206 Biographical Memoir M. of Claude Louis Richard. 



into with him more positive, he did not hesitate to draw upon 

 his small capital for the purpose of fitting himself out for his 

 travels ; and during them, he was not more attentive to his in- 

 terest : what occupied his attention least was what was taking 

 place in France during this interval, and the influence which 

 these events might have on his circumstances. 



He was soon however to learn, that neither the personal pro- 

 tection of a king, nor the orders of his ministers, are always 

 sufficient guarantees against the caprices of personages of a 

 much lower rank. It is related that a pasha, on being threat- 

 ened by one whom he had oppressed, with the wrath of the sul- 

 tan and of God, replied, " The sultan is very far off, God is 

 very high, and here I am master." The Governor of Cayenne, 

 although he did not make use of the same language, conducted 

 himself according to the same principle — the most sordid inte- 

 rest was his only motive. He had filled with pulse, for his own 

 use, the royal garden intended for the culture of spices ; and 

 M. Richard, whose principal office at Cayenne was to be the di- 

 rection of this garden, and who had caused himself to be con- 

 ducted there on his arrival, could not so much as obtain entrance 

 into it. What he experienced with respect to the clove-trees 

 did not less excite his surprise and indignation. The governor, 

 thinking he might imitate, for his own advantage, the tyrannical 

 proceedings for which the Dutch have been so much reproached, 

 had pretended that the colonists neglected too much the culti- 

 vation of these trees, and in consequence had ordered all the 

 single trees dispersed over their estates to be removed to a dis- 

 tant and solitary place, where, in the king''s name, he assumed 

 monopoly of them to himself. So absurd a command had in- 

 censed the proprietors to such a degree, that the greater num- 

 ber had chosen rather to destroy their trees than to give them 

 up. But at length the governor was become master of all that 

 remained. He guarded them like the dragon of the Hesperides, 

 and M. Richard, who had been sent by the King of France into 

 a French colony, for the express purpose of propagating clove- 

 trees, and distributing them through our other islands, could 

 not even get near the place where they were confined. He was 

 obliged, in order to get some seeds of them, to do at Cayenne 

 as Poivre and Sonnerat had done in the Moluccas ; and it cost 



