NATURE'S TRIUMPH. 457 



the clearing of a i^lantation, tliey make no impression on tlie for- 

 est; they form a part of one great whole, every portion of which 

 has accommodated itself to every other. Tropical man does not 

 rule Nature, but is himself a part of her great domain. 



The old Dutch sugar planter with his slaves made little more 

 impression on the forest than the savage. True, his clearing was 

 larger and lasted as long as his struggle with Nature was kept 

 up ; but when, finding out the superior fertility of the coast lands, 

 he abandoned it and retired, the forest quickly incorporated it 

 with herself. For about a hundred miles up the Berbice and 

 Demerara Rivers the banks were once lined with plantations ; 

 now, beyond some ten miles, every one of these has reverted to 

 dense forest, here and there only a few negro huts indicating 

 that man still lives there, like the Indian, without making any 

 real impression. 



The stages in the onward march of the forest over a clearing 

 are most interesting. Perhaps two or three hundred acres had 

 been planted with sugar canes, and fifty in plantains, vegetables, 

 and fruit. There would be a fair-sized dwelling house, a water 

 or cattle sugar mill, huts for the negroes, and a wharf on the river 

 bank. The planter decided to give up the place, as he had an offer 

 of a more fertile piece of land on the coast. Taking away every- 

 thing portable, including the machinery of his mill, he abandoned 

 the rest, carried away his negroes, and left the clearing to Nature. 



Let us look upon the plantation a year later. Already a 

 thicket has grown up which is only penetrable by the constant 

 use of a cutlass. After a great deal of labor we reach the borders 

 of the once tidy clearing. What a wonderful sight ! Along the 

 line of forest trees a dense wall of creepers rises sixty to a hundred 

 feet high, forming an effective veil to the dark arcades beyond. 

 From these stretch out long ropes, twining vegetable serpents, 

 and giants' fingers, all moving toward what was once the open 

 space. Some are hundreds of yards long, rooting at the joints, 

 whence other branches radiate and form the dense obstruction 

 we have cut through. 



The creepers, twiners, and scramblers have not yet reached 

 the house, but Nature is at work there also. Round it was once 

 a2i orchard of oranges, limes, star apples, and other tropical fruit, 

 with a few flowering shrubs. Most of these are now overrun with 

 the blood- sucking loranths vegetable leeches which are con- 

 tinually draining their juices and evidently fattening on the 

 spoil. These exotic bushes and trees have no business here ; they 

 are intruders. If man protects them and destroys their enemies 

 they can thrive, but if he abandons them they must perish. Per- 

 haps you are thirsty and look for an orange, but among a dozen 

 trees not a single fruit can be found, and never will be again. 



VOL XLVI. 38 



