d, extending to a distance in every direction from the trunk
sixty or eighty feet. Indeed, the gigantic size of the tree, its rich
and luxuriant foliage, and its noble and majestic appearance, were
in perfect keeping with the place. I tarried some time beneath its
branches, and gazed with interest on the picturesque scene, regretting
that I had no companion to share my admiration, and thinking that as
doubtless no human being, unless some wild Carib in days of yore, had
ever previously visited that singular spot, so it was likely centuries
would pass away before any other individual would chance to behold and
admire that beautiful terrace on the mountain side. I then plunged among
the trees and vines growing upon the steep declivity on the further
side, and, after a precipitous retreat of two or three hundred feet,
heard the murmuring of a stream below, by following which I at length
reached a cultivated district.

The clouds on those mountain tops often collect with extraordinary
quickness, and, while the sun is shining brightly on the cultivated
lands, pour down the rain in deluging showers, which, rushing in
cataracts through the gorges, swell the rivers unexpectedly, sometimes
causing fatal disasters by sweeping away horsemen or teams when fording
the streams. The rise of a river from this cause is sometimes alarmingly
sudden; the water comes down in solid phalanx, six or eight feet
in perpendicular height, and extends from bank to bank; and with
irresistible force sweeps down rocks and trees, shaking the earth on the
banks, and making a loud and rumbling noise like distant thunder.

The vicinity of Grenada to the continent causes this island, as well as
Tobago and Trinidad, to be exempt from the hurricanes which have proved
a terrible scourge in several of the Windward Islands, and from time to
time have been terribly destructive to life and property. In Barbadoes,
on the 10th of October, 1780, nearly all the plantations were ruined by
a hurricane of inconceivable fury, and between four and five thousand
persons lost their lives. Grenada has only once been visited by a
hurricane since its first settlement by a French colony from Martinico,
in 1650. But this hurricane was the means of removing a far greater
evil, the circumstances attending which were of an extraordinary nature,
and which I shall relate as I learned them from the lips of many who
were witnesses of their occurrence.

It was about the commencement o