The Savannah morning news., 1904-12-11

native; the emerald-green alligator
pear, more properly called the Avoca-
do, eaten at every meal and often in
between; the mango, which grows so
luxuriantly that billions rot upon the
ground every season: and the succu-
lent ackee, scarlet fruit which forms
an excellent substitute for the mush-
room-all these, and many more, were
within the range of his vision.
No Need for Work.
Looking around, 1 felt a whole
hearted sympathy with the lazy ma
tives," he said. Work? Why should
anybody work in such a land, where
food of every kind and description
falls from the trees and only needs to
be picked up. The primal curse has
been removed. If Carlyle had lived
in Jamaica he would not have thun-
dered so eloquently about the dignity
of labor. For one thing, his liver
would not have troubled him, and that
would have made a whole lot of Diff
ference to his point of view"
When / met the late Tom Reed,
sometime Speaker of the House of
Representatives, down in Jamaica, 1
asked him when he was going back
to Gods country"
Gods country" he exclaimed.
w ny, IL Is Ilkul neIb.
Mark Twain, who was with Mr..
Reed at the time, went into ecstacies
over the beauty of the country. He
was taken to one lovely waterfall aft
err another, to one fern-covered glen
that opened into another still more
beautiful, and he exhausted the re-
sources of the language in admiring
adjectives.
Mark Twain's Idea of Heaven.
At last he reached a mountain peak,
from which he could look clear over
twenty miles of hill and valley and
forest to the turquoise sea.
"Well, what do you think of it, Mr..
Clemens?" he was asked.
He did not reply. He sat down on
a ss-covered rock under a shady
bamboo. filed his pipe, and gazed at
the landscape for the best part Of an
hour without talking. His jamaican
hosts asked him to come and have
lunch but he waved them aside impa-
tiently. At last, when the mules were
brought up for the return journey
down the mountain. he rose to his
feet, highed deeply, and said
I'D like to come here when / die,
instead of going TO heaven"
Unfortunately the American travel
err does not often see the best that is
in the West Indies when he goes
down there. He stays in the hot,
stuffy, dusty towns most of the time,
and when he makes flying trips into
the country districts he stays at
wretched little lodging houses and so
called hotels that are utterly devoid
of the comforts and decencies Of life.
But II he is luck enough to have even
one solitary Introduction to an Eng
lish planter. he need not spend a cent
for hotel bills while he is In the
island.
West Indian Hospitality.
West Indian hospitality is as gener-
Gus to-day as IL was IN the times OF
Michael Scott, when Tom Cringle,
Aaron Bangs and Paul Geld drank
one another under the table with
sangaree and rum punch. The plant
ers are not as rich as they were. ow-
ing 10 the decline OF the cane sugar
Industry. The dine of silver plate
and lament the good old days when
their ancestors ate on golden dishes
and entertained British dukes with a
magnlncence 10 which the dukes We're
unaccustomed. But the same spirit ~
hospitality is there, although u can
not be ~ reRaily displayed.
The planters still own the great
houses" 81 their ancestors with stone
walls I'VE feet thick, and they are