Gold in British Guiana. 299 
ginning of a new era of prosperity of a kind hitherto un- 
known in the country. Science, as we all know, must 
claim its martyrs; and modern progress, even in the 
peaceful arts, is somewhat of a Juggernauth car, else we 
should scarcely find the boon of cheap bread — so benefi- 
cent a blessing to the poor of Europe — causing the 
patrician West Indian to weep for the cheapness of 
sugar. There was a time when the Continental farmers 
found wheat no longer profitable, but they did not bewail 
fate or traduce the American producers who caused the 
drop in prices ; they set themselves to establish a new 
industry, and if their success has operated prejudicially 
towards us we have at least similar resources open to us. 
It may be asked whence is the labour to be derived 
to effect so desirable an end ? When we find the West 
Indian newspapers of the day advocating the wholesale 
emigration of the African population from the Islands 
as the readiest means of bestirring themselves, it is clear 
I think, that the labour question may safely be left to 
take care of itself. A recent issue of the Bulletin says : — 
" Every day the conviction deepens that the best thing 
for Barbados and the best thing for themselves is for 
large numbers of people to emigrate to the Congo or to 
British Honduras, or anywhere they can improve their 
condition and rise in the world." With regard to the 
recent proposal to establish an Agricultural College in 
this Colony, which has been so decidedly negatived in 
some quarters, no more unjust or unmerited aspersion has 
ever been cast upon a class than that which represents 
our Creoles as too lazy and indifferent to avail themselves 
of the benefits of such an institution. At times innume- 
rable, when paying large sums to gold labourers, I have 
