The West indies in 1837

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JAMAICA.

same line, the three Peaks of the Blue Mountains, tbe highest summits in Jamaica. The attorney of Clifton Mount, COLIN CHISHOLM, accompanied us to the pass called Content Gap, from whence is seen a magnificent prospect of the plain and mountains of Liguanea, the city and harbor of Kingston, and the adjacent coasts. We rode through the " Gap," and ascended by a spi­ ral path to Cold Spring, the ruins of the property and seat of the W A L L K N S , celebrated by BRYAN E D W A R D S . The thermometer at this elevation, ranges throughout the year from 44o to 7 0 ° - The coffee and tea trees, the Magnolia, EngUsh and American oaks, firs, cedars, broom, and furze grow here together. The oaks com­ mence their hybernation regularly at the same season as in our own climate. There are two of the old English variety, of which the largest, though still vegetating, was laid prostrate by the tempest of 1 8 1 5 , a period so memorable in this mountainous district, that it is em­ ployed by the negros, as an epoch, from whence to date all subsequent events. Its effects are still visible, the swoln torrents having torn away masses of rock, and carried off the soil from the sides of the mountains, leaving in many places, the bare rock or the original earthy strata fully exposed. We ascended from Cold " Spring nearly to the summit of the Peak. The small wild strawberry and blackberry of our own country are common at this height, but the coffee tree ceases to flourish at a greater elevation than four thousand or four thousand five hundred feet. 4th.—We left Robertsfield early this morning, and called on our way to Kingston^ at the house of S. B O U R N E , where we met R . CHISHOLM, a planter in his district, who has the credit of governing his ap­ prentices with kindness, and without the need of Sti-


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