GENERAL DESCRIPTION OF THE ISLAND. 27 
form a settlement after a visit paid by Almeida, 
envoy to India, in 1506 ; and a French colony 
was established as early as 1642, in the province 
of Anosy, in the south-east. An English settle¬ 
ment was made also on the west coast, which 
was named St Augustine, in the same year ; but 
these essays in colonisation were imperfect in 
organisation, and consequently only temporary 
in their results. The numerous harbours and 
islets offered refuge to the bands of pirates and 
slave-hunters which infested the Mozambique 
Channel; and on more than one occasion the 
west coast was, as early as the seventeenth cen¬ 
tury, the scene of conflicts between the combined 
forces of European men-of-war and these despera¬ 
does. It is sad to think that, after all the sacrifice 
of life and money which has been freely made by 
this country for this particular service, it is not 
possible even now to record the complete abolition 
of the desolating and foul trade in human beings, 
which clings like a curse to the African shores. 
From time to time attempts have been 
made, chiefly by France, to plant European 
colonies in Madagascar; but so far they have 
only met with disaster and disappointment. 
From Cape Amber in the north, to Cape St 
Mary at the extreme south, the length of the 
island is nearly 950 miles, and it measures in 
its broadest part about 350 miles, with an area 
