sion of the most beautiful plants and creepers. In
some parts of the country there are thriving towns, with good streets,
elegant shops, and fine houses, such as there are in London.

[Illustration]

From the West Indies, specimens of industry have also come. Rice,
fruits, sugar, metals, and plants, are among the contributions.

The West Indians send us sugar rice, currants, raisins, cloves,
nutmegs, cinnamon, allspice, and mace, for puddings; nice nuts, for
our little boys and girls; coffee, cocoa, and chocolate, for our
breakfast and tea; and fine silk, and cotton, for our dresses.

Under the name of the West Indies, there are many countries:--Cuba,
Jamaica, Hayti, Porto Rico, Barbadoes, and others. In Cuba, are found
mines of gold, copper, and different other metals; there is a quantity
of sugar grown there; and the tobacco is finer than that of most other
islands. The trees are principally ebony, cedar, and mahogany, which
are hewed down, and sent to foreign countries, to be made into
furniture of various sorts. Cedar wood is also used to scent clothes
and papers, on account of its sweet perfume. The Cubans are fond of
bull-fighting, and of cock-fighting, I am sorry to say. Balls and
parties are also a favourite and more innocent amusement.

In Jamaica, the principal exercise of industry is in growing sugar,
indigo, coffee, and ginger. These are cultivated in what are called
plantations, which are attended to by negroes, who used to be slaves,
and used to be lashed on to work unnaturally hard with whips; but they
are now free in all the British colonies, as I hope they will be every
where, long before any of my little friends, who read this book, may
die. For not only were men and women kept in a state of slavery, but
all their dear innocent little children, both little boys and little
girls were treated as slaves.

The bread-fruit tree is one of the most useful productions of the
country, it not only supplies food, but other necessaries. Of the
inner bark is formed a kind of cloth; the wood, which is soft, smooth,
and of a yellowish colour, serves for the building of boats and
houses; the leaves are used for wrapping up food; some parts of the
flowers are good tinder; and the juice, when boiled with cocoa-nut
oil, is employed for making bird-lime, and as a cement for mending
earthenware vessels. So you may guess how useful it is to the people
of Jamaica, and yet it is not a native of the West Indies, but was