nt state. The following is
an extract from a Letter, written to Mr. Correard by a Physician, who has
carefully examined Cape Verd.

"This Cape is very different from what we thought. Its surface is not above
six or eight square leagues; its population is very numerous, and by no
means in proportion with the part of this peninsula, proper for
cultivation, which is not above one-third of its surface. Another third
serves for pasture for the flocks of the blacks; and the other part is too
much _vulcanised_, too full of rocks, to afford any hope of advantage in an
agricultural view. But its military position is admirable; all seems to
concur to render it impregnable, and it would even be easy to insulate it
entirely from the Continent, and to form upon it several ports, which
nature seems to have already prepared."

This letter likewise speaks of the advantages offered by the environs of
Rufisque, which are so well known, that we may dispense with speaking of
them here. We shall only mention as among the principal points to be
occupied, with the _mornes_ of Cape Rouge, Portudal, Joal, and Cahone, this
last on the river Salum near the Gambia; they are large villages, the
environs of which are covered with magnificent forests, and the soil of
which is perhaps the most fertile of any in Africa. For more ample accounts
of these countries, we refer to the excellent works of Messrs. Durand and
Geoffroy de Villeneuve, who have examined them like enlightened observers,
and perfectly well described them in their travels, only that they have too
much exaggerated the agricultural advantages of Cape Verd.

We shall not have the presumption to lay down plans, to propose systems, to
enforce such or such means for putting them in execution. We shall merely
terminate our task by some general considerations calculated to confirm
what numerous and able observers have already thought, of the importance of
the establishments in Africa, and of the necessity of adopting some general
plan of colonisation for these countries.

However pride, prejudice and personal interest, may deceive themselves
respecting the re-establishment of our Western Colonies, nobody will be
able longer to dissemble the inutility of attempts to persevere in a false
route. Calculation will at length triumph over blind obstinacy and false
reasonings. There is already a certain number of incontestable data, the
consequences of which must be one day admitted. And first, tho