. Popular science monthly. worse music may beheard in many more favored parts of the world. Football is a favoritesport and there is keen rivalry between teams representing neighboringoficinas. There is the inevitable biograph, a dance hall, annual visits bya circus, a saloon and even a gambling house, for since the men willgamble anyway, it is deemed best to have it done where some controlmay be exerted over it. Little trouble ever arises, for the resident man-ager is in some ways a local czar, with the very efficient mounted policeof the pampa to assist in keeping order. It is sometimes clai
. Popular science monthly. worse music may beheard in many more favored parts of the world. Football is a favoritesport and there is keen rivalry between teams representing neighboringoficinas. There is the inevitable biograph, a dance hall, annual visits bya circus, a saloon and even a gambling house, for since the men willgamble anyway, it is deemed best to have it done where some controlmay be exerted over it. Little trouble ever arises, for the resident man-ager is in some ways a local czar, with the very efficient mounted policeof the pampa to assist in keeping order. It is sometimes claimed that the laborers are exploited outrageouslyby the companies; that two prices are the rule in the company stores,the higher price always being for the laborers; that buying outside isalmost or quite impossible; that they are assessed for medical servicewhich they never need, and so on. It is also pointed out that althoughprovided with houses, the living conditions among the laborers are THE NITRATE FIELDS OF CHILE 227. The main street of Antofagasta, from the corner of the plaza. decidedly primitive, especially as regards sanitary arrangements. It isquite true that the camp commonly is placed where the wind will notcarry the odors to the houses occupied by the manager and his sub-ordinates. But in the bright sun and dry air of the desert, most dis-ease germs do not thrive, and there filth, unpleasant as it may be, doesnot lead to the sickness which it might cause elsewhere. In order toget some return from the monthly assessment of a peso for doctorsservices, so it is said, the people commonly feign illness, until the freemedicine is received, whereupon the medicine promptly is thrown probably is some truth in all the claims that the lot of the nitrateworkers is not everything which could be desired, yet it is undeniablethat they are better off than a good many of their own countrymen whoare working elsewhere. Living in the nitrate pampa has some compensations, as
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