The West Indies and the Spanish Main

by Anthony Trollope

I should imagine that a tour through the whole of Trinidad would richly repay the trouble, though, indeed, it would be troublesome. The tourist must take his own provisions, unless, indeed, he provided himself by means of his gun, and must take also his bed. The musquitoes, too, are very vexatious in Trinidad, though I hardly think that they come up in venom to their brethren in British Guiana.

The first portion of our ride was delightful; but on our return we came down upon a hot, dusty road, and then the loss of that hour in the morning was deeply felt. I think that up to that time I had never encountered such heat, and certainly had never met with a more disagreeable, troublesome amount of dust, all which would have been avoided had I inquired over-night into the circumstances of the Trinidad watches. But the lady said never a word, and so heaped coals of fire on my head in addition to the consuming flames of that ever-to-be-remembered sun.

As Trinidad is an English colony, one's first idea is that the people speak English; and one's second idea, when that other one as to the English has fallen to the ground, is that they should speak Spanish, seeing that the name of the place is Spanish. But the fact is that they all speak French; and, out of the town, but few of the natives speak anything else. Whether a Parisian would admit this may be doubted; but he would have to acknowledge that it was a French patois.

And the religion is Roman Catholic. The island of course did belong to France, and in manners, habits, language, and religion is still French. There is a Roman Catholic archbishop resident in Trinidad, who is, I believe, at present an Italian. We pay him, I have been told, some salary, which he declines to take for his own use, but applies to purposes of charity. There is a Roman Catholic cathedral in Port of Spain, and a very ugly building it is.

The form of government also is different from that, or rather those, which have been adopted in the other West Indian colonies, such as Jamaica, Barbados, and British Guiana. As this was a conquered colony, the people of the island are not allowed to have so potent a voice in their own management. They have no House of Commons or Legislative Assembly, but take such rules or laws as may be necessary for their guidance direct from the Crown. The Governor, however, is assisted by a council, in which sit the chief executive officers in the island. That the fact of the colony having been conquered need preclude it from the benefit (?) of self-government, one does not clearly see. But one does see clearly enough, that as they are French in language and habits, and Roman Catholic in religion, they would make even a worse hash of it than the Jamaicans do in Jamaica.

And it is devoutly to be hoped, for the island's sake, that it may be long before it is endowed with a constitution. It would be impossible now-a-days to commence a legislature in the system of electing which all but white men should be excluded from voting. Nor would there be white men enough to carry on an election. And may Providence defend my friends there from such an assembly as would be returned by French negroes and hybrid mulattoes!

A scientific survey has just been completed of this island, with reference to its mineral productions, and the result has been to show that it contains a very large quantity of coal. I was fortunate enough to meet one of the gentlemen by whom this was done, and he was kind enough to put into my hand a paper showing the exact result of their investigation. But, unfortunately, the paper was so learned, and I was so ignorant, that I could not understand one word of it. The whole matter also was explained to me verbally, but not in language adapted to my child-like simplicity. So I am not able to say whether the coal be good or bad—whether it would make a nice, hot, crackling, Christmas fire, or fly away in slaty flakes and dirty dust. It is a pity that science cannot be made to recognize the depth of unscientific ignorance.

There is also here in Trinidad a great pitch lake, of which all the world has heard, and out of which that indefatigable old hero, Lord Dundonald, tried hard to make wax candles and oil for burning. The oil and candles, indeed, he did make, but not, I fear, the money which should have been consequent upon their fabrication. I have no doubt, however, that in time we shall all have our wax candles from thence; for Lord Dundonald is one of those men who are born to do great deeds of which others shall reap the advantages. One of these days his name will be duly honoured, for his conquests as well as for his candles.

And so I speedily took my departure, and threaded my way back again through the Bocas, in that most horrid of all steam-vessels, the 'Prince.'