340 THE GBUI8E OF THE 'GUEAQOA: 



foreheads just below the liorns, a better plan, says M. 

 Boiitan, than yoking them vi\> when it was not for any 

 length of time, as in long continuous work. The oxen, 

 liowever, were resting a little and panting away as if they 

 did not find it very easy work. The land seemed pretty 

 stifl, with a clay subsoil. 



The garden and plantation part is a good-sized piece of 

 ground, very level, but on a slight incline. On the edge of 

 it, looking towards Port-de-France, there is a deep gully, 

 down which some time ago, during the rains, the water had 

 descended like a mountain torrent, as it really was, entirely 

 overflowing the ground in that place, washing a good deal 

 of soil and vegetation away, and covering tlie land with 

 stones. This has been all rearranged, and in order to 

 prevent, if possible, a similar occurrence, a bank has been 

 thrown up along the side of the gully. 



M. Boutan showed us some coffee trees which had not 

 been planted more than eighteen months or two years, that 

 were covered with an amount of bloom which Mr. Veitch 

 said he had never seen equalled in any other place. I was 

 told that the coffee berry was very fine, and that the soil 

 and climate were well adapted for the cultivation of coffee. 

 Everything appeared to flourish in the garden ; vegetables 

 of many kinds showed vigorous growth, and some 

 European friut trees that had been planted there, also 

 looked as if they Avonld do well. The Government 

 allows the Director only 9,000 francs a year for the farm, 

 of which he has to return to the Government between 3,000 



