1. The Dwelling House 2. The Overseers Dwelling 3. The Book-keepers Office 4. The Kitchen 5. The Storehouse 6. The Poultry-house 7. The Hogs-sty 8. The Boat-house or small Dock 9. The Carpenters & Coopers Lodge 10. The Drying Lodge for the Coffee 11. The Bruising Lodge for do 12. The Negro-houses 13. The Horse Stables 14. The Fold for Sheep & Bullocks 15. The Great Guard house 16. The Hospital 17. The Pigeon-house 18. The Corn-house or Granary 19. The Necessary houses 20. The Sentry Boxes for Watchmen 21. The Floodgates 22. The Great Draw-bridge 23. The Landing Place 24. The Great Canals 25. The River or Creek 26. The Gravel walks 27. The Drying Floor for Coffee 28. The Negro Gardens 29. The Pasture for the Horses 30. The Pasture for the Sheep & Bullocks 31. The Poultry-yard 32. The Hogs-yard 33. The Kitchen Gardens 34. The Flower do 35. The Plantain Trees 36. The Groves of Orange Trees 37. The Dams & Gutters for Draining 38. The Path to enter the Fields 39. The Bridges over the Gutters 40. The Gates, Barriers, &c.

London, Published Decr. 1st, 1791, by J. Johnson, St. Paul’s Church Yard.

At the times of harvest, it is not unpleasing to see the negroes picking the crimson berries among the polished green, where all ages and sexes are employed to fulfil their [[355]]task with ardour, when the youth who having first filled their baskets, wantonly run naked, and play amongst the luxuriant foliage.

I will now conduct them before the overseer’s presence, where, all the baskets being inspected, the flogging commences, which is mostly inflicted with impartial severity on all who have not fulfilled their tasks, whether from idleness or incapacity. This ceremony concluded, the berries are carried home into the bruising-lodge, and the slaves return home to their houses. The berries being bruised in a mill for that purpose, in the above lodge, to separate the kernels from the husks or pulpy substance, they are next steeped in water one night to cleanse them, and then spread on the drying-floor, which is exposed to the open air, and is constructed of flat stones; after which they are spread on garrets made for the purpose, to let them evaporate and dry internally, during which time they must be turned over every day with wooden shovels: this done, they are once more dried in large coolers or drawers, that run easily on rollers in and out of the windows, to prevent them from being overtaken by showers of rain: then they are put into wooden mortars, and beaten by candle-light with heavy wooden pestles, like the rice at Gado-Saby, to divest them of a thin coat or pellicle that unites the two kernels in the pulp. At this exercise the negroes wonderfully keep time, and always sing a chorus. Being next separated from the chaff through a bunt-mill, once more thoroughly dried on the [[356]]coolers, and the whole beans picked from the bruised, which last are consumed in the colony: they are finally put into casks or barrels, of about three or four hundred, weight each, for exportation.

I shall only farther observe, that in Surinam some coffee plantations produce above 150,000 pounds weight per annum; and that, as I have already mentioned, in the year before our arrival no less was exported to Amsterdam alone than 12,267,134 pounds of this valuable article, the prices of which have fluctuated, from three-pence halfpenny to eighteen pence; but which, calculated at the average price of eight-pence halfpenny, produces a yearly income of not less than 400,000 pounds sterling; (which, is no despicable revenue) besides what goes to Rotterdam and Zealand.

This is sufficient to prove that the cultivation of coffee is highly worthy the attention of the planters: and as for the virtues of this excellent berry, without entering into particulars, I will only refer the reader to that highly-approved pamphlet, entitled “A Treatise concerning the Properties and Effects of Coffee; by Benjamin Mosely, M. D. Author of Observations on the Dysentery of the West Indies;” from which I cannot resist the temptation of extracting the following passage:—“Bacon says, coffee comforts the head and heart, and helps digestion. Doctor Willis says, being daily drunk, it wonderfully clears and enlivens each part of the soul, and disperses all the clouds of every function. The celebrated [[357]]Doctor Harvey used it often. Voltaire lived almost entirely on it; and the learned and sedentary of every country have recourse to it to refresh the brain, oppressed by study and contemplation.”

With the above description I must conclude the observations which I have been able to make on such of the vegetable productions of this colony, as have offered themselves to my examination. But so abundant is the variety, and so extraordinary the properties, of the trees, plants, roots, &c. of this country, that by far the greater number are as yet perfectly unknown to the oldest inhabitants of this settlement, and to all the world besides.

A few years ago a Count Gentelly, an ingenious nobleman, travelled through the desarts of Guiana with some Indians, and had acquired considerable knowledge in this his favourite study. But alas! his labours, which promised fair to be of material benefit to the Botanic Society, and to mankind in general, were interrupted by a fever, which, owing to his excessive fatigue, he caught at the River Correntine, and cut him off in the midst of his useful and entertaining researches.