Gardens of the Caribbees, v. 1/2 / Sketches of a Cruise to the West Indies and the Spanish Main

by Ida May Hill Starr

III.

Eager as the children are to reach Le Jardin des Plantes, the famous Botanical Gardens of Martinique, we must stop on our way for a closer inspection of one of these bright birds of the forest,—the Martinique porteuse.

The women of the tropics have an affinity for nature such as we of the North cannot comprehend. As the forest and the flowers and the birds and the insects abound in marvellous hues, so do these children of the sun love to bedeck themselves in all the schemes of colour known to the dyer’s art. Let us, just for the sake of the picture it will give us, stop this woman coming and make excuse to buy one of the green cocoanuts of which she seems to carry a great load on her head. Look at her! Isn’t she magnificent!

Have you heard of the feats of endurance which these young girls perform? How they will carry upon their heads, over one hundred pounds out from St. Pierre across the mountains, a distance of fifty miles in one day? And this while barefooted and at all times of the year, through all kinds of weather, through dry seasons and wet seasons. Not only on such days as these, when the air is sweet and cool in the shade, but days when the sun scorches and withers, even under the deep recesses of vine-clad porch and lattice. She is the ever-willing burden-bearer, the unloader of ships, the handler of cargoes, the welcome carrier of bread for the early breakfast in mountain homes, the vender of all stuffs and utensils by the roadside where no cart could well be taken; where even the patient donkey might refuse to go. Agile, nimble, erect of body, motionless of head, with eyes that pierce into every crook and turn of the way, and poised like a queen, she is the dweller among the green, yellow, red, and purple of the forest, and in her love of colour she follows in her adornments the strong instincts of nature. She it is whose burden is so great that were she herself to attempt to lift it or take it from her head, it might mean a rupture, a dislocation, or a broken vein; she it is whom all men, from the richest to the poorest, help to unload, so great is the respect in which she is held.

And yet we talk of the idleness, the weakness bred in the tropics! It is true that continual summer enervates, and necessitates slow methods of living; but I can truthfully say, that (outside of Haïti), I saw less vagabond-age, less indolence, in the West Indies, than in any of our Southern States. We were constantly witnessing most remarkable feats of endurance in both men and women. In these countries the horse is scarce, and the donkey costs money, so that the human back becomes the carry-all for the plunder of man.

This motionless bronze statue before us, with the great tray of fruit, appears—to one unaccustomed—more than indifferent whether we buy or not, for she stands there, mute, her fruits higher than our own heads; she is tall to begin with, and the great tray itself is six inches higher, and the head pad on which it rests is more than an inch thick; so, altogether, it is so high that we can only make a guess at the fruit she carries, from the fringe on the edge and the pyramid on top. This is our first experience with la porteuse, and we wait for her to stoop, camel-like, to unload. But not she! She knows too well the possible penalty of such rashness, and quietly stands with her quick eyes questioning us, and we stand wondering what she wants us to do.

The kerchief about her shoulders over a light chemise rivals the rainbow. I try to fix my eyes on some predominating colour, but when I decide that it is yellow, in will blaze a green stronger than the yellow, and then huge red roses splash their lurid colour into the yellow and green, and royal purple and blue daisies and magenta buttercups career around in wild indifference as to conventional form and tint. A loose calico frock hangs to her ankles, with the bare, tireless feet, straight, shapely and well-formed, showing beneath.

Intelligence dawns upon us at last, and the tall man reaches for a green cocoanut, just toppling on the edge of the tray, for we realise we must reach for the fruit if we want it. This cocoanut, encased in its green husk, is just about the size of a small melon, and has a striated, light-green, smooth skin. A vender near by, interested in the purchase, and charitable to the strangers, takes the cocoanut, and, with a sharp knife, dexterously pares off one end, and with a slash straight across the top, cuts through the still soft shell, and hands it to us ready to quench our thirst with a long pull, for there is as yet no meat in the cocoanut, only a quantity of the rich milk. I cannot say that it is particularly good, or particularly bad; it has an inoffensive sweet taste, is said to be perfectly harmless, and is one of the few fruits of the tropics that the uninitiated can eat with impunity. After we have all drunk, there seems to be quite a bit of the milk left. So it goes to the most insistent of the crowd of small boys, who are, as usual, escorting us with much enjoyment, and a constant merry chatter of French.

Let us move on now up the clean stone street, up, and up, and up, passing many a walled recess where sparkling jets of water fill the jars brought to the fountain by barefooted girls,—up and on, on and up, past votive shrines—les chapelles—and high-walled gardens, coming finally to the broad avenue leading to the Botanical Garden,—the same road from which we were so glad to escape the night before. We follow the white, dusty road in the bright sunlight, with now and then glimpses of the mountains above, and come at last to the broad stone gateway of Le Jardin des Plantes, which, entering, plunges us at once into the deep shades and marvellous beauty of a tropical forest.