804 



WEST INDIES. 



hardware and cutlery, leather, tobacco, ma- 

 chinery, and a general assortment in small lots 

 of various other manufactures. 



Danish. (For details relating to area and 

 population, see "Annual Cyclopaedia" for 1883.) 

 The Governor of the colonies is Col. C. Aren- 

 drup. The American Consul at St. Thomas is 

 V. V. Smith. 



Ste. Croix, commonly called Santa Cruz, 

 celebrated, on Sept. 6, 1884, the one hundred 

 and fiftieth anniversary of its union with the 

 Danish kingdom. 



St. Thomas is now a mere port of call for 

 vessels repairing and awaiting orders by cable. 

 From being an entrepot, distributing many 

 millions of goods annually, it has sunk to a 

 position of comparatively little commercial 

 importance. Still, the chief lines of steamers 

 call there. 



American trade has remained comparatively 

 important; on the one hand, because the sugar 

 produced on the island of Ste. Croix is very 

 much liked in the United States, and, on the 

 other, because the revictualing- vessels and 

 neighboring islands are glad to buy American 

 flour and provisions at this central point of dis- 

 tribution. Latterly, however, even American 

 trade is on the wane in the locality, as the 

 following few figures of American exports to 

 the Danish West Indies will show : 



YEAR. 



1879 $886,857 



1880 689,104 



1881 721,128 



YEAR. 



1882 $716.591 



1883 694,565 



1884 578,997 



Dutch. (For details relating to area and pop- 

 ulation, see " Annual Cyclopaedia " for 1883.) 

 The Governor of Curacoa is N. van den Brand- 

 hof. The American Consul at Curacoa is Al- 

 mont Barnes, and at St. Martin's, D. 0. von Ro- 

 mondt. Curagoa, being close to the northern 

 coast of Venezuela and a free port, has, since 

 the independence of the Colombian republics, 

 been an important entrepot for merchandise 

 from Europe and the United States. Latterly, 

 however, Venezuela has begun to discriminate 

 against such importation in tramitu, and Cura- 

 oa has experienced somewhat the fate of St. 

 Thomas. The island has been a tborn in the 

 side of Venezuela as much as Trinidad. While 

 the South American republic was being chroni- 

 cally convulsed with civil strife for thirty-five 

 years, most of the " pronunciamientos " and 

 expeditions against the men that chanced to 

 be in power were launched from there. Since 

 Venezuela has passed the era of revolutions, 

 Curacoa has even lost this importance. 



The recent American trade with the Dutch 

 West Indies is shown in the following table: 



Freneb. (For details relating to area and 



Population, see "Annual Cyclopaedia" for 

 883.) The Governor of Martinique is M. 

 Allegre ; the Governor of Guadeloupe and de- 

 pendencies is M. Laugier. The annual expend- 

 iture of Martinique is 4,593,000 francs, and 

 that of Guadeloupe 5,112,000. 



On August 17, 1884, M. Deschanel, editor of 

 the Paris " Journal des Debats," began an agi- 

 tation, under the prompting of Prime-Minister 

 Ferry, for the cession to France by England of 

 the Leeward Islands, in exchange for French 

 concessions on the coast of Newfoundland. M. 

 Deschanel, in a lecture before the Academy of 

 Moral and Political Sciences, advocated the 

 acquisition of the Leeward Islands as a part of 

 the prospective French line via Panama, Ta- 

 hiti, and Australasia. 



Martinique. This island, in common with 

 all other sugar-producing countries, lias suf- 

 fered severely from the low prices ruling in 

 Europe and this country. Following a hint 

 thrown out by the home Government, the Con- 

 sul-General of Martinique, early in July, 1884, 

 passed a bill abolishing the so-called " octroi 

 de mer" decreed under the Second Empire, 

 and in its place re-establishing discriminating 

 duties in favor of goods from France. It was 

 a deliberate return to the old colonial system 

 at a time when even Spain began to abandon 

 it. Under the provisions of the "octroi de 

 mer " duty, important and rapidly increasing 

 business relations had sprung up between Mar- 

 tinique, the United States, and Canada. While 

 Martinique imported thence provisions and 

 other articles of food a great deal cheaper 

 than France could furnish them, the United 

 States and Canada in return drew from Mar- 

 tinique large amounts of sugar, and the Ameri- 

 can market in particular gradually became the 

 most favorable market to sell the sugar in, be- 

 cause American consumers began to appreci- 

 ate the superior quality of Martinique sugar. 



Meanwhile the French Chambers did their 

 best to indemnify the colonial population for 

 the sacrifice, and in return passed a bill favor- 

 ing French colonial sugar by a " detaxe," c 

 bounty, of 5 francs the 100 kilogrammes on it 

 being imported into the mother-country. 



In 1859 sugar production in Martinique sud- 

 denly rose to 29,706 tons; in 1882 it reached 

 47,888 tons. The smalmess of the island h( 

 indeed been the only obstacle to sugar-plant- 

 ing expanding still further. Two thirds of th< 

 production consist of white granulated, while 

 the product of 1859 was common muscovado 

 sugar. Coffee production has almost ceased. 

 In 1880 only nine tons left the island. 



Guadeloupe. As early as May, the Council- 

 General of Guadeloupe informed the sub-Sec- 

 retary of State at Paris, M. Felix Faure, that 

 the "octroi de mer" was abolished, and that 

 a duty would thenceforward be levied on for- 

 eign merchandise imported. The "octroi de 

 mer," which treated all merchandise on the 

 same footing, whether French or foreign, had 

 been in operation since the spring of 1870 > and 



