AFRICAN ISLANDS, 21 1 



pepper, ebony, palm, and other kinds of wood and fruit-trees. Many 

 of the trees yield odoriferous gums and resins, particularly benzoin 

 of an excellent sort, in great plenty. The rivers are well stocked 

 with fish, the coast with land and sea tortoises, and every part of the 

 country with horned catile, as well as hogs and goats. Ambergrise, 

 coral, and the most beautiful shells, are found upon the shore. The 

 woods are full of turtle-doves, paroquets, pigeons, and a great variety 

 of other birds, beautiful to the eye, and pleasant to the palate. The 

 French first settled here in the year 1672, after they were driven from 

 the island of Madagascar. They have now some considerable towns 

 in the island, with a governor. Since the revolution they have given 

 it the name of Reunion. 



There are a great many more small islands about Madagascar and 

 on the eastern coast of Africa, laid down in maps, but no where des- 

 cribed. 



Leaving therefore the eastern world and the Indies, we now turn 

 round the Cape of Good Hope, which opens to our view the Atlantic, 

 an immense ocean lying between the two grand divisions of the globe, 

 having Europe, Asia, and Africa, or the old world, on the east ; and 

 America, or the new world, on the west ; towards which division we 

 now steer our course, touching in our way at the following islands 

 upon the African coast, that have not yet been described, viz St. 

 Helena, Ascension, St. Matthew, St. Thomas, Ecc. Goree, Cape Verd, 

 the Canary and Madeira Islands. 



St. HELENA. The first Island on this side the Cape is St. Helena, 

 situate in west long. 5° 49' south lat. 15° 55', being 1200 miles west of 

 the continent of Africa, and 1800 east of South America. The island 

 is a rock, about twenty-one miles in circumference, very high and very 

 steep, and only accessible at the landing place, in a small valley at the 

 east end of it, which is defended by batteries of guns planted level 

 with the water; and as the waves are perpetually dashing on the 

 shore, it is generally difficult landing even there. There is no other 

 anchorage about the island but at Chapel Valley Bay ; and as the 

 wind always blows from the south-east, if a ship overshoots the island 

 ever so little, she cannot recover it again. The English plantations 

 here afford potatoes and yams, with figs, plantains, bananas, grapes, 

 kidney-beans, and Indian-corn : of the last, however, most part is 

 devoured by rats, which harbour in the rocks, and cannot be destroy- 

 ed ; so that the flour they use, is almost wholly imported from Eng- 

 land ; and in times of scarcity they generally eat yams and potatoes 

 instead of bread. Though the island appears on every side a hard 

 barren rock, yet it is agreeably diversified with hills and plains, 

 adorned with plantations of fruit trees and garden vegetables. They 

 have great plenty of hogs, bullocks, poultry, ducks, gec.se, and tur- 

 keys, with which they supply the sailors, taking in exchange shirts, 

 drawers, or any light cloths, pieces of calico, silks, muslin, arrack, 

 sugar, &c. 



St. Helena is said to have been first discovered by the Portuguese 

 in 1502, on the festival of the empress Helena, mother of the emperor 

 Constantine the Great, whose name it still bears. It does not appear 

 that the Portuguese ever planted a colony here : and the English 

 East India company took possession of it in 1600, and held it with- 

 out interruption till the year 1673, when the Dutch took it by sur- 

 prise. However, the English, under the command of captain Munden, 

 recovered it again within the space of a year, and at the same time 



