor; for they are, as a class,
men and women, good workers. If the field and garden here could only be
cultivated according to the well-tested and improved methods of enlightened
nations, the same amount of labor—less labor in fact—would bring the
abundant harvests of wise tillage to the Haytian laborer.
As more, fully explanatory of the purpose and policy of the government with
regard to the subject of this dispatch, I transmit herewith inclosed, as
translated, circular numbered 12 of the department of the interior and
agriculture. This circular will also render the address of the secretary
more intelligible and easy of apprehension. Soil as fertile and easy of
cultivation as that of Hayti, so generous in products, deserves kindly
treatment of its tillers. And were the tillage improved by the introduction
of better implements, and suitable
[Page 448]
machinery used in harvesting and preparing its products for market, the
rewards of agricultural industry would be greatly enhanced, and the general
interests of the country promoted.
I have, &c.,
[Inclosure 1 in No.
54.—Translation.]
Address of the secretary of agriculture.
Gentlemen: The fête of agriculture of this day
terminates the series of fetes which are no longer in rapport by the
method of award with the progressive march of the age. To the legitimate
aspirations of the nation the government has responded in prescribing to
the administrations communal and of the arrondissements the agricultural
exhibition, September 21, 1877.
The dissensions which have broken out in the conseil communal of Port au
Prince, the trouble which was introduced into the elections, the treason
of March 14, have produced some deplorable results, among which must be
reckoned the failure to execute measures which should tend on the part
of each administration to establish the agricultural exhibition.
The government does not make light of difficulties which are connected
with the execution of every measure the importance of which is not yet
appreciated by agriculturists. To-day the government is happy to
announce, in the presence of the chiefs of section, the councillors of
agriculture who will shortly be proclaimed by the conseil
d’arrondissement, the agriculturists here assembled, that the best
method of encouraging the development of our tillage is to induce every
citizen to offer to the appreciation of the conseil d’arrondissement, in
the place of the exposition, the fruits of his labor, at stated periods,
to compete in point of superiority and quantity, in order to obtain
prizes more or less valuable, each conseil d’arrondissement being
appraiser, ex officio, of the prosperity of
agriculture in its locality.
The government is deeply interested in the introduction of central
manufactories for making white sugar, machines to hull, to winnow, to
clean coffee, to gin cotton, to extract the oil from our oleaginous
grains, to grate, to press tapioca, to prepare rice, to grind our
different cereals. It will avoid to the conseils d’arrondissement, who
have not yet adopted the excellent plan of importing machinery, the
expensive experiments to procure for themselves the best models of this
kind, in order to recommend them. These conseils, called to endow their
localities within the limit of their resources with suitable machines
for the improvement of the product of our soil, should alone appreciate
by the agricultural exhibition the merit of those agriculturists who
ought to obtain them. The exhibition will only be closed at the end of
this month.
Thus it is by the exhibition of your products, citizen agriculturists,
that you will succeed in obtaining improved machines, good instruments
pertaining to husbandry, proper to supply the insufficiency or the
unwillingness of laborers.
The government will not hesitate to give encouragement to all real and
well-directed efforts. Your productions are numerous and varied. The
names and the prizes will be made known among you through the diligence
of the conseil d’arrondissement.
Gentlemen, the chiefs of section, you are requested to second the efforts
of the commandant d’arrondissement, the commune, the conseil
d’arrondissement, the conseil communal, the commissaire of the
government, and the justices of the peace. Your rôle to be well
performed requires activity without limit. Remember that agriculture,
like commerce, lives of guarantee and trust; the more severe you are
against disorder, vagrancy, and theft, the more you will encourage the
industrious agriculturists. The more you maintain the respect of person
and property, the more you will see new establishments built in your
rural sections, attracted by the good order which shall be established
there by you.
Let us follow the Presdent of the republic to the Temple of the Savior to
implore His benedictions upon your families and your laborers.
Vive l’Agriculture!
Vive la Constitution!
Vive le President d’Hayti!
[Page 449]
[Inclosure 2 in No.
54.—Translation.]
Circular of the Department of
Agriculture.
Port au
Prince, November 10,
1877.
Circular No. 12.
Liberty! Equality! Fraternity!
Republic of Hayti, section of agriculture, seventy-fourth
year of the independence. Office of the secretary of state for the
department of the interior and agriculture.
To the conseils d’Arrondissements of the Republic:
Gentlemen: The plan of an agricultural
exhibition at the headquarters of arrondissement having been proposed
and accepted as a measure calculated to bring about an amelioration of
our productions and the increase of our resources of exportation, it now
only rests with the government to point out the means of realizing this
by a course which is as easy as it is encouraging. You ought, above all,
to labor to attain a complete uniformity of views with us for the
classification of the prizes to be awarded, the preparation and the
order of arrangement as to quality and quantity of the principal
products to be exhibited, which will tend to show that we purpose, more
and more to maintain those principles of order and unity, indispensable,
above all, in the variety of work which has been confided to us.
The exhibition known as the fête of agriculture ought to be preceded,
from the 15th to the 22d of April, by preparatory exhibitions in
communes, to take place at the seat of the conseil communal. These
preliminary exhibitions have in view to afford you leisure to verify and
appreciate the productions placed in competition, according to the order
of their condition, in order to determine upon the selection of those
worthy of being exhibited at the central exhibition on the 1st of
May.
Once classified, these productions must be conveyed to the headquarters
of arrondissement, at the risk of the producers, in order to be shipped
in good season, in vessels destined to receive them.
The competitors whose products have been approved of by the conseils
communaux, from whatever section of the country they may come, must
appear in person on the day of the fête of agriculture, with said
products, at the grand distribution of awards. By this means the
industrious agriculturist, in whatever section of the territory he
lives, will have the satisfaction of seeing the fruits of his labors
appreciated and enjoying the advantages of the exhibition and the
benefits accruing therefrom.
It now only remains to classify and define the natural products of the
first order for which prizes will be reserved by the conseils
d’arrondissements according to the limit of their means. You will keep
me informed of these amounts in arranging a price on each article. We
enumerate: Coffee, first prize, superior quality, quantity of pounds to
minimum, good condition of cleanliness; second prize, ordinary quality,
clean, quantity of pounds to minimum; third prize, quality called Moka.
Cotton, first prize, superior quality, quantity of pounds to minimum;
second prize, inferior quality, quantity of pounds to minimum. Cacao,
first prize, superior quality, quantity of pounds to minimum; second
prize, ordinary quality, quantity of pounds to minimum. Indigo, one
prize, quantity, pounds. White sugar, one prize, quantity, pounds; brown
sugar, one prize, quantity, pounds. Sirup, prepared for exportation, at
45 degrees, in barrels. Camphor, quantity ad libitum. Vanilla, quantity
ad libitum. Tobacco in leaf, seroons, of 25 to 50 pounds. Chitterling,
three feet minimum. Ginger, quantity, barrels. Pistachio, quantity,
barrels. Nuts of Pomme d’Acajo (mahogany apple) quantity, barrels.
Divers cereals, corn, &c., quantity, barrels. Hoholy, quantity,
barrels. Yams, in quantity of ten pounds. Potatoes, quantity, barrels.
Couscans, quantity, barrels. Starch, quantity, barrels. Arrow-root,
quantity, barrels. Ordinary pineapples, one prize. Loaf-sugar, one
prize, superior quality. Divers textures, one prize. Cords, one prize.
Hammocks, one prize. Stallions, superior quality, ad libitum in size of
breed. Mules, one prize. Mares, superior breed. Fat cattle, one prize.
Fat swine, one prize. Fat sheep, according to weight, one prize. Fat
goats, according to weight, one prize. Superior game, according to
weight, one prize. Divers animals, improved breeds, to raise for
exportation. Palma Christi oil, one prize, quantity, gallons.
Such is the plan which must serve as a basis and which permits the
country, according to the degree of administrative ability and the
intellectual development of the population, to produce its elements of
life and prosperity.
Please accept, Messieurs les Conseillers, the expression of my
distinguished consideration.
