I think that to most people Seychelles is principally known as the home of that eccentric palm, the double cocoa-nut, or "Coco de Mer." Its range is indeed very restricted, being, in fact, limited to Praslin,—one of the smaller islands of the Group,—and even there it only grows in one particular valley. A few have been introduced into Mahé, and great care is now being taken in order to promote their extension. There was a handsome specimen of the female tree growing in the grounds of Government House, which was shown to me by Mr. Brodie, the courteous Secretary to the Council. The tree being unisexual, isolated specimens can only be made fruitful by artificial means. In the present instance, the tree being over thirty years old, and in the proper condition for impregnation, Mr. Brodie had taken the trouble to obtain from Praslin the reproductive portion of a male plant, which he had placed over the immature fruits on the female tree. The male tree bears a long thick spike, studded with minute flowers, the pollen from which must be shaken over the female flowers, in order to insure impregnation. The tree at Mahé was about twenty feet high, but I was informed by Mr. Brodie that fully grown trees in the island of Praslin attain a height of a hundred feet. The mature nuts if left on the ground readily germinate. The outer hard covering splits at the sulcus of the nut, and from thence shoots out a rhizome, which after extending underground for a few feet gives origin to the future stem and rootlets, which proceed respectively upwards and downwards from the termination of the rhizome. The Coco de Mer is an article of trade, a good many being brought over annually to Mahé, where some are sold to visitors as curiosities, while the remainder are shipped to the Red Sea ports to be sold to the Arabs, who have a profound belief in their medicinal properties.
In the gardens of Government House were also two fine examples of the celebrated Land Tortoise of Aldabra, an animal which, although indigenous in Aldabra Island alone, has of late years been introduced into many of the neighbouring islands. The pair at Mahé were male and female, and weighed respectively about four hundred and five hundred pounds. The male seemed to have no difficulty in bearing a man upon his back. At the time of our visit the female had just commenced to lay, depositing her eggs in holes which she excavated in the damp soil, and carefully filled in.
From a commercial point of view, the Seychelle Islands are now in a transition state. The cocoa-nut industry has of late years been unprosperous, mainly owing to the ravages of a worm which invades the roots and stem of the cocoa-nut trees, and causes them to dwindle and perish. The produce of oil has consequently been so reduced, and the freight charges continue to be so high, on account of the absence of steamship competition, that only a small margin of profit is left to the planter. This failure of the cocoa-nuts has led to a revival of the old spice industry, which, under the early French settlers, was at one time deemed likely to vie with that of the Moluccas. On looking over the Blue Book Report, I find that in the year 1880 there were 12,000 acres of land planted with cocoa-nuts, which in spite of the recent blight continue to be the staple product of the Group. In the same year there were one hundred and fifty acres devoted to the growth of vanilla; a hundred acres were planted with cacao bushes, and a hundred and fifty were producing cloves; besides a large extent of land bearing coffee plantations. Both the Liberian and the common coffee plants have been introduced, and found to grow remarkably well. Vanilla, in particular, seems to find a congenial home in the Seychelle Islands, and, during our short visit to the colony, we gathered that the future hopes of the settlers were mainly centred upon the successful cultivation of this plant. It grows rapidly, and although the flowers require to be fertilized by hand, yet this process is so readily performed that beans of large size and excellent quality are produced. It is as yet only grown in a small way, most of the vanilleries, as these plantations are called, covering only an extent of about five acres. It is estimated that each plantation of this size represents an annual produce of two hundred and fifty pounds' weight of vanilla beans. We inspected some plants in the garden of Dr. Brookes, an old resident, and noticed that the beans averaged eight inches in length, and were otherwise well formed. He told us that he had been most successful in the curing of these beans, and expected that when they became well known they would command a large price in the European markets, and that eventually vanilla would become the staple produce of the Seychelle Islands.
The method employed at Seychelles for the expression of the oil from the internal white lining of the cocoa-nut struck me as being novel and primitive; and as it is said to be very efficient, I shall try to give an intelligible description of a crushing mill and its mode of construction. In principle it is a sort of gigantic pestle and mortar, in which the pestle is made to perform a movement of circumduction, and whilst doing so to rotate against the sides of the mortar, where the crushing process is effected. A large-stemmed tree of very hard wood having been cut down, so as to leave about three feet of the trunk projecting above the ground, a bucket-shaped cavity is excavated in the stump. A heavy round spar about ten feet in length is stepped into this cavity, and is made to incline forcibly to one side by means of a wooden outrigger, which is supported by a rope attached to the head of the spar, and is weighted with heavy stones placed at its outer extremity. The inner end of the outrigger is fitted with wide U-shaped jaws, which engage in a collar scored in the tree stump just above its point of emergence from the ground, while the rope-lift which supports its outer extremity is so attached to the head of the upright spar that the outrigger may be free to move radially about the stump at the same time that the upright spar rolls round on its long axis, as it presses heavily against the sides of the trough. Finally a small hole is bored laterally, so as to reach the bottom of the cavity in the tree stump, and into this is thrust a short bamboo tube to act as an oil-tap. The broken-up copra is thrown in around the lower extremity of the upright spar, and a bullock is set to work to drag round the outrigger arrangement. The only attendance required is that of a small boy to feed the wooden trough with copra, and occasionally to throw stones so as to accelerate the otherwise lazy motion of the bullock. In the mill which I examined the oil was flowing steadily from the bamboo tap in a clear limpid stream.
We dredged several times with the steam-cutter in the channel between Mahé and St. Anne's Island, and also in St. Anne's Channel. The depth of water in these channels ranged from four to twelve fathoms, and the bottom consisted of sand and coral. The fauna was abundant, and comprised Shells of the genera Murex, Arca; large grey Holothurians; Echinoderms of four or five species; Crustacea of the genera Thalamita, Galathea, Porcellana, Atergatis, Scylla, Alpheus, etc., and a large variety of Corals and Polyzoa.
One of the most conspicuous objects about the foreshore at Port Mahé is a curious fish of the genus Periophthalmus, which may be seen not only jumping about the dry mud flats at low water, but also climbing up the rugged vertical faces of the blocks of granite of which the sea-wall and pier are formed. It is very difficult indeed to catch one, as I have good reason to know. Associated with them were several species of crabs, among which I recognized representatives of the genera Macrophthalmus, Gelasimus, Grapsus, and Ocypoda.
The Seychelles are peculiar in being the only small tropical oceanic islands of granitic structure. All the others, excepting St. Paul's Rocks, are either of volcanic or coral formation. The rock about Port Mahé is a syenitic granite, in which the mica of ordinary granite is replaced by hornblende. In some cases the felspar is coloured blue, in others reddish, and in every instance it occurred in large coarse crystals. The soilcap was a reddish pasty clay, of great thickness. In one of the road cuttings near the settlement a section of this clay fully ten feet in depth was exposed.
We left Mahé on the 14th of March, and on the following day anchored off a small coral islet, the northernmost of the Amirante Group. This, with another similar islet adjoining, constitute the African Islands. A party of surveyors immediately landed in order to fix on a suitable place for taking midnight observations of the stars, and I had soon afterwards an opportunity of landing to explore. The islet is two hundred yards long, by about sixty yards in width, is more or less elliptical in outline, low, and flat, and for about three-fourths of its circumference is girt by a smooth beach of coral sand, on the surface of which I noticed a prodigious number of Orbitolites discs. The northern end of the islet is composed of upraised coral sandstone, which has been grooved and honeycombed into various fantastic shapes, so that for walking over it presents quite as unsatisfactory a surface as volcanic clinker. All the central part of the islet within the inner drift beach is covered with scrubby grass and low bushes of the same character as those at Bird Island. There were one or two young shoots of a Barringtonia; but nothing else in the shape of an arborescent plant. Among the dead shells, light driftwood, and bleached sponges and coral blown up on the inner beach, I noticed some of the familiar rhomboidal fruits of a Barringtonia.
"COPRA" CRUSHING-MILL IN USE AT SEYCHELLES (p. [217]).