9 



Jjooking at a map of Reunion, a stranger is immediately struck by 

 the number of rivers indicated, and naturally concludes it to be a well- 

 watered land. But as a fact nine-tenths of the rivers and streams 

 marked are merely dry watercourses which run only for a few hours 

 after heavy rains. A closer examination of the lower deposits shows 

 that many of these mountain torrents were formerly slow-moving 

 rivers. Had not Government stepped in with a very strict forest law, 

 and liberally restocked the forests where necessary, the Island of Re- 

 union would in course of a hundred years or so have been as barren as 

 the rocks of Aden, or the denuded deserts of Abyssinia. It takes, how- 

 ever, only a few minutes to cut a tree down, but many years to bring a 

 new one to perfection, and the mischief done will take very long to 

 repair. Thus, in the meanwhile, considerable tracts of land have gone 

 out of cultivation, and must perforce lie fallow for long periods. The 

 mischief is arrested, but far from completely stopped. The forest laws 

 apply in only a very limited way to private lands, and with rare excep- 

 tions very few private landowners do much replanting, except for fuel 

 purposes, whilst the smaller owners, who live from hand to mouth, seek 

 only how to make the most ready-money possible out of their forests, 

 and think not of the future or the result to their own and their neigh- 

 bours' lands. As a matter of fact, forest clearing, and especially on 

 steep slopes, is even now carried on in far too reckless a manner. 



There still remains, however, plenty of land fit for cultivation 

 besides the sugar belt running round the island, and up to about 1,500 

 feet on the slopes. 



The upland plains of Salazie, Pilaos, Plaine des Cafres, Plaine des 

 Chicots, and Dos d'Aae, amongst others situated at from 3,000 to 5,000 

 feet are all cultivable, and, except the Plaine des Chicots, more or less 

 cultivated, but from 5,000 feet upwards the soil is practically non-exis- 

 tent, and cultivation is impossible. 



The Reunion sugar culture has been fully explained in my report 

 above referred to, and calls for no further remarks, except to observe that 

 the fall in the price of sugar and the beet competition have been felt almost 

 as accutely in Reunion, in spite of protection, as in the British West 

 India colonies. A distinction, however, must be drawn between plan- 

 ters and millowners. In spite of hard times millowners have been able 

 to offer to planters prices tor canes brought to the mill to be crushed 

 which have given fair profit to the planter. The better the mill, the 

 better the sugar product, and, therefore, if the planter elects to be paid 

 in sugar, the bigger profit for the planter who chooses the best mill 

 availabJe. It is the millowner who has chiefly felt thd pinch. Cen- 

 tralisation of mills has long been recommended, and under given cir- 

 cumstances works well. Decentralisation, i.e., division of labour, would, 

 perhaps, work better, the millowner sticking to his trade as miller, and 

 the planter to his as planter, mutual contracts existing between mill- 

 owner angl planter as to lands to be cultivated and the labour to be 

 supplied on more or less the lines of the Queensland Sugar Acts. 



But Reunion would be in a far worse plight to-day than she 

 actually is if she had depended entirely upon sugar. It is hardly too 

 much to say that her planters, or many of them, have been saved from 



