Annual Work Routine on Plantations in Maranhao, Brazil, Mid-Nineteenth Century

[The following description of the annual work routine on the cotton and rice plantations of Maranhao is from a book on slavery by a native of that northern province, F. A. Brandao, Junior. A Positivist reformer with experience in France, Brandao based his account of slave labor upon youthful memories. Particularly interesting are his references to the inadequate tools which slaves used and the damaging ecological effects of the prevailing agricultural system. Source: Fs As Brandao, Junior, A escravatura no Brasil precedida d'um artigo sobre a agricultura e colonisacao no Maranhdo (Brussels: H. Thiry-Venn Buggenhoudt, 1865), pp. 31-38.]

On the plantations there is no law but the absolute will of the master, which is rudely delegated to the overseer, usually a trusted slave. And since there is no better wedge than a chunk of the wood itself, the overseer surpasses his master's intentions when enforcing his orders, making extraordinary demands upon the workers in the tedious service in the fields.

At six o'clock in the morning the overseer forces the poor slave, still exhausted from the evening's labors, to rise from his rude bed and proceed to his work. The first assignment of the season is the chopping down of the forests for the next year's planting, using a scythe to hack down the smaller trees. This work normally goes on for two months, depending upon the type of jungle being cut and the stamina of the slaves.

The next step is destruction of the large trees, and this, like previous work, continues for twelve hours each day. At night the slaves return home, where evening work of two or more hours awaits them, depending upon the character of the master. They set fire to the devastated jungle, and then they cut and stack the branches and smaller tree trunks which have escaped the fire and which, occupying the surface of the earth, could hinder development of the crop.

These mounds of branches are again burned, and the result is a sad and devastating scene! Centuries-old tree trunks which two months before had produced a cool, crisp atmosphere over a broad stretch of land lie on the surface of a field ravaged by fire and covered with ashes, where the slaves are compelled to spend twelve hours under the hot sun of the equator, without a single tree to give them shelter.

This destruction of the forests has exhausted the soil, which in many places now produces nothing but grasses suitable for grazing cattle. The temperature has intensified, and the seasons have become irregular. The rains at times damage the crops, and at other times there is no rain at all. The streams and certain shallow rivers, such as the ltapucuru, have dried up or have become almost unnavigable, and lumber for building, has become very rare, or is only found at a great distance from the settlements.

When it finally rains toward the end of December or early January, the slaves begin to seed the devastated fields, and the only tool they use in planting cotton is a small hoe, and for the rice and millet they use nothing but a stick with an iron point to hollow out the ground.

After this comes the weeding. This is painful labor for the slaves, who, with nothing to work with but a weeding-hook, are forced to stand in a stooped position during the entire day, cutting the shoots- or other native plants, and enduring a temperature in the sun of 40° Celsius. This work, which is the most arduous, continues as long as it takes for the plants to fully establish themselves.

The next step is the rice cutting in May or June, which each slave accomplishes with a small knife, cutting the stems one by one, and at night beating them with a branch to loosen the grains. During this phase of their labor the overseers demand a certain number of alqueires of rice from each slave, and if the unfortunate person does not produce what is demanded of him, the tragedy is brought to an end with the daily bread of the slave, that is, the lash.

There is still another kind of work no less exacting, in which the masters make even greater demands. This is the picking of the cotton crop. To accomplish this the slaves disperse themselves over a certain part of the field, collecting the pods and depositing them in a basket or sack which each slave carries for this purpose attached to his waist.
Under a brutally hot sun, the atmosphere bathed in exhausting light, the slave unsteadily forces himself to pick the nearest pod, responding only to the terrible system of injustice which condemns him, with no appeal to clemency; with no hope of reward except respite from daily labor. . . . From time to time he interrupts the silence of these deserts with his melancholy song, inspired by his slave condition, whose rhythm itself is often set to the crack of a whip!