The Berbice River : and an Analysis of some of 
its Soi/s.* 
By the Hon. B. Howell Jones. 
JO much has been written about the Berbice 
River and descriptions of the scenery along its 
banks that it may appear superfluous and con- 
ceited on my part to attempt to give any further informa- 
tion about a river which I have visited only once, and 
that for the short space of only one week ; but anyone, 
I venture to think, who has visited that district cannot 
but wonder why such a beautiful river of the colony has 
not become more thickly populated and the land brought 
under cultivation, and it is only by making a careful ex- 
amination of its soils that this to some extent becomes 
apparent. I am not now speaking of that portion of the 
river adjacent to its mouth on which are situated the fine 
sugar-estates of Providence, Highbury, Friends, Mara, 
and Ma Retrait, but of that section lying between the 
old Dutch town of Fort Nassau and the Etoony downs. 
At the first named place a stranger notices the banks 
of the river rising a few feet from the level of the water ; 
and, on landing, a sharp rise brings you to the remains 
of this once fine settlement, now a mass of crumbling 
brick work, overgrown with bush and creepers, and it is 
curious to see the lianas which have forced their way 
through the crevices of the brick work, enclosing some 
of the bricks in their embrace, still retaining their hold, 
* This paper was read at the meeting of the Society held on the 12th 
June, 1884. 
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