XXVI [NTBODUOTTON 



destinies that England at thai time devoted her superior 

 forces t<> retaining the Latter. 



To the naturalist the islands are a paradise, and in their 



plants, animals, and rocks he finds not only the new and 

 wonderful, bu1 grand problems of origin and distribution. 

 How these lands arose from the sea, and what their rela- 

 tions to the continents are, must still be regarded as ques- 

 tions not satisfactorily answered. 



From the esthetic standpoint these islands have been 

 the inspiration of noble works of prose and poetry. Scenic 

 pictures of mountains, valleys, and coast everywhere over- 

 whelm the eye with wealth of form, while rich vegetation 

 of a hundred tints, shaded or illuminated by clouds and 

 sunlight, presents an unrivaled wealth of color. The 

 whole, set in a framework of glorious sea, is a marvelous 

 natural picture. 



Books have been written treating of various places and 

 parts of the "West Indies, but, within the past quarter- 

 century at least, none which presents a geographic and 

 economic conspectus of the subject as a whole a fact 

 apparent to the traveler who searches in vain for such a 

 reliable guide-book. Some writers, like Stoddard, Ober, 

 St. John, and Bryan Edwards, have presented charming 

 glimpses of certain portions of the islands. Kingsley, 

 in " Westward Ho ! " and " At Last," has given descrip- 

 tions of scenes and localities which will have a permanent 

 place in literature. Michael Scott, the author of "Tom 

 Cringle's Log," Mayne Eeid, Marryat, and Robert Louis 

 Stevenson have produced amusing sketches of scenes here 

 and there. Samuel Hazard has written two instructive 

 books on the every-day scenes and life of Cuba and Santo 

 Domingo. Lafcadio Hearn's "Two Years in the West 

 Indies," giving the strange story of the life and decadence 

 of the French island of Martinique, is a most readable and 

 instructive book. St. John has graphically told the heroic 

 story of black Haiti's struggles for freedom and its revolt- 

 ing sequence. Froude has written of the English in the 



