tyranny; their spirit has been tortured by abuse and contempt, and brutalized by ignorance; in a word, there is no injustice that has not been inflicted on them, short of depriving them of their liberty; and in a work published at Madrid in 1819 (Estado de las Yslas Filipinas, par [sic; for por] Don Tomas Comyn), whose author was a factor of the Phillippine company, a whole chapter (the 4th) is devoted to the mild and humane project "of establishing Spanish agriculturists throughout the islands," who are, "to require a certain number of Indians from the governors of towns and provinces, who are to be driven to the plantations, where they are to be obliged to work a certain time, the price of their labour being fixed, and then to be relieved by a fresh drove!"[1]
Such a system, incredible as it may appear, has been proposed to a Spanish cortes; and still more wonderful, plans like these excited no reprobation in Manila. Such were Spanish ideas of governing Indians! Justice would almost tempt us to wish that this scheme had been carried into execution, and that the Indian had risen and dashed his chains on the heads of the authors of such an infernal project. And yet the Indian is marked out as little better than a brute; so many of them are, but to the system of government, and not to the Indian, is the fault to be ascribed.
It is not here meant to accuse the Spanish laws; many of them are excellent, and would appear to
- ↑ Was it not by this system (the mita) that the mines and plantations of Mexico were wrought? and Mexico,—that Mexico which the Spaniards of Cortes in the 15th century called New Spain,—became nearly a desert?
