208 WEST INDIA SOCIETY. 



about the mill yaxd, brawling, either together or with some niggerlet, 

 for cane tops or a half-devoured yam ; the miserably spare and 

 squalid appearance these animals present here, might well bear out 

 the eastern notions of their uncleanness. But men and mules, children 

 and cattle, pigs and poultry are all equally gamesome in crop time. 

 Shew took me yesterday to visit one of those singular ravines, 

 caused by the rush of water down our island steeps in the rainy 

 season. After threading a narrow savanna, that contracted as it 

 neared the mountain, we passed along the dry bed of a stream, un- 

 til our progress was suddenly arrested at the gorge itself; the little 

 valley had now acquired a gloom that was in perfect keeping vnth 

 its wild seclusion, concluding, like another Hinnom, in a recess that 

 defied even the tropic beams to penetrate it. Here my guide began to 

 climb a titanic pile of rocks, thickly shaded with dark branches of 

 the manchineel, the bois immortel, and others whose roots were 

 hidden in a vegetable mass of cactus. I observed an American 

 aloe, whose blossoms are so rare, and near it a long, parasitical 

 plant not unlike our clematis ; this they call the Barbadian vine. 

 There was also a bush whence those black guava berries are gather- 

 ed, which are peculiar to the Virgin Islands, and make, when pre- 

 served, a good substitute for English currants. The dell, from its 

 loneliness, the rough and tangled path through it, and the deep 

 solemnity of shade thrown over all — might be visited and revered as 

 the last shrine of a waning superstition. 



And superstition is on the wane among our negroes ; they seem 

 to confess that whatever appettis (spells) their magicians could once 

 effect, these have long since failed before superior Christian incan- 

 tations. The Obeah man with his cutacoo — whose mystic contents 

 usually comprise an old snuff box, human hair, dried grass and 

 other trash — cannot protect himself when discovered, nor gather a 

 poor pittance from his old devotees. The more harmless pageant 

 of Jonkanoo also, with its little emblem of Noah's ark, have fallen 

 into disuse together with Obeah. 



Although we had left our coats below both were pretty well 

 drenched in ooze of our own, before gaining the point to which our 

 efforts were directed ; a dear little basin of nature's most Catholic 

 holy water, placed in a niche of her own formation. It was " a 

 fountain sealed, a well of living waters, and streams from Lebanon." 

 To think of the Canticles was thinking of love ; and that had enga- 

 ged me in tracing out thy beautiful image, Mary Belle, in the pel- 

 lucid mirror before us, when k pebble from my companion's hand 

 spread it into a hundred circles ; just as my heart expands in mu- 



