VEGAS. 3 



at some time or other ; and have been thrown into grass 

 during the period of depression dating from 1845. It has 

 not been worth while, as jet, to break them up again, though 

 the profits of sugar-farming are now, or at least ought to be, 

 very large. But the soil along this line is originally poor and 

 sandy; and it is far more profitable to break up the rich 

 vegas, or low alluvial lands, even at the trouble of clearing 

 them of forest. So these paddocks are left, often with noble 

 trees standing about in them, putting one in mind if it were 

 not for the Palmistes and Bamboos and the crowd of black 

 vultures over an occasional dead animal of English parks. 



But few English parks have such backgrounds. To the 

 right, the vast southern flat, with its smoking engine-house 

 chimneys and bright green cane-pieces, and, beyond all, the 

 black wall of the primaeval forest ; and to the left, some 

 half mile off, the steep slopes of the green northern moun- 

 tains blazing in the sun, and sending down, every two or 

 three miles, out of some charming glen, a clear pebbly brook, 

 each w^inding through its narrow strip of vega. The vega is 

 usually a highly cultivated cane-piece, where great lizards 

 sit in the mouths of their burrows, and watch the passer- 

 by wdth intense interest. Coolies and jSTegros are at 

 work in it : but only a few ; for the strength of the 

 hands is away at the engine-house, making sugar day and 



night. There is a piece of cane in act of being cut. The 



B 2 



