Fish are caught in great abundance, and as poultry thrive well, a large stock of them are kept and allowed to run wild. Fresh water being also plentiful, the inhabitants are not on the whole badly off for the necessaries of life.
After a long interview with old Hickey, who most generously presented us with some turkeys and ducks, we bade him a long good-bye, and steamed away towards Providence Island.
We anchored off the west side of this island on the forenoon of the 21st of April, and lay about a mile from the land, and a quarter of a mile outside a long fringing reef, over the raised outer edge of which the sea broke heavily, forming an almost continuous line of rollers.
Providence Island lies two hundred and forty miles from the Amirante Islands, in a south-west-by-south direction, and is two hundred miles north-east-by-north from the northern extremity of Madagascar. It is entirely of coral formation, is low and flat, and measures two miles in length by one-third of a mile in width. It is surrounded with broad submerged fringing reefs, which at the southern extremity of the island are continuous with a long reef, extending in a southerly direction for a distance of sixteen miles, and partially dry at low tide. At its southern termination are three small islets, or rather sand-cays, which are termed collectively Cerf Islands.
Providence Island belongs to two Seychelle gentlemen; viz., Mr. Dupuys and Dr. Brookes, for whom it is managed by an elderly Frenchman named Hoyaeux. The population consists of Hoyaeux, with his wife and nephew, and a gang of negroes, male and female, amounting in all to thirty-four. The houses of the settlement are situated on either side of a broad avenue which traverses the middle of the island from east to west. The only landing-place is at the western end of this avenue, opposite to which we were anchored; and even here it was always somewhat dangerous, and in bad weather quite impracticable to effect a landing, on account of the rollers which broke over the outer edge of the fringing reef. The latter forms the nearest approach to a "barrier reef" which I have yet seen in these waters; excepting that at Alphonse Island, which we had not time to examine carefully. The depth of water over its general surface is not more than a fathom at low tide; while at its outer edge, which is marked by the line of breakers, the depth is only a foot or so less.
The produce of the island consists of cocoa-nut oil and green turtle. The greater part of the island is covered with cocoa-nut plantations, young and old, for which the soil seems admirably suited. I noticed that here the cocoa-nuts had been planted in the surface soil, and not in pits as at Poivre and Des Roches; and on my making a remark to that effect, Monsieur Hoyaeux, the manager, explained to me the reason. It has been found by experience that cocoa-nuts will not thrive on any of these islands unless they are so planted that the roots may be enabled to reach the bed of coral into which the sea-water penetrates. Hence it follows that when nuts are planted on any but very low coral islands it has been found advisable to put them at the bottom of basin-shaped excavations, some three or four feet in depth, so that the roots may have a chance of reaching the moist coral beneath. Providence Island being sufficiently low by nature, it was not necessary to make these excavations.
Green turtle are captured in great numbers during the month of April, when the females come up on the beaches to deposit their eggs. A turtle pond near the settlement contained, at the time of our visit, no less than eighty, all of large size. In connection with this pond a portion of the sandy inner beach was wattled in, so as to serve as a hatching-ground for the captured turtle. As soon as the young ones have become sufficiently strong to take care of themselves, they are turned adrift into the open sea. In this way the young turtle escape the danger, which they are otherwise exposed to when of a tender age, of being destroyed by predatory sea-birds; and thus the maintenance of the stock is favoured. It is a curious thing that young turtle seem to have a difficulty about, or a strong disinclination to, diving beneath the surface of the water. One almost always sees them floating in the ponds, instead of groping about the bottom as the adults do.
The indigenous fauna and flora were almost identical with those of the Amirantes, except that there were no land-birds as at Isle des Roches. Monsieur Hoyaeux very kindly supplied me with the creole names of the trees, shrubs, and one or two herbaceous plants. Among these were the "Bois Blanc" (Hernandia peltata), "Sauve Souris" (a low tree with long dark green leaves), "Bois Cu Cu" (a tree with drupaceous fruit, having a curved hook at the apex), "Veloutier Tabac" (Tournefortia argentea, a seaside bush of the family Apocynaceæ, the leaves of which are sometimes smoked instead of tobacco), and the "Veloutier Blanc" (Scævola kœnigii, a very common seaside bush of the family Goodeniaceæ). Some of the bushes and Casuarina trees (called "Cedre" by the creoles) were overrun with a parasitic creeping plant, Cassytha filiformis, which they use for making a sort of tea, and to which they give the name "Liane sans feuilles."
The huge land-tortoises of Aldabra have been imported, and seem to find a congenial home in the island. There was a herd of seven roaming about among the bushes, one of which was said to be able to carry two men on its back.
Among the introduced plants and vegetables we saw the papaw, custard-apple, pepper, sweet potato, onions, lettuce, capsicum, etc.