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214 Cruise o f ihe “ Aiert.”
species of shells, worms, and Ophiurids, and two or three species
of sponge.
At three o’clock in the afternoon we anchored at Mahe, the
chief island of the Seychelle Group.
Seychelles, a term which is used to comprise the group of
eighty islands, has been a British colony since the year 1794,
when it was taken from the French by force of arms. Most of
the land is in the possession of descendants of the old French
settlers, men who have the reputation of being devoid of enterprise,
and of squandering the produce of their land in habits of dissipation.
W e were told that among the upper classes there were only
about six Fnglishmcn in the group, including the governor,
secretary, and doctor, etc. By a census taken in 1880, the total
population was 14,035, of which 2,029 was represented by African
negroes. The population of the chief island, Mahe, alone
amounted to 1 1,393> so that there remains less than 3,000 to be
divided among the remaining islands of the Group. The total
has S i i i c e been increasing, owing to a stream of immigration having
set in from Mauritius, where there exists a commercial depression ;
so that at the time of our visit it was said to amount to i 8,000.
I think that to most people Seychelles is principally known as
the home of that eccentric palm, the double cocoa-nut, or “ Coco
de Mer.” Its range is indeed very restricted, being, in fact,
limited to Praslin,— one of the smaller islands of the Group,__
and even there it only grows in one particular valley. A few
have been introduced into Mahe, and great care is now being
taken in order to promote their extension. There was a handsome
specimen of the female tree growing in the grounds of
Government House, which was shown to me by Mr. Brodie, the
courteous Secretary to the Council. The tree being unisexual,
isolated specimens can only be made fruitful by artificial means.
In the present instance, the tree being over thirty years old, and
in the proper condition for impregnation, Mr. Brodie had taken
the trouble to obtain from Praslin the reproductive portion of a
The Coco-de-Met- -A Huge Land Tortoise.
male plant, which he had placed over the immature fruits on the
female tree. The male tree bears a long thick spike, studded
with minute fiowers, the pollen from which must be shaken over
the female fiowers, in order to insure impregnation. The tree at
Mahe was about twenty feet high, but I was informed by Mr.
Brodie that fully grown trees in the island of Praslin attain a
height of a hundred feet. The mature nuts if left on the ground
readily germinate. The outer hard covering splits at the sulcus
of the nut, and from thence shoots out a rhizome, which after
extending underground for a few feet gives origin to the future
stem and rootlets, which proceed respectively upwards and downwards
from the termination of the rhizome. The Coco de Mer is
an article of trade, a good many being brought over annually to
Mahe, where some are sold to visitors as curiosities, while the
remainder are shipped to the Red Sea ports to be sold to the
Arabs, who have a profound belief in their medicinal properties.
In the gardens of Government House were also two fine
examples of the celebrated Fand Tortoise of Aldabra, an animal
which, although indigenous in Aldabra Island alone, has of late
years been introduced into many of the neighbouring islands. The
pair at Mahe were male and female, and weighed respectively about
four hundred and five hundred pounds. The male seemed to have
no difficulty in bearing a man upon his back. A t the time of
our visit the female had just commenced to lay, depositing her
eggs in holes which she excavated in the damp soil, and carefully
filled in.
From a commercial point of view, the Seychelle Islands are
now in a transition state. The cocoa-nut industry has oi late
years been unprosperous, mainly owing to the ravages of a worm
which invades the roots and stem of the cocoa-nut trees, and
causes them to dwindle and perish. The produce of oil has consequently
been so reduced, and the freight charges continue to be
so high, on account of the absence of steamship competition, that
only a small margin of profit is left to the planter. This failure
in:
IT