Coolie

“ He was always interesting, that coolie. They are a feeble folk, the most of them, — the coneys amongst mankind, — and the intelligent are in a desperate minority. Look around at the crowds of coolies whose life is a long yarn of gray toil, crossed at intervals with tawdry threads of lazy, worthless self-indulgence. Of “remembrance fallen from heaven” they have none. When the high gods sat down to fashion them, they must — to turn the poet's words — have wrought with more weeping than laughter, more loathing than love. ”

“ The coolie and his ways are matters of much interest to foreigners, but after a time one ceases to be amazed at their endurance or their recklessness. After the most violent exercise, ninsoku, the coolie, will take off his one superfluous garment and sit in summer ease in his decorated skin. ”

“ The poor coolie is troubled by no such formality, and wears a great umbrella-like head covering, that he perches on a little bamboo tower, six inches above his crown, tying down the whole concern by a string that passes behind his ears. When at leisure, he wears his long cue trailing to his feet; when busy, it is snugly coiled around his head and out of sight under his hat. The gentleman and mandarin, on the contrary, never ties up the cue, its flowing grace, like his long finger nails, being a badge of his superior condition in being above manual labor. ”

“ Coolie, Cooly, kōōl′i, n. an Indian or Chinese labourer who has emigrated under contract to a foreign land: a European's name for a hired native labourer in India and China. [Prob. Kuli, a tribe of Guzerat; or orig. Tamil, cf. kūli, hire.] ”

“ The coolie does most of the rough labor, including the floors, the stoves, the washing, both of dishes and clothing, and the ironing, producing dress-shirts that would make the best steam-laundries in the United States blush with shame, if they were capable of any such display of emotion, and pressing even feminine evening frills with the deft hand of a French maid. ”

“ Even the humble coolie, who carries you around in your jinrikisha, firmly believes this, and thinks that if he is in a small measure the means of your making a happy purchase, his way into your affections is won. If you tell him in the morning that you wish to take a ride, he will tuck you comfortably in and start at a rapid pace towards the main thoroughfare of the city. ”

“ These, frequently discarded by their families, are seen by the official and the village elder on their way to the coolie-house with a sense of relief and satisfaction; and not seldom is the coolie-broker aided in his object of obtaining men by persons of this class, and frequently by the relations of the men themselves. ”

“ The missionary gave him money to hire a coolie to help carry his load. Besides his roll of bedding, cooking utensils and food, one of the young preachers had given him three lacquer-ware vessels, as presents for his former teachers. The coolie must be paid in advance, according to the custom of the country. After going a few miles the coolie found an excuse to get out of U Po Hline's sight, and ran away, taking the money with him. At the next village another coolie was engaged, who must also be paid in advance. ”

“ Coolies frequently go bare-legged; they use sandals made of rope and possess rain-coats made of palm leaves. The garments of the poorer classes are made of cotton, generally dyed blue. Wealthy people have their clothes made of silk. ”

“ When exasperated, the Coolies are afraid to approach him. If his wounds are such as to prevent his proceeding, his load is generally obliged to be left behind; a loss that is much more felt than that of the loads of a few Coolies. ”

“ The Coolies were all but naked, and were constantly plunging into the pools of the rivers; for, though filthy in their persons, they revel in cold water in summer. They are powerful swimmers, and will stem a very strong current, striking out with each arm alternately. It is an animated sight when twenty or thirty of these swarthy children of nature are disporting their muscular figures in the water, diving after large fish, and sometimes catching them by tickling them under the stones. ”

“ The Coolies are valued for their superior skill and intelligence, but as men will treat a hired horse worse than a horse of their own, so they were, until they happily bethought them of killing themselves, more hardly used than the Negroes. ”

“ The Coolies are useful creatures. Without them sugar cultivation in Trinidad and Demerara would cease altogether. They are useful and they are singularly ornamental. Unfortunately they have not the best character with the police. There is little crime among the negroes, who quarrel furiously with their tongues only. The Coolies have the fiercer passions of their Eastern blood. Their women being few are tempted occasionally into infidelities, and would be tempted more often but that a lapse in virtue is so fearfully avenged. ”

“ Therfore in lyke maner and with suche diuersitie as men are commonly whyte in Europe and blacke in Affrike, euen with like varietie are they tawny in these Indies, with diuers degrees diuersly inclynynge more or lesse to blacke or whyte.”4
The Coolies interested us immensely, in whatever part of the island we met them—and they are to be seen everywhere—and were for us the subject-matter of constant study. They occupy an entire suburb of the Port-of-Spain, and, for those who are interested in sociological and economic questions, no place is more worthy of a visit. ”

“ Coleridge loved equally mildness and wildness, as I saw them on the one hand in the warm red fields, the gorse smouldering with bloom, the soft delicious greenery of the banks; and on the other hand in the stag’s home, the dark, bleak ridges of heather or pine, the deep-carved coombs. Mildness, meekness, gentleness, softness, made appeals both sensuous and spiritual to the poet’s chaste and voluptuous affections and to something homely in him, while his spirituality, responding to the wildness, branched forth into metaphysics and natural magic. ”

“ Who are the Koltykwerps? Where did these strange folk come from? How did they ever find their way down into this World of Eternal Frost? And, above all, where do they get their food and clothing from? These were a few of the questions which I was so impatient to have answered that my temperature was raised a whole degree, and I was obliged to sleep with only one single pelt between me and my divan of crystal ice. ”

“ The summer air, the luscious scent of the orange-trees beneath which they were seated, might have inclined them to mere lazy enjoyment of their young existence—the busy sounds from the tilt-yard near have summoned them to the sports and exercises for which their graceful, well-grown strength evidently fitted them, or the books, several of which were scattered on the marble steps of the court, have employed their attention. ”

“ A soft, still air,
Which makes each closely folded thing
Look always fair.
My darlings, do you feel me near,
As every day
Into this hidden place and dear
I take my way?
Always you stand in radiant guise,
Always I see
A noiseless welcome in the eyes
You turn on me.
And, whether I come soon or late,
Whate'er befall,
Always within the guarded gate
I find you all.
MENACE. All green and fair the Summer lies,
Just budded from the bud of Spring,
With tender blue of wistful skies,
And winds which softly sing.
Her clock has struck its morning hours ”

“ In alluding to this latter, or negative form of suffering—that form, I mean, which presents not the too fugitive glimpses of past power, but its blank annihilation—Coleridge himself most beautifully insists upon and illustrates the truth that all which we find in Nature must be created by ourselves; and that alike whether Nature is so gorgeous in her beauty as to seem apparelled in her wedding-garment or so powerless and extinct as to seem palled in her shroud. ”

“ And I’ve an idee that, if anything, it’s we that’s got the weather-gauge; and if so, by all means keep it, even if we has to run the gauntlet of her broadside for a minute or two. Once let’s be to wind’ard, and in such weather as this I wouldn’t fear the smartest square-rigged craft that ever was launched. We could lead ’em no end of a dance, and then give ’em the slip a’terwards when we was tired of the fun. ”

“ Now, boys, lay aft here with your squeegees, and give this poop a drying down!”
It was a glorious morning; the sun, already well above the horizon, just taking the keen edge off the air, and rendering the pure easterly breeze soft and balmy without depriving it of any of its bracing and exhilarating qualities; the sky a magnificent, deep, pure blue overhead, softening down in tint to warm tender tones of grey as the eye travelled from the zenith, horizon-ward. ”

“ You ask me to explain why I am afraid of a draft of cool air; why I shiver more than others upon entering a cold room, and seem nauseated and repelled when the chill of evening creeps through the heat of a mild autumn day. ”

“ God be praised, Coleridge, wonderful as it is to tell, I have never once been otherwise than collected, and calm; even on the dreadful day and in the midst of the terrible scene I preserved a tranquillity, which bystanders may have construed into indifference, a tranquillity not of despair; is it folly or sin in me to say that it was a religious principle that most supported me? I allow much to other favorable circumstances. ”

“ Thou wilt not be received with lacerations of cheeks, nor with funereal ululation—but with circling dances, and the joy of songs. Thou art terrible indeed, yet thou dwelleth with Liberty, stern Genius! Borne on thy dark pinions over the swelling of Ocean, they return to their native country. There, by the side of Fountains beneath Citron-groves, the lovers tell to their beloved what horrors, being Men, they had endured from Men. ”

“ In a moment all his savage instincts were aroused. He flitted across the snow like a flash of moonlight, and, with a great leap, seized it by the neck. Mumbling and snarling, he devoured the poor bird. ”

“ Clasped in close [216] embrace, with tears and smiles and loving self-reproachings, they stood before the fire; and as they bent for their first reconciled kiss, the fir cones, flashing once more into life and activity, rose upon the topmost log. Even the burned and blackened ones glowed with fresh fire. Hand in hand, as it were, they climbed into position, and leaped and capered side by side as if merrily dancing, while little jubilant cracks and clicks and sounds, as of small hands clapped for joy, accompanied the movement. ”

“ The fresh natural emotion of a young and brilliant mind is eternally interesting, and Coleridge's youthful Muse, with a frankness of self-disclosure which is not the less winning because at times it provokes a smile, confides to us even the history of her most temporary moods. ”

“ In the middle of the night the cold was bitter, so cold that I had icicles hanging on my moustache and eyelashes. It was impossible to remain on the camels, and ill as we all felt we had to walk—drag ourselves would be a more suitable expression—to keep ourselves from freezing. On these cold nights we simply longed for the sun to come out. ”

“ Indeed, I think we have summer days from time to time the winter through, and that it is often the snow on the ground which makes the whole difference. This afternoon the air was indescribably clear and exhilarating, and though the thermometer would have shown it to be cold, I thought there was a finer and purer warmth than in summer, a wholesome, intellectual warmth in which the body was warmed by the mind's contentment,—the warmth hardly sensuous, but rather the satisfaction of existence. ”

“ To this late hour of my life, and even to the end of it did Coleridge trace impressions left by the painful recollection of these friendless holidays. The long warm days of summer never return but they bring with them a gloom from the haunting memory of those whole day's leave, when by some strange arrangement, we were turned out for the live-long day, upon our own hands whether we had friends to go to or none. ”

“ I never heard anything so absurd in my life. Persons, [175] and things that are not persons," said the White Pair; "what do you mean?"
"Yes; what do you mean? What is the use of beating about the bush in this way?" remonstrated the Big Gray Pair. "Who did eat the sweetmeat? Say plainly."
"Half of it was eaten by a policeman, and the other half by a rook," replied the Little Blues, in a meek voice.
"Ho, ho!" roared the Gray Stockings, while the White Pair joined in with a shrill giggle. "That beats all! Half by a policeman, and half by a rook! A fine way to dispose of a Christmas sweetmeat! ”

“ The sun came out again, clear and strong, drying our washing in about half an hour, and to complete the good work, a nice, steady wind from the north-east sprang up, and sent us bowling merrily along upon our course once more, with all our flying-kites aloft to woo the welcome breeze, the glass beginning to rise again immediately the thunderstorm was over. ”

“ Arrangements for summer cooling are equally metaphysical; the shoji are simply thrown open in hopes of snaring wayward breezes, whose meager cooling is enhanced psychologically by the tinkle of wind bells hung in the verandas. ”

“ God’s goodness grants this boon,—that thou shalt see,
And hold communion for a little space
With that dear child so lately gone from thee.
Arise, and haste away; God may not let her stay.” [74]
So we arose, and quickly we went forth;
How could we slight such all undreamed-of boon?
And when we reached the ultimate far North—
All in a hush of frozen afternoon,
Lit by a dim sun-ray, liker to night than day ”