78 TIMEHRI. 
low hills and their intervening creeks, and as the placers 
are neared the hills become slightly higher and steeper, 
and large boulders of white sugary quartz are met with 
on every hill top, while the forest on all sides is rich in . 
large trees, principally Greenheart and Mora. . 
The camps are not so large, nor in most cases so well 
found, as in the Potaro and Conawarook, though I had 
the good fortune to stop chiefly at the best of all of 
them—owned by Messrs. D’AGUIAR and DUARTE, where 
a nicely shingled logie with such comforts as a table and 
benches were placed at my disposal. At one camp an 
effort, which has been partially successful, has been 
made to grow vegetable produce, and many a bunch of 
plantains and basket of tannias have rewarded the enter- 
prising manager who planted them. . 
Most of the managers however, look at the subjeét of 
planting the land near them with too selfish an eye, for 
they say their positions are not certain, and the land 
located is small, or likely to cease to pay before any 
return can be gathered from the plants, and then follows 
usually a comparison of the far superior manner in which 
the same subjeét is treated in Cayenne or Surinam, 
where immense tra€ts are licensed for gold mining, of 
which there is no fear of exhaus ion for many years. 
But a direét question put to them as to their preference 
for gold mining in the three Guianas, is always an- 
swered in favour of this Colony, where they say every- 
one, even a poor man, has a chance of finding and 
working some good claim, It is to be hoped that the 
amalgamation of claims, which is feasible under the 
existing law, may satisfa€torily dispose of the objeétion 
as to the small area of land held by different indi- 
