CULTURE OF WHEAT WITHIN THE TROPICS. 
115 
shells, with the exception of some curious sand composed of round or oval 
particles (a specimen of which I take this opportunity of sending to you). 
We suffer much in certain seasons from the want of rain. In the months 
of May and September it falls in torrents, washing the soil from all slopes 
and declivities, and thus doing much injury: but after the rains cease, the 
stratum of soil is so thin , and so little retentive of moisture, that it very shortly 
dries down to the very rocks, destroying almost every thing which cannot do 
without moisture, or which has not strength enough to send its roots downwards 
into the cracks and fissures of the rocks. We have no rivers or ponds of any 
description: all our water being obtained from wells. Artificial watering is, 
therefore, out of the question, except in very small gardens. From what I have 
stated, I think you will see that we are not very likely to do much in the 
agricultural way. The ground is so rocky that no where could a plough, or even 
a spade, be used : the hoe is the only instrument of which we can avail ourselves.” 
Mr. Lees' next letter, of the date of the 30th of June, 1837, after an interval 
of nearly twelve months, contains a less favourable account, but one for which 
we might, in some degree, be prepared by the facts communicated in his preceding 
letter. From this we learn that 44 Mr. Stork planted last January a quarter of 
an acre of Victoria Wheat for experiment, and promised to keep a journal of the 
various points of information you wish to obtain: but the small birds, of which 
there are great numbers here, ate every grain of the Wheat, which was bearing 
abundantly Thus the plague of the birds, as destructive for the farmer as the 
plague of Locusts in Egypt, deprived Mr. Storr of his anticipated harvest, and 
robbed us of the valuable results of his labours. This, however, was a failure 
in the production of which climate had no share, and which might have been 
equally the result of the same cause in the temperate fields of England, did not 
the English farmer, warned by repeated experience, know how to guard effectually 
against it. But in a gentleman of the name of Butler —an individual of con¬ 
siderable property and influence, united to a competent share of agricultural 
knowledge—Mr. Lees was fortunate enough to meet a more successful coadjutor, 
from whom he received the following favourable account of the Wheat; the 
more valuable from the insertion of precise dates, enabling us to follow his 
experiment through all its various stages :—• 
“ My dear Sir,—Annexed you have the result of my first trial of the Victoria 
Wheat. I think it will yield a very large return annually, and is well worth 
our attention in the Bahamas. My object is to introduce it to the planters at 
Rum-Key (about lat. 23° 37' N.): the success in that quarter I will hereafter 
communicate, and remain, &c., 
44 Hon. J. C. Lees. 
( Signed) 
Robert Butler/' 
