CHAP. XII. THE WEEPING PLACE OF TIIE HOVAS. 313 



they were collected from more remote provinces, and sold 

 to factors or dealers, who resorted thither for the purpose 

 of purchasing and conducting them to the coast. It was 

 at this place that the manacled and goaded slave, forced from 

 home and country, and all that makes life dear, obtained 

 his first view of the sea, across which he was to be carried 

 to a land of unknown hardships, misery, and death ; and 

 when he reached this spot, his eye had rested also, for the 

 last time, on the lofty summits of the mountains of his be- 

 loved Imerina. We do not wonder at such a spot being 

 called " The Weeping-place of the Hovas." The treaty for 

 the abolition of the trade in slaves, formed in 1817, was 

 faithfully observed by Eadama, who even put some of his 

 own relatives to death for not regarding it ; but it was vio- 

 lated, during the absence of Sir E. Farquhar on a visit to 

 England, by General Hall, who was acting governor at Mau- 

 ritius at the time, and restored the traffic in slaves. In 

 1820, when the British agent who was sent to renew the 

 treaty, and the missionary, were on their way to the ca- 

 pital, and just on the outskirts of the great forest before us, 

 they met about a thousand slaves going from Imerina to 

 the coast, each one chained by a ring of heavy iron round 

 the wrist, and bearing a heavy burden. 



As we continued our journey, the vegetation of the country 

 around us became entirely changed. The rofia palm was 

 no longer seen. The travellers' tree was stunted and scarce ; 

 but the base of the hills and the valleys were covered with 

 the bamboo, which was far more abundant than during any 

 former part of the journey. There were at least four distinct 

 varieties : one a large growing kind, erect nearly to the point ; 

 a second smaller, seldom rising much above twenty feet in 

 height, bushy at the base, and gracefully bending down its 

 tapering point. A third kind rose in single cane, almost 

 without a leaf, to the height of thirty feet or more ; or, bending 



