IN THE WEST INDIES 405 



capital and labour wages. We send out a lot of Governors, 

 not one in ten of whom knows anything of tropical products 

 or can promote old or new industries. 



We have incurred a gigantic obligation in having to rule, 

 educate, police, and provide sanitary and medical aid for 

 the poor of a huge population for which there is no labour 

 provided ! 



The fact is, if we do not expend largely and soon, some of 

 the islands will lapse into the state of Hayti and St. Domingo. 



* 

 To Bev. J. D. La Touche 



March 2, 1898. 



England has brought this about, and England must pay 

 to set the matter right — not by bounties or duties, but by 

 advancing money, some to clear off large standing loans, some 

 for promoting new industries — the latter chiefly in the way 

 of establishing Gardens for new profitable vegetable products 

 — and some loans to encourage capital. 



Jamaica has prospered ever since, under the stimulus 

 of good Governors, she encouraged new industries. Thirty 

 years ago, sugar formed something like f of her wealth, it is 

 now I believe nearer £, and instead of a chronic debt she has 

 an annual surplus, and is making roads, railroads, &c, &c, &c. 



Sir J. P. Grant and Sir A. Musgrave were the chief instru- 

 ments, and the abuse they got from the sugar planters was 

 scathing. That this danger of a relapse of some of the Islands 

 into black barbarism is a reality cannot be disputed, it is a 

 terror to the whites of some of them. 



Yet great progress had already been made in organising 

 West Indian industries. 



To Dr. Fawcett 1 



April 1, 1897. 

 It astonishes me to read of the extension of your useful 

 work in agriculture, botany and horticulture, since my old 



1 William Fawcett (1851), B.Sc. Lond., F.L.S. to 1916. He was assist- 

 ant in the Botanical Department at the Natural History Museum 1880-86, 

 when he became Director of the Public Gardens and Plantations in Jamaica. 

 He held various positions in the Jamaica Institute, 1887-1907, and retired in 

 1908. He has contributed several papers to the Bulletin of the Botanical 

 Department, Jamaica, and in addition to a Guide to the Gardens, has published 

 on the Flora, Woods and Forests, and Economic Plants of Jamaica. 





