life assume more charming than that which we were
now looking on? Once more, the earth does not contain any peasantry so
well off, so well cared for, so happy, so sleek and contented as the
sons and daughters of the emancipated slaves in the English West Indian
Islands. Sugar may fail the planter, but cocoa, which each peasant can
grow with small effort for himself, does not fail and will not. He may
"better his condition," if he has any such ambition, without stirring
beyond his own ground, and so far, perhaps, his ambition may extend, if
it is not turned off upon politics.

Even the necessary evils of the tropics are not many or serious. His
skin is proof against mosquitoes. There are snakes in Trinidad as there
were snakes in Eden. "Plenty snakes," said one of them who was at work
in his garden, "plenty snakes, but no bitee." As to costume, he would
prefer the costume of innocence if he were allowed. Clothes in such a
climate are superfluous for warmth, and to the minds of the negroes,
unconscious as they are of shame, superfluous for decency. European
prejudice, however, still passes for something; the women have a love
for finery, which would prevent a complete return to African simplicity;
and in the islands which are still French, and in those like Trinidad,
which the French originally colonized, they dress themselves with real
taste. They hide their wool in red or yellow handkerchiefs, gracefully
twisted; or perhaps it is not only to conceal the wool. Columbus found
the Carib women of the island dressing their hair in the same fashion.

The water-works, when we reached them, were even more beautiful than we
had been taught to expect. A dam has been driven across a perfectly
limpid mountain stream; a wide open area has been cleared, levelled,
strengthened with masonry, and divided into deep basins or reservoirs,
through which the current continually flows. Hedges of hibiscus shine
with crimson blossoms. Innumerable humming-birds glance to and fro among
the trees and shrubs, and gardens and ponds are overhung by magnificent
bamboos, which so astonished me by their size that I inquired if their
height had been measured. One of them, I was told, had lately fallen,
and was found to be one hundred and thirty feet long. A single drawback
only there was to this enchanting spot, and it was again the snakes.
There are huge pythons in Trinidad which are supposed to have crossed
the straits from the continent. Some washerw