§ SIR ROBERT FOWLER (London)asked the Secretary of State for the Colonies, Whether his attention has been called to the excessive mortality among the coloured labourers employed 1349 on the works of the Panama Canal; and, whether Sir Henry Norman, Governor of Jamaica, has taken any action in the matter?
§ THE SECRETARY OF STATE (Sir HENRY HOLLAND) (Hampstead)I have not been informed of an excessive mortality among the coloured labourers employed on the works of the Panama Canal. In March, 1885, and in April, 1887, the Governor of Jamaica, having received information from the British Consul at Panama that a large number of labourers on the isthmus were without employment, issued notifications to that effect in the Jamaica Government Gazette; and in these notifications the magistrates, ministers of religion, and others interested in the welfare of the people were invited to warn them of the risk they would incur by going to the isthmus.