92 EXPEDITION TO JAPAN. 



dicular cliffs from six to twelve hundred feet high. These are broken in several places by 

 chasms which open to the sea shore, and form narrow valleys winding np to the table land 

 above. In the centre of the island is an elevation known as Diana's peak, 2,693 feet above the 

 sea level. A calcareous ridge runs across the island from east to west, and divides it into two 

 unequal parts, the larger and better of which is on the north side, containing, among other 

 spots of interest, Jamestown, Longwood, the Briars and Plantation house, the governor's 

 summer's residence. Tlie whole circumference of the island is about twenty-eight miles. At 

 the termination of James' valley on the sea stands Jamestown, the only town and port of the 

 island, with a population of about twenty-five hundred. It is built on both sides of a well 

 paved street which runs nearly a mile up the valley. A strong water battery commands the 

 bay. Ascending James' valley, the traveller arrives on the plain or table land of Longwood, 

 which consists of fifteen hundred acres of good land, elevated about 2,000 feet above the sea, and 

 slopes gently toward the southeast. Though the island looks so barren from the sea, yet the 

 interior is covered with a rich verdure, and is watered by numerous springs which irrigate a 

 very fertile soil. The fruits and flowers of Europe and Asia are successfully cultivated, while 

 horned cattle, sheep, and goats thrive on the rich pastures. Barley, oats, Indian corn, 

 potatoes, and most of the common vegetables are easily produced. Fresh beef, mutton and 

 poultry may at all times be procured, and fish are abundant. 



The climate is one of the most salubrious under the tropics. At Plantation house the 

 thermometer ranges from 61° to 73° within doors, and sometimes, between June and Septem- 

 ber, (the winter season,) falls to 52° in the open air. At Longwood the thermometer is 

 generally a little lower, and at Jamestown a little higher, than it is at Plantation house. The 

 summer rains fall in January or February, and the winter rains in July or August. 



The East India Company, while in possession of the island, constructed excellent roads, 

 which are kept in admirable order by the present government ; they are inclined planes, 

 adapted as well for wheel carriages and artillery as for horses and foot passengers ; and as one 

 rides through the country the appearance of the cultivated fields, kept constantly green by the 

 rains which fall in light showers from the clouds, driven over the island by the southeast 

 trades, forms a striking and agreeable contrast to the barren cliffs which shelter the valleys. 

 During the winter months, indeed, the raiirs are commonly very copiuus, and sometimes fall in 

 such torrents as seriously to injure the cultivated grounds, and make for a time the roads 

 impassable. 



It will thus be seen that, so far as physical comfort is involved, St. Helena is not the worst of 

 prisons ; and if it provoked indignant remonstrance from tlie illustrious captive who laid his 

 bones there, his complaints were prompted not so much by the asjiects of nature around, which 

 never insulted him, as by the petty indignities offered him by little minds, and the irksomeness 

 of restraint to a chafed spirit, whicli, in its isolation, felt deeply the contrast between its now 

 enforced solitude and its former mingling and ruling in the crowd of men, wielding as if by 

 magic the destinies of Europe. To him a hemisphere for his theatre and nations for his play- 

 things had become in some sort a necessity. His own spirit forged his heaviest chains on St. 

 Helena. 



But it was the memory of that captive that gave to the ofiicers of the ship the chief interest 

 of the island, and every one accordingly made it his first object to visit Longwood and the spot 

 where the ashes of Napoleon h( d once rested. 



