Question

read the passage from sugar changed the world. in the sugar colonies, the wounds of slavery were never far beneath the surface. the africans who had worked in sugar quickly left the plantations and tried to farm or moved to nearby towns. as one planter said, it made no sense to believe that the negro would become a grateful and cheerful free laborer on the soil which had been watered by his tears in slavery. but what could the former slaves do? every indian who accepted the paltry wages specified in the indenture contract lowered the price an african could charge for his labor. which question does this passage answer most effectively? why did indians come to work on the plantations? why did africans leave the plantations to farm elsewhere? why did the indians accept low wages for work on plantations? why did indenture contracts include low wages for africans?

Explanation:

The passage explains that Indians accepting low - wage indenture contracts lowered the labor price Africans could charge. This directly relates to the question of why Indians accepted low wages for plantation work. The other options: the passage doesn't explain why Indians came to plantations, why Africans left to farm elsewhere (it just says they left), or why indenture contracts had low wages for Africans.

Answer:

B. Why did Africans leave the plantations to farm elsewhere? (Wait, no, correction: The correct option is C? Wait, no. Wait, let's re - analyze. The passage says "Every Indian who accepted the paltry wages specified in the indenture contract lowered the price an African could charge for his labor." So the question it answers is "Why did the Indians accept low wages for work on plantations?"? No, wait, the passage is about how Indian acceptance of low wages affected African labor prices. Wait, maybe I misread. Let's check the options again.

Option B: "Why did Africans leave the plantations to farm elsewhere?" The passage says "The Africans who had worked in sugar quickly left the plantations and tried to farm or moved to nearby towns. As one planter said, it made no sense to believe that 'the Negro would become a grateful and cheerful free laborer on the soil which had been watered by his tears in slavery.'" So this option's question is answered by the passage. The passage gives the reason (the pain of slavery on that soil) why Africans left to farm elsewhere.

Option C: The passage doesn't explain why Indians accepted low wages, just that their acceptance affected African labor prices.

Option A: The passage doesn't explain why Indians came to work on plantations.

Option D: The passage doesn't talk about why indenture contracts included low wages for Africans.

So the correct answer is B. Why did Africans leave the plantations to farm elsewhere?