Notes of a naturalist in South America. Ball John
IN HAYTI.
About sunrise on the 2nd of April the anchor was let go, and we found ourselves in the harbour of Jacmel, the only port on the south side of the great island of Hayti. The Royal Mail steamers call here periodically to deliver letters and to receive a bag which, after due fumigation and such other incantations as are deemed proper, is delivered at the end of a long pole. The entire island being supposed to be constantly subject to zymotic diseases, especially small-pox which is the great scourge of the negro race, no further communication with the shore is permitted, and within less than two hours we were again under way. The hills surrounding the harbour are apparently covered with forest, the trees being of no great size, but of the most brilliant green; but I could detect no dwellings of a superior class such as Europeans would be sure to construct in picturesque and healthy spots near a seaport. As we ran for more than twenty miles very near the coast, I could at first detect here and there small patches of cleared ground with sheds or huts; but beyond the distance of a few miles these ceased, and no token of the presence of man was discernible.
Making large allowance for exaggeration, and having had the opportunity of correcting some loose reports by the more careful and accurate information afterwards received from a gentleman who resided for some time at Port au Prince as the representative of a European power, it is impossible for me to avoid the conclusion that, in the hands of its black possessors, this noble island has retrograded to a condition of savagery little, if at all, superior to that of the regions of tropical Africa whence they originally came.
There may be but slight foundation for the reports as to the revival of cannibal customs in the interior of the island; but it would seem that the sanguinary encounters so frequently recurring between the people of the rival republics between whom the island is divided, differ little in point of ferocity from those of Ashantee or Dahomey. The political institutions, caricatures of those of the United States, have produced in astonishing luxuriance all the abuses characteristic of different types of misgovernment, and the few men distinguished by superior intelligence and a desire for rational progress have sought in vain for support in efforts for reform. The condition of the two republics, Hayti and San Domingo, seems to be the reductio ad absurdum of the theories which ascribe to free institutions an inherent power of promoting human progress.
April 3 was a day to be long remembered. Barbadoes to Jamaica is as Champagne or Mecklenburg compared to Switzerland or Tyrol, and now for the first time the dream of tropical nature became a reality. At six p.m. we passed Port Royal, and about seven had cast anchor at Kingston. The first impression on landing here is unfavourable. The buildings are mean, the thoroughfares and side-paths out of repair, the people in the streets seem to have nothing to do and to be doing it, the general air that of listlessness and neglect. Altogether the place contrasts disadvantageously with the ports of Spanish America, to say nothing of our own colonies. But Kingston was not to detain us, and the overpowering attraction was towards the range of the Blue Mountains, on which my eyes had been fixed all the morning as we approached the shore. We were told that we must return to the ship at five o’clock, so that it was hopeless to attempt to reach even the middle zone of the mountains, and all that could be done with advantage was to engage a carriage to a place called Gordontown, in a valley which is the ordinary route to Newcastle and other places in the mountains. After a delay which to our impatience seemed unreasonable, I started in a tolerable carriage with W – , an old friend who was proceeding to Lima as commissioner from the Court of Chancery to receive evidence in an important pending lawsuit, and who, although not a naturalist, gave effective and valuable help on this and other subsequent occasions in the work of plant-collecting.
EXCURSION IN JAMAICA.
For a distance of four or five miles the land slopes very gently from the coast towards the roots of the hills. This tract is partly occupied by sugar-plantations; but our road lay for some time among small country houses, each surrounded by pleasure-ground or garden. As the dry season was not yet over, the country here looked parched; but I saw many trees and shrubs new to me, many of them laden with flowers, and found it hard to keep my resolution not to stop the carriage until we should reach Gordontown. The excitement increased as we entered the valley, and the road began to wind up the slopes above the right bank of the torrent, where at every yard some new object came into view. It was near eleven a.m. when we reached the little inn, which, with four or five houses, make the station of Gordontown, where the carriage road ends, and horses are hired by those bound for Newcastle or other places in the hills. No time was to be lost, and we were speedily on our way to ramble up the valley, keeping as near as might be to the banks of the torrent.
The first effect upon one accustomed only to the vegetation of the temperate zone is simply bewildering. As I expressed it at the time, it seemed as if the inmates of the plant-houses at Kew had broken loose and run scrambling up the rocky hills that enclose the valley. These are of a red arenaceous rock, rough and broken, but affording ample hold for trees as well as smaller plants. The torrent at this season was shrunk to slender dimensions, but is never wholly dry; and I was somewhat surprised to find that on the steep slopes exposed to the full sunshine the vegetation was much less parched than one commonly finds it in summer in the Mediterranean region, and even to gather a good many ferns on exposed banks. It would appear that, even in the dry season, the air must here be nearly saturated with aqueous vapour, and that abundant dews must supply the needs of delicate plants. Not many species were in flower, but yet there was more than sufficient to occupy the short time available. Malvaceæ and Convolvulaceæ were the most prominent forms; but to a new-comer the most lively interest attaches to groups never before seen in a wild state, such as Passiflora– of which two species were found in flower – a first solitary representative of the great tropical American family of Melastomaceæ, or the gorgeous Amaryllid, Hippeastrum equestre, hiding in shady places by the stream.
VEGETATION OF GORDONTOWN.
Although Gordontown can scarcely be so much as a thousand feet above the sea-level, the climate is very sensibly cooler than that of Kingston. When we left the town the thermometer stood at 83° in the shade, while here at midday the sea-breeze felt positively cold, and I was glad to have with me an extra garment. A light luncheon of ham and eggs, with guava sweetmeat for dessert, was soon despatched; and, as I wished to halt at several spots on the way, we started about half-past two, laden with the spoils of the excursion, and reached the steamer before five o’clock. Great was my disgust to find that there was no intention of starting until nine a.m. the next morning, and this was changed to indignation when it came to be known that we had been deprived of the priceless pleasure of a trip to the mountains by the deliberate misstatement of the company’s superintendent, who had arranged to embark on the following morning three hundred negroes going to work on the Panama Ship Canal.
A stranger can scarcely fail to observe a marked difference between the negro population of Jamaica and that of Barbadoes. In the larger island, while no way deficient in physical qualities, they appear decidedly inferior in intelligence, activity, and courtesy towards their white neighbours. It is said that the independent class, who live by cultivating small patches of land on which they have squatted, has of late years much improved, and that the increasing desire for purchasable comforts and luxuries has begun to develop habits of steady industry; but as regards the mass of the people who live by wages, there are many indications of a sullen dislike towards the descendants of their former masters which some trifling provocation may at any time inflame to a pitch of wild ferocity. Some who have lived in the island maintain that a general rising with a view to the massacre of the white population is not an impossible occurrence, and, however improbable it may appear, there is ample reason for constant vigilance on the part of those responsible for the government of the island. Such vigilance, it must be remembered, is quite as much requisite to prevent acts of real or apparent injustice towards the inferior race, as to repress the first beginnings of violence if some spark should fire the mine of suppressed hatred.
After a too short visit to this beautiful island, we were under way before ten a.m. on April 4th, and before midday the outline of the Blue Mountains of Jamaica was fast fading in the northern horizon. Throughout the greater part of the run from Kingston we encountered a moderately brisk breeze, which gradually veered from south-east to south-west, and this, according to our experienced captain, commonly occurs at this season. It may be conjectured