EEUNION. 



49 



standing its fertility, the soil no longer vields sufficient corn, vegetables, or fruits 

 for the local demand. Consequently these provisions, as well as cattle and other 

 live stock, have now to be imported, chiefly from Madagascar, and rice for the 

 coolies from Bengal. The extension of the plantations, owned by a few great 

 proprietors, has also had the effect of driving the old settlers from their small 

 holdings, which can no longer be worked profitably, and compelling them to swell 

 the number of idle hands in the large towns. The great landowners have thus 



Fig. 15.— The Three Cirques. 

 Scale 1 : 260,000. 



W^...^^:J. à ieWtV <^ ^. ,.u\..^ ^„ .Ah^'^-^. 



3 Miles. 



gradually absorbed everything except a few ilettes or isolated plots in the upland 

 valleys. 



The competition of European wares has hitherto prevented the development of 

 any local manufacturing industries. No attempt has even been made to utilise 

 the inexhaustible deposits of titanic iron thrown up by the waves on the beach at 

 St. Leu, although these sands contain a mean proportion of over fifty per cent, 

 of pure metal. Keunion has a small commercial fleet, but nearly all the foreign 



4-0 



