Il IIIIIIIIWIIIIII 



CHAPTER III. 



DUTCH GUIANA. 



HE Dutcli, who were the first settlers in British Guiana, laid the 

 foundations of the prosperity of that colony to the benefit of their 

 English rivals. What they have preserved of their old posses- 

 sions is of far less value than what they have lost. Surinam, as 

 ^ they call their present colony of Guiana, has scarcely one-sixth of 

 the population grouped . round Deraerara, in the British possessions, while its 

 trade hardly amounts to one-fifth of the commercial transactions carried on by the 

 neighbouring colony. 



The economic crisis following the abolition of slavery in 1863 involved 

 numerous plantations in utter ruin, and vast stretches of cultivated land reverted 

 to the solitude of the savannas and woodlands. The population even decreased 

 by emigration, and several years of decadence elapsed before the first symptoms 

 of a slow revival became manifest. At present the population is on the increase, 

 though this is due to the arrival of a few Indian coolies. The planters are 

 gradually resuming possession of the land, but are for the most part devoting 

 their attention to economic plants different from those cultivated by their 

 predecessors. 



As in British Guiana, the inhabited and cultivated zone forms but a small 

 part of the whole territory. It comprises the coastlands between the outer belt of 

 bush and mangrove swamps and the inland savannas. But even in this 

 cultivated zone there are numerous gaps occupied by scrubby and marshy tracts. 



NiCKEUlE GrOKINGEN. 



Nickerie, the westernmost district, lying east of the Corentyne and its estuary, 

 is but thinly settled, and the population is still very slight. At the beginning 

 of the nineteenth century some planters and traders established a colony at the 

 headland close to the confluence of the Corentyne with the River Nickerie on 

 the right bank of the estuary. The site seemed favourable, and the settlement 

 increased rapidly. But in less than two generations the very ground on wbich the 

 quays and buildings had been erected was swept away by the Atlantic waves 



