easy acclivity, and facing towards the rising sun, But the steepest acclivities sometimes consist of a most fertile soil, and produce the most luxuriant canes there is, however, a great additional difficulty in removing them from these eminencies to the mill; and a remote estate requires double the number of oxen which are on one situated by the sea side, in order to transport its produce to the shipping place. An estate which has a water-mill, saves considerably in stock; as one, without such conveniency, must work their mills with cattle and mules: if, however, it be situated near the sea, it may be supplied with a wind mill. In the interior, the breeze is too unsteady and precarious for such a machine, and is too liable to be intercepted by the natural inequalities of the country. The works of an estate, or buildings for the manufacturing of the produce, are placed in the most central situation of the cane land; at the same time with an eye to other conveniences, as a stream of water (this being a most essential advantage, in many points of view). an easiness of access, and a proper extent of eligible ground for building on, and for a good sizeable area around for drying trash, &c. These buildings are a mill (sometimes two, a water and cattle-mill, or cattle-mill and wind-will, or two cattle-mills, according to the size of the estate;) a boiling-house, a curing-house (where the sugar is cured) a distilling-house; one, two, or three

24

making five or

The other build

trash-houses (for drying the cane-trash for fuel); one or two mule sheds; and a cooper's and carpenter's shop. These, if on a large scale, will cost twelve or fifteen thousand pounds currency: but such an expensive set of works are only necessary to a first-rate estate, six hundred hogsheads of sugar. ings on the estate are the proprietor's house, the overseer's house, an hospital for sick negroes, and sometimes a house for the surgeon; though sometimes he resides in the overseer's house. The land is portioned out in the following manner: If a large estate, consisting of about fifteen hundred acres, about a fifth part is planted in canes; two fifths are laid out in guinea-grass and common pasture; one fifth is occupied by plantain walks, &c. and negro grounds; and the remaining fifth consists in woods, ruinates, and land lying fallow. This proportion varies, however, according to circumstances. The fields of canes and pastures are enclosed either with logwood fences or stone walls; the former is most common, and, when kept in neat order, are a beautiful ornament to an estate; it much resembles the hawthorn. Some few have tried the marengo as a hedge, but it by no means answers the purpose so well as the logwood; it is, however, a handsome plant, bearing a whitish blossom, and the inner rind of its bark is a very

good substitute for horse-radish, being exactly the same in taste *.

Besides the logwood and marengo, hedges of the lime-tree are sometimes used; but these are rare. There is a curious creeping plant here, with sharp prickles, which is used to plant on the top of stone walls, where it flourishes in perpetual green, with a very slight portion of earth. There is also a plant called penguins, which answers for this purpose, and to plant on the tops of the banks of ditches. It much resembles the pine-apple plant, and bears a yellow berry of a sharp acid taste. The fields of canes contain from ten to twenty acres, having between them roads or intervals of twelve or fifteen feet wide. The negroes' houses are grouped together, and stand isolated from all the other buildings, forming a sort of rustic village, inclosed by a stone wall, and displaying an intermixture of gardens and various fruit-trees, which has a pleasing sylvan appearance. These gardens, besides the different roots, the plantain, the banana, &c. cultivated in the grounds, contain also a variety of pulse (of which there are numerous species

*Such coincidences in vegetables, so opposite in all other respects, are doubtless surprising; they are often, however, observable; it is remarked, that the seeds of a fruit here (the papaw) exactly correspond in taste to the garden cress. The water-cress of Jamaica is precisely the same as the European water-cress.

in the island) and sometimes European vegetables.

When an estate is to be laid out or settled from the uncultivated woods, the first thing is to fell and clear the trees. The price of this, if done by a jobber (one who has a gang of negroes, and undertakes various work with them) is twelve pounds per acre. The trees are not grabbed up as in Europe and North America; but, being eut down, and suffered to remain for some time on the ground till they have become pretty dry, fire is set to them, and they are soon consumed. Previous to this operation, however, the most valuable of the timber is drawn out; but, if far in the interior of the country, where the carriage is difficult and expensive, much of this is consumed in the indiscriminate blaze. Ruinate, or thicket, is cleared for about half the above sum, When the land is cleared, the choicest of it is appropriated for the sugar cane. It often indeed happens that newly opened land proves too rich for the cane; in consequence of which, while it grows to a most enormous size, it yields but a poor insipid juice, that is unfit for sugar, and is therefore converted into rum. As a corrective to this evil, the stubble on the fields is burnt off every year, till the land is duly impoverished for the purpose. Much land of this kind is not When the land is

however often met with.

cleared, it is laid out into the requisite fields,

halled, and planted in the proper season. The price of halling stiff land by a jobber, is eight pounds currency per acre, and of lighter land about six pounds. The price, however, varies, according to the style of doing this; some cane holes being opened in the manner of trenches, others with intervals between. The season of planting is March for a spring plant; and September, and the two following months, for a full plant. Some estates begin as early as December to cut thin canes for crop; others do not begin till the commencement of the February following: this difference of time depends on various circumstances, which it were tedious and useless to detail. The canes are brought to the mill by carts with cattle, and on the backs of mules: here they go through the necessary operation of grinding in the mill, from whence the juice flows into the boiling-house, and is converted into sugar, while the molasses and scum from the coppers, being passed into the distilling-house, are there manufactured into rum. To enter into the minutiae of these operations, would only be a superfluous repetition of what has often before been described.

Crop being finished, and the produce sent to to the market, the planter turns his whole attention to the weeding of his canes, and, at the proper time, planting an additional supply, if required, not forgetting, also, his pastures and pro