CARIBBEAN EXPEDITION, 1956 — SCHMTTT 447 



I was told that this type of shovel was ordinarily used for shoveling 

 cocoa pods and beans about. Before us, atop the sea wall, we saw 

 another step in the journey of the cocoa beans on their way from the 

 parent tree to the tin of commerce in which cocoa is sold. Along the 

 harbor road square yards of pods were spread out on tarpaulins to 

 dry in the sun. Over them a buxom, heavy-weighted native woman 

 strode in endless measured tread back and forth, crunching the pods 

 to free the beans. 



Grenada, the southernmost of the British Windward Islands, 97 

 miles to the north of Trinidad, and only 133 square miles in extent, 

 is a veritable "Spice Island," for, aside from cocoa beans, of which 

 over 5 million pounds are exported each year, nutmegs are the largest 

 item in the island's economy. Before the well-nigh disastrous hurri- 

 cane of 1955 more than 6 million pounds of nutmegs and mace were 

 shipped out of Grenada, Most of these two spices are exported to the 

 United States, where, according to local reports, the nutmegs are used 

 chiefly to flavor sausage meats. Included in the island's spice exports 

 are cinnamon and cloves ; considerable cotton is also grown here. 



The morning after our arrival in Grenada, Mr. Bredin and Dr. 

 Smith headed for the hills and Grand Etang, a beautiful crater lake 2 

 miles in circumference situated in the heart of a tropical rain forest 

 which covers most of this island. The volcanic depression in which 

 the lake is located at an elevation of about 1,600 feet is reached by a 

 steep, much-contorted, yet exceedingly picturesque road. It is often — 

 as it was this day — overhung with curtains of moist fog, while hard 

 showers of rain fell intermittently. The forest that fills the inner 

 valleys of Grenada shows the effects of the recent hurricane violence, 

 in that the trees, often too thickly growing to fall, stand broken and 

 leafless in eerie ranks. The region is not high enough to support the 

 "elfin woodland" that characterizes high portions of the Antilles, but 

 nevertheless the predominant trees do not much exceed a height of 30 

 or 40 feet. The immediate shores of the lake are low and swampy, 

 and here the botanist found excellent collecting, obtaining many 

 herbaceous plants such as sedges and the pretty yellow-flowered 

 Utricularia obtusa. On the slopes farther from the lake, in the debris 

 of the ruined forest, were found the coarse large-flowered Lobelia 

 cirsifolia, masses of the little prostrate shrub Sauvagesia erecta, and 

 many small-flowered orchids and ferns on the fallen branches of trees. 



It is the luxuriant vegetation of the moister islands among the West 

 Indies that have merited them the name Isles of Paradise. Cer- 

 tainly those who live on Grenada, Martinique, Dominica, and Guade- 

 loupe^ — and many who visit them — feel this way about them. While 

 Dr. Smith was sampling the flora, Dr. Chace and I, with our para- 

 phernalia, took a taxicab out to Point Saline, for here the rocky 



