PHYSICAL GEOGRAPHY. 



[PART I. 



with verdure, and sheltered from the sunbeams by the 

 cool shadows of the palm groves. 



SOIL. But the soil, notwithstanding its wonderful 

 display of spontaneous vegetation, is not responsive to 

 systematic cultivation, and is but imperfectly adapted 

 for maturing a constant succession of seeds and cereal 

 crops. 1 Hence arose the disappointment which beset 

 the earliest adventurers who opened plantations of 

 coffee in the hills, on discovering that after the first 

 rapid development of the plants, delicacy and languor 

 ensued, and that these were only to be corrected by re- 

 turning to the earth, in the form of manures, those elements 

 with which it had originally been but sparingly supplied, 

 and which were exhausted by the first experiments in 

 cultivation. 



Patenas. The only spots hitherto found suitable for 

 planting coffee, are those covered by the ancient forests 

 of the mountain zone ; and one of the most remarkable 

 phenomena in the ceconomic history of the island, is the 

 fact that the grass lands on the same hills, closely ad- 

 joining the forests and separated from them by no 

 visible line save the growth of the trees, although they 

 seem to be identical in the nature of the soil, have 

 hitherto proved to be utterly insusceptible of reclama- 

 tion or culture by the coffee planter. 2 These verdant 

 openings, to which the natives have given the name of 

 patenas, generally occur about the middle elevation of 

 the hills, the summits and the hollows being covered 

 with the customary growth of timber trees, which also 

 fringe the edges of the mountain streams that trickle 

 down these park-like openings. The forest approaches 

 boldly to the very edge of a " patena," not disappearing 



1 See a paper in the Journal of 

 Agriculture, for March, 1857, Edin. : 

 on Tropical Cultivation and its Limits, 

 by Dr. MACVICAB. 



2 Since the above was written, 

 attempts have been made, chiefly by 

 natives, to plant coffee on patena land. 



The result is a conviction that the 

 cultivation is practicable, by the use 

 of manures from the beginning ; 

 whereas forest land is capable, for 

 three or four years at least, of yield- 

 ing coffee without any artificial en- 

 richment of the soil. 



