Jteeve cfc Co.,Lond^'-
S T . H E L E N A .
PART I. —HI STORICAL.
C T . HELENA is the most solitary island of the Southern.
^ Atlantic Archipelago. In 15° 55' south latitude and 5° 49'
west longitude, alone it stands, in the very midst of the South
Atlantic Ocean, 1140 miles distant from the African Continent on
one side, 1800 from South America on the other, 698 from the
Island of Ascension, and 4000 from England. No human eye
ever saw this rocky spot in its primeval grandeur until the 21st
of May in the year 1502, when one of the earliest and bravest
navigators, Commodore John de Nova Castella, commanding a
Portuguese fleet on its return from India, discovered it. He found
there no aborigines, nor was any trace of man’s work to he seen.
This celebrated voyager with his companions had, however, the
satisfaction of seeing the Island in all the pristine beauty of its
native vegetation. Unfortunately in those days it never occurred to
them to make a collection of its plants, or other productions; and all
we know of it at that period is, that rich vegetation clothed its surface,
the interior being described as an entire forest, with Gum wood
and other indigenous trees overhanging some of the sea precipices.
I t requires some amount of faith on the part of the modern traveller,
when told this, to see in the now dark, frowning, barren, rocky
outside of St. Helena any probability of its ever having been green
with verdure; but there are good reasons for believing the record
of the discoverers to be correct. : An abundance of fresh water,
running down the valleys into the sea, existed then as now, but
the only inhabitants seem to have been sea birds, seals, sea lions,
and tu rtle ; at least we are not informed of any others, although
it is elsewhere recorded that one land bird was found there. These
early navigators were generally on the look out for new islands, and
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