HARVARD 
UNIVERSITY 
OA P) Y 
BOTANICAL LEAFLETS 
HARVARD UNIVERSITY 
“AMBRIDGE, Massacuusetts, APRIL 22, 1943 VoL. Pi, No, 2 
KCONOMIC PLANTS OF ST. JOHN, 
U.S. VIRGIN ISLANDS 
BY 
Roserr H. Woopwortu 
(Bennington College, Bennington, Vermont) 
THE ISLAND OF St. JOHN presents a truly virgin ap- 
pearance, being forested from the hilltops to the water’s 
edge. A century ago practically the whole island was 
under cultivation, sugar cane being the main crop. After 
1848, when slavery was abolished, the cultivation of the 
island’s very poor soil was no longer profitable. As the 
forests slowly covered the hillsides the population gradu- 
ally dropped from twenty-five hundred to less than one- 
third that number. 
Among the few remaining signs of this earlier activity 
are the ruins of the sugar estates, and even these are, for 
the most part, overgrown with vines and trees. 
Most sections of the island are accessible by trails 
which wind over the mountains, along the shores and 
through the dense vegetation of the deep valleys. There 
ure no roads. ‘The island is free from the ‘‘improvements 
of modern civilization’” and interestingly enough has no 
urgent economic problems. It is not intended to imply 
that the natives would not profit by a better diet, but 
this is just as true of people everywhere. A large majority 
of the St. John folk have never been off their island. The 
natives have less than the people of nearby islands and 
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