The Anaconda standard. [volume] (Anaconda, Mont.) 1889-1970, 1899-08-08

explore the woods and mountain uls-
tricts, so l passed one nignt on the
crater brim, with an old plack man
as guide and companion, in order to
acquaint myself with the phenomena
of nature there We slept on the
ground, and I had blanket, put my
sable friend had nothing between MIN
ana mother earth; yet IN the morn.
Ing he was awake with the dawn, ana
led me into the depths OF the crater.
1t is like huge bowl the sldes pre-,
cipitous but fringed with trees ana
vines, and at the bottom are immense
ceibras and gommiers, with trunks
TWO feet in diameter, showing that
many centuries have elapsed since the
last eruption there.
The wild animals of the island are
not numerous, comprising agoutls, rap
bits, wild hogs and armadillos, and in
the crater I found only wood pigeons,
thrushes, humming birds and doves.
once was the time when the Island
was like a vast garden, when fields
OF waving sugar cane covered the
plains, tobacco, indigo and cotton the
Ioothllls and coffee groves the noun
tain slopes, even to the crater brlm.
Then there We're 10000 people living
there, 5000 white Hoanders and 15,OO0
blacks; now there are but 1900, and
the white man is "rara avis The
scarce q believe there is not stream
on the island). and frequent hurricanes
have completed the ruin that Lord
Rodney began. In the good old times
before emancipation an acre of soil
was reckoned to produce from four to
six hogsheads of sugar of 1,500 pounds
to the hogshead; but to-day there is
hardly that much raised on seven
square miles, total, of territory. Most
OF the sugar land lies over on the wind
ward or eastern side of the island, for
the leeward or western is almost too
hilly for that sort of cultivation. There
are several elevations of respectable
height, as the White Wall, 900 feet;
North HILL $50; Signal Hill, $50; Round
Hill, 500; Old Fort, 300, and the town
of Orange itself is well set up above
the beach, the tower of its Dutch
church being lis feet above sea level.
The old church, like the mansions Of
those who built 1t, has fallen into ruin,
but when / was there the quaint
sounding board still hung above the
pulpit, and the pew was shown in
which the representative of their high
mightinesses, Governor Johannes de
CRAFT, used it.
The island is Dutch still, like Cura-
Gao, but the language of commerce and
common use is English. That the Off
clal language is Dutch, the passport or
permit to shoot, without which l was
not allowed to wander around with a
gun, and which cost me two guilders,
amply testifies. 1t rectes the DE Gez-
zaghebber van st. Eustatius" hereby
permits the bearer to carry abroad .een
dubbel-loop achterland scheitgeween"
during his stay, and the police force of
the island Zone man strOng) is caution
ed not to interfere with my explora-
tons. which are in the interests of
science" etc.
In order not to have any trouble, how
ever, l took the police force with me
on my rambles, and it was his small
son, Alexander, who plotted me to the
haunts of the tropic bird. This rare
bird is common enough at sea, but its
terrene haunts are hard to find; so it
was with great joy that l learned that
the tropic bird (Phaethon aethereus)
made its home in the cliffs not far from
Orange town. 1t afforded me the sport,
being swift of wing and shy and Sc
cured several specimens.
We went to the cliffs for tropic
birds but for humming birds and trop-
icals we sought the hooks and hollows
in the hills, where the wild mango casts
its dense shade, the silk cotton spread
gigantic limbs and the acacias shed
perfume. There we found the yellow
blossom" or jessanine, wild frangi-
panni, with its whorls of bloom, the
"church-yard blossoms" something like
four-o' clocks, and butterfly orchids.
Near one such nook was the caved-in
magazine of the old fort, 300 feet above
the sleepy town, where few rusty
cannon of the last century poked their
muzzles out of a tangle of cactus and
acacia. They We're obsolete and dis
mounted, not worth taking away as
old iron, even, or they would not have
remained in the fort SO long but what
an interest attaches to those antiquated
guns! What an interest to an Ameri-
can, I mean; for the salute fired from
them on a certain day in 1776 was the
ostensible grievance urged by England
when she broke the treaty with Hol-
land that precipitated Rodney. like a
thunderbolt, upon this island.
I forgot to mention that what John
Bull made the greatest fuss over was
the firing of salute in honor of the
American flag by order of the Dutch
governor of 'Statia. And, moreover, it
was probably the first recognition of the
sort ever obtained in a foreign port by
our flag.
According to the annals of the time,
certain privateer from Baltimore,
named the Andrew Doria, came here
for supplies in November, 1916, flying a
flag that had never been seen in these
seas before. 1t was not the flag official
ly adopted by congress, of course, for
that was made a year later; but it
probably resembled the naval flag of
the Netherlands, with alternate red,
white and blue stripes. Anyway, when
the saucy privateer came sailing into
Orange harbor, with it's red, white and
blue flag fluttering, and gave the fort a
salute from it's guns the sturdy Gov