842 



TRINIDAD: THFN AND NOW. 



Livingbird, who had been on the Pandora when she 

 was wrecked in the second Bocas. We had selected 

 a few of her sailors for service in the Police Force, 

 and Livingbird was attached to the detective depart- 

 ment where he proved himself to be intelligent and 

 useful. Being an old sailor he was able to mix freely 

 with the sailors of the Solent, which when we got to 

 Barbados went on to Demerara. While on his way 

 to Barbados, which in those days took three nights 

 and two days, he satisfied himself that the sailors had 

 no opportunity of tampering with the mails ; so when 

 we got to Barbados I continued on to St. Kitts and 

 then passed over to Nevis. 



A rumour of this state of things had reached 

 the neighbouring colonies and numerous were the 

 complaints received from them of money having been 

 abstracted from letters. On the last occasion when on 

 my way to Nevis I called on Mr. Trimmingham, the 

 Postmaster-General of Barbados to talk over matters 

 with him, as frequent complaints were also made by 

 his department. While in his office one of his clerks 

 brought in a slip on which a complaint was made 

 about a letter containing $10 being missing, the per- 

 son who was to receive the money having been noti- 

 fied by another letter that it was sent. " Where 

 were these letters posted/' I asked. " At Arouca 99 

 was the reply. Now I happened to know the post- 

 master at Arouca to be not only a careful but also an 

 honest man, and I told Mr. Trimmingham so. "Well, 

 there is the fact " he said, " you can't get over that." 

 " No," I replied, " if it is a fact, but as I am here 



