288 AGRICULTURE. 



Tlic ruin of the West Indies at tlie end of the great Frencli 

 war was princii)ally owing to that exclusive cultivation of 

 the cane, whicli forced the planter to depend on a single 

 article of produce, and left him embarrassed every time prices 

 fell suddenly, or the canes failed from drought or hurri- 

 cane. We all know what would be thought of an European 

 farmer who thus staked his capital on one venture. " He is a 

 bad farmer," says the proverb, " who does not stand on four 

 legs, and, if he can, on five." If his wheat fails, he has his 

 barley if his barley, he has his sheep if his sheep, he has 

 his fatting oxen. The Provencal, the model farmer, can re- 

 treat on his almonds if his mulberries fail ; on his olives, 

 if his vines fail; on his maize, if his wheat fails. The 

 West Indian might have had the Cuban has his tobacco ; 

 his indigo too ; his coffee, or as in Trinidad his cacao and 

 his arrow-root ; and half-a-dozen crops more : indeed, had 

 liis intellect and he had intellect in plenty been diverted 

 from the fatal fixed idea of making money as fast as possible 

 by sugar, he might have ere now discovered in America, or 

 imported from the East, plants for cultivation far more 

 valuable than that Bread-fruit tree, of which such high hopes 

 were once entertained, as a food for the Xegro. As it was, 

 his very green crops were neglected, till, in some islands at 

 least, he could not feed his cattle and mules with certainty ; 

 while the sugar-cane, to which everything else had been 



