Travel Reference
In-Depth Information
CHAPTER SIX
Barbados
THE only occupants of Barbados, when the English first landed there in 1605, were a number of wild
swine that had been left there by the Portuguese on an earlier visit. Since then the history of the island has
varied very little. The Arawaks and the Caribs, in their ascent of the Caribbean Chain, were either unaware
of its existence or found that it lay too far from the route of their advance. Columbus also failed to discover
it, and its records date only from the beginning of the seventeenth century, making it, historically speaking,
the youngest of all the islands. It has been in uninterrupted British possession ever since, and, having been
spared the conflicting occupations and cultures of the other islands, it has remained English to an almost
unbelievable degree.
Barbados is geographically and geologically, as well as historically, different from the other islands, for
it does not belong to the long volcanic mountain range in which the Caribbees are rooted. It is a coral is-
land which has worked its way to the surface here fortuitously, rearing its mild contours above the water
as a monument to the industry of many millions of zoophytes.
Arriving, as we did, straight from the precipitous scenery of Dominica, with the mountains of Marti-
nique and Guadeloupe still fresh in our minds, the flatness of the skyline of Barbados came almost as a
shock. But wandering through the streets of Bridge-town, we were both compensated and bewildered by
the very familiarity of everything. It was a completely English town, a town on the edge of London, and
the wide, clean streets appeared to be almost as full of white as of coloured Barbadians. All the familiar
landmarks were there—the one-price bazaars, the chemists with well-known names and the multiplicity of
teashops. We paused a long moment before the window of a dressmaker in Broad Street. The reader will
understand the extreme English-ness of the Barbadian capital, and capture the exact shade of its identity
with the Mother Country, by studying this advertisement of the Modern Dress Shoppe. 'The name of this
Establishment,' it runs, 'was selected with a very definite purpose; namely, to enshrine an ideal. The em-
ployment of the designation SHOPPE may appear to be an anachronism, particularly when thrown into
relief by its association with the term MODERN. There is no conflict of ideas, indeed the contrary is the
case, for upon your first visit you will realize that, whilst every modern requirement can be procured, it is
proffered with a gesture reminiscent of other days.'
The more one sees of the little capital, the more it resembles a London suburb. But, after leaving the thor-
oughfares of the centre—all of which bear homely names like Broad Street, Chapman's Road, Trafalgar
Square or Lightfoot Lane—and when the region of the Women's Self-Help Association and the Ladies'
Lyceum Club has fallen behind, glimpses are caught of fine wooden houses in the Regency style retreating
from the road among groups of trees. A large savannah encircled by a race-course encloses a grandstand
and a polo ground where grooms walk blanketed race-horses under the palms. The little contiguous towns
of Hastings and Worthing faithfully echo in miniature the seaside resorts of England; and the Marine Hotel,
the Windsor, the Ocean View and the Balmoral, bask placidly in the sunshine like advertisements of Tor-
quay. Old gentlemen in tussore suits and panama hats sniff the ozone, and pink Anglo-Saxon babies, safe
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