Unit Test — Unit test Answers

Read the passage from Sugar Changed the World.The Indian coolies and the ex-slaves, who resented these newcomers flooding into the colonies and driving down wages, were instant rivals. This was convenient for the planters—who were skilled at the game of divide and rule. The planters lumped their workers into two distinct but equally nasty stereotypes: Former slaves were described as lazy, whereas Indians were called meek, docile children. "You may have work and plenty of it for a black man and a coloured man, and they will not do it,” claimed planter W. Alleyne Ireland. He conveniently ignored the fact that the ex-slaves wanted to work their own land, not labor for their former owners. The overseers praised the Indians' meekness but also held them in contempt. The Indian, one overseer claimed, "possesses the low, cringing and abject habit common to his nationality."

Read the passage from Sugar Changed the World.Traditionally, English workers had brewed their own beer, which they drank along with bread, their other major source of food. A Scottish writer of the late 1700s noticed that tea had "become an economical substitute to the middle and lower classes of society for malt liquor," which they could no longer afford. "Tea," which had to be transported from Asia, and "sugar brought from the West Indies . . . compose a drink cheaper than beer." The new drink soon became not only cheap but necessary. Why did the English, in particular, need a low-cost, filling hot drink? In a word: factories. England was the first country in the world to shift from making most of its money in traditional places, such as farms, mines, or small shops, to factories. In the early 1800s the English figured out how to build machines to weave cloth, and how to organize workers so that they could run the machines. Factory workers needed to leave their homes to go to work—they were not on farms where they could grow their own food, nor were they in shops where they could stop when they wanted to have a snack. Instead, they worked together in long shifts, taking breaks when allowed. Factory workers needed cheap food that was easy to transport and that gave them the energy to last until the next break.All over England, in sooty cities such as Manchester and Liverpool, when the factory whistle blew, workers would set down their presses and file out to drink a quick cup of tea sweetened with sugar—usually dipping a piece of bread in the warm drink. Soon a smart manufacturer figured out that this break, and the need for a jolt of sweetness, was an opportunity. English workers were offered sugary cookies and candies—what we call today energy bars—that quick pick-me-up that helped workers to make it through their long shifts.Starting around 1800, sugar became the staple food that allowed the English factories—the most advanced economies in the world—to run. Sugar supplied the energy, the hint of nutrition, the sweet taste to go with the warmth of tea that even the poorest factory worker could look forward to. Sugar was a necessity.

Read the passage and study the image from Sugar Changed the World.Cutting cane was hard work, but it was nothing like what came next: Piles of freshly cut cane had to be fed into the ever-turning mill wheels, until they were completely crushed. The owners insisted that during the work hours the grinding never stop, no matter what. The mills were most often tended by women who were doing dangerous work while getting almost no rest. That was a very bad combination. An ax was often propped up near the rollers so if a slave closed her eyes for a second while pushing the cane, her arm could be hacked off before she was pulled through the merciless grinders. Guests at sugar plantations often remarked on how many one-armed people they saw.Day after day, week after week, month after month, the cane was cut, hauled to the mill, and fed through the rollers. The mills kept going as long as there was cane to grind—the season varied between four and ten months, depending on the local growing conditions. A visitor who came to Brazil in 1630 described the scene: "People the color of the very night, working briskly and moaning at the same time without a moment of peace or rest, whoever sees all the confused and noisy machinery . . . will say that this indeed is the image of Hell.”In this illustration by William Clark, sugar cane is fed into a mill to be ground.

Read the passage from Sugar Changed the World.Eventually, I visited Guyana to find out the fate of our house. As our car passed old sugar estates, and I saw the palm trees bending against the wide sky, the lush cane growing in thick, shiny rows, the villages, which were really parcels of land surrounding the important estates, I realized that sugar had been the entire reason for this country's existence. Every now and then an old boiling house—where the cane is processed into crystals, molasses, and rum—would show itself on the flat landscape, cropping up like a hulking ghost.

Read the passage from Sugar Changed the World.On the day the coolies were to depart, each one was given a "tin ticket,” an identification disk, hung around the neck or strapped to the arm. The enslaved Africans who were taken to the sugar plantations lost their names; they were meant to be pure property. The Indian indentures were lied to, they were tricked, they were no more than cheap labor to keep the plantations running—but they were still individuals. Each of their names was carefully recorded in account books.