THE BAND A NUTMEG PLANTATIONS. 3 



Neira three, and Pulo Aai six (thirty-four in all). Government has a 

 monopoly of the spice, at a fixed rate ; and though this be low, the 

 Parkineers have many privileges. One of these is, that the labour is 

 chiefly done by convicts, of whom Government furnishes 2500, paying 

 them a rupee and a half a month, with gratis medical care; while the 

 Parkineer supplies them with rice and two suits of clothes yearly. 

 Again, rice is sold to the Nutmeg-growers at half-price, and they ob- 

 tain gratis building-materials and implements from the Government 

 stores. Without such aid the spice crop must cease, for there is no 

 native population in Banda to do the work. Four overseers and six- 

 teen park-rangers are employed by Government to see that the convict- 

 labourers are well treated, and that no smuggling goes on ; also to re- 

 port the state of the plantations, the trees that die, those which arc 

 planted, and all particulars of the produce. 



Of these thirty -four plantations, I visited all those on Great Banda and 

 Neira, that is, twenty-eight, and was charmed with the lovely scenery 

 and magnificent prospects which many of them command. The former 

 island is a mountainous ridge, rising above the ocean to the height of 

 1500 feet at the east end, sloping more gradually to the west; the 

 summit consists of undulating plateaux, with no table-land. In many 

 places the ground is precipitous and quite inaccessible : over the more 

 practicable portions of the island are carried artificial staircases, in some 

 instances quite perpendicular. We travelled up and down these in 

 chairs, each borne by ten men ; and a most giddy and perilous journey 

 did it seem ; for it is indispensable in descending to hold fast by the 

 arms, with the feet resting on a cross-bar, else the rider may be hurled 

 over the bearers' heads, where hundreds of feet yawn right below; while 

 in ascending you are carried horizontally, with the face upward to the 

 sky. The scenery, when you have courage to look round, is enchant- 

 ing, — the cool shade, varying views, and freedom from entangling jun- 

 gle, are peculiar and delightful. Underfoot is a carpet of short grass, 

 Mosses, Ferns, and Lyeopodiums; for to keep the vegetation short 

 under the Nutmeg-trees is the sole approach to cultivation. No manure 

 is used: the only attempt at planting is to stick in a growing nutmeg 

 wherever a vacancy exists, without regularity, so that often clumps oi 

 the trees are seen together, 10 to 12 feat apart, 50 to 60 f t high, and 

 their stems onbranched for 15 or 20 feet above the ground. Clear rills 

 of pure refreshing water rush down the steep ravines, their sound min- 



