AGRICULTURE IN 1820. 251 
the superior congeniality of food and climate. There 
is no doubt that by proper establishments the whole 
of the British Navy on the West India Station might be 
supplied with a better and cheaper description of dried 
or smoked beef than from any other part of the continent 
or islands. The Port of Demerara ought indeed to be 
the Grand Depét for provisions and fuel for the Navy in 
these seas. It moreover enumerates more than 50 differ- 
ent kinds of hardwood of the most superior quality, of 
which several, for size and durability, are the best calcu- 
lated for the construction and repairs of Ships of War, as 
a proof of which the strength and durability of the 
different species of colony craft may serve as a specimen. 
It is extraordinary, that with all these advantages 
of local circumstances, the Mother Country has never yet 
suspected that she was in possession of a colony, that 
under every circumstance would enable her to keep her 
Navy without intermission on a West India Station. The 
French and Dutch have been long aware of this, but the 
former have kept the knowledge to themselves from 
* and the latter when possessors, from that 
cautious system, that prevented them from showing all 
its advantages lest they might tempt the aggression of 
stronger powers. Accordingly, from the first we have 
little more information than what relates to botany, birds 
and butterflies, and from the latter nothing but accounts 
of agues, fevers and bush negroes. The English them- 
selves have been so long exclusively occupied with their 
mercantile concerns, that after a possession of nearly 20 
years, the legislature at home, or many of them, still call 
* Omission in MS. 
KK 
