HOW DEMERARA SUGAR LEAVES HOME 53 



going back for a fresh load of sugar, set up a rough 

 mast, and rig it with a patchwork sail made of empty 

 sugar-bags. The Demerara River is the highway for 

 a motley collection of strange-looking boats — Indian 

 canoes, corials and woodskins ; timber-rafts, equipped 

 with romantic-looking, palm-thatched camps, which 

 persuade you at a glance that they are manned by 

 relatives of Robinson Crusoe. But amidst all the 

 quaint shipping, most striking are the punts under 

 sugar-bag canvas ; they look like a cross between a 

 Norfolk wherry and a Chinese junk. 



On arrival at Georgetown, the sugar-bags are dis- 

 charged in mid-stream into small boats, which transfer 

 them to the warehouses or straight to out-going 

 steamers ; or the lighters and punts bring them directly 

 alongside the wharves. 



It often happens that whilst sugar-bags are being 

 unloaded at one side of a wharf, there is a big, ocean- 

 going steamer lying at the front thereof, taking aboard 

 a large consignment of Demerara crystals for transport 

 to one of the world's leading markets. Since this is 

 the time above all others to see life in full swing on a 

 Demerara wharf, I am going to take you to one of the 

 largest of the Georgetown wharves, in the height of 

 the sugar-transport season, on a day when it is the 

 centre of both unloading and loading activities. 



A large proportion of Demerara sugar leaves home 

 on board the fleet of the Royal Mail Steam Packet 

 Company and Direct Line Joint Cargo Service. These 

 boats discharge a mixed cargo of imports, and take in 

 place an export load of sugar, at three of the busiest 

 among the many busy wharves in Georgetown, each 

 steamer belonging to this fleet being berthed at which- 



