Guadeloupe continued - The Traveller's Tree: A Journey Through the Caribbean Islands - page 17

We were in a world of mist and wind, as remote from the tropics as an Irish bog in midwinter. The vol-
cano has not erupted on a large scale since the period of the French Revolution, at which time it caused
considerable damage in the neighbourhood of Basse Terre. The crater is now choked with scoriæ and
black basaltic rock, but so thickly muffled in rainbow-coloured moss that every inch of ground is damp,
resilient and treacherous. Deep crevasses are roofed by a thin layer of spongy growth, so that it is very
dangerous to leave the paths which traverse this wilderness. Even when the moss is torn away, the rocks
themselves are less substantial than they look. For yet another layer of vegetation clings to them, far dens-
er and more deceptive, but so compact that it appears as firm as a millstone. The guide drove his cutlass
into it up to the hilt, meeting only the resistance of plasticine, and then, with cunning twists of his sharp
weapon, removed firm cones and cubes and prisms of stinking and glutinous mauve stuff.
In clear weather the islands of Marie Galante, the Saints and the Désirade are visible from the crater
towards the south-east, and the large British island of Dominica; and to the north, Antigua and Monserrat,
and a faint indication of the smaller British Leeward Islands trailing north-westwards towards the horizon
like a distant line of battle. But now the swirling mist obscured all but the spurs and cliffs that lay close
to us. So we lay down on the moss like Niebelungen, and opened the bottle of red wine that Raoul had
thoughtfully brought with him, and talked—or rather persuaded Raoul to talk—about Créole life, and the
history of the French Antilles.
Raoul's family was among the earliest to settle in Martinique after the French laid claim to these is-
lands in the person of the Norman sailor and colonizer, Pierre d'Esnambuc, governor of St. Christopher,
in 1635. This action on the part of France was a direct result of the expansionist policy of Cardinal Riche-
lieu. The islands of Guadeloupe, Martinique and Dominica were to be exploited by the newly founded
Compagnie des Iles d'Amérique, under the command of the Cardinal's namesake du Plessis, and of Ly-
enard de l'Olive. The Spaniards who had discovered the islands over a century before had made no effort
to colonize them: the resistance of the Caribs was too fierce to make their capture worth while, compared
to the glittering goals of Mexico, Peru and Eldorado. Since then the history of Raoul's family is typical
of the landed proprietors of the French islands. An uncle later showed me in Martinique the grant of arms
and the title-deeds to their Martinican estate, signed by Louis XIV, 'in recognition of his brave services in
command of a regiment of Martinican grenadiers against the English and the savages of the islands'—a
war of extermination that over the space of centuries wiped out the whole Carib race, except for a small
number still surviving in Dominica. They grew rich with the importation of slave-labour in 1650—a
traffic that began fortuitously when a Spanish slave-ship was captured by French filibusters—and poorer
with the emancipation of the slaves in 1848. They now live in moderate prosperity. The history of this
family, with its affiliations scattered all over the Antilles, and even as far away as the valley of the Missis-
sippi and Nova Scotia (for which Raoul used the obsolete French name of Accadie ), is also a reminder of
the sad fortunes of the great French Empire of the New World. Raoul's ancestors were the sort of French-
men that accompanied Champlain to the Great Lakes, and colonized Canada and Louisiana and Guiana.
But Quebec fell to General Wolfe, Sainte Dominique—Haiti—revolted and won its freedom at the time
of the Revolution, and Louisiana was sold by Napoleon to the United States. The lesser Antilles changed
hands between the French and the English again and again, but most of them finally remained with the
British: pawns won on the chessboard of the great European congresses and treaties. All that now remain
under French domination are French Guiana, Martinique, Guadeloupe and its satellites, Saint Barthélémy
and half St. Martin in the Leeward Isles, and St. Pierre and Miquelon, those two minute, icebound islets
off the Newfoundland coast whose inhabitants eke their existence from the cod-fishing industry.