VISIT TO PAMPLEMOUSSES. 35 



leave the Isle of JVance without performing" a 

 pilgrimag-e to Pamplemousses, a pretty ^"illag•e 

 seven miles distant, near which are the (so called) 

 tombs of Paul and Virginia, and the Botanic Gar- 

 dens. For this purpose, — as we sail the da}^ after 

 to-morrow, I started at daylight. The road, even 

 at this early hour, was crowded with people — 

 Coolies, Chinamen, Negroes, and others, bringing in 

 their produce to market, while every now and then 

 a carriage passed by filled with well-dressed Creoles 

 enjoying" the coolness of the morning air, or bent 

 upon making" a holiday of it, for the day was 

 Sunday. I breakfasted in one of the numerous 

 cabarets by the roadside, dignified with the name of 

 ^' Hotel de — , &c." Numerous small streams crossed 

 the road, and the country, so far as seen, exhibited 

 a refreshing greenness and richness of veg'etation. 



" Les Tombeaux " are situated in a garden 

 surrounded by trees, and a grove of coffee plants, 

 behind the residence of a g"entleman who must 

 be heartily sick of being so constantly disturbed by 

 strang"er3. They exhibit nothing" more remarkable 

 than two dilapidated monumental urns on opposite 

 sides of the garden, shaded by a clump of bamboos 

 and casuarinas, the latter usually mistaken for 

 cypresses. In the coffee plantation close bjr, I was 

 delighted to find great numbers of a large and 

 handsome land shell, Achitina pantherina, — it bur- 

 rows in the earth during dry weather, but some rain 



D 2 



Digitized by Microsoft® 



