. The earth and its inhabitants ... ,and cacao were cultivated. Since that time Trinidad has steadily increased in population and wealth, evenduring the wars which resulted in the British conquest. As in most of theAntilles, the bulk of the inhabitants are negroes and half-breeds, descendants,like their former owners, of immigrants from the other islands, and speaking theFrench créole patois. This is an extremely soft idiom of highly simplified6 66 SOUTH AMEEICA—THE ANDES EEGIONS. structure, though still possessing its own grammatical and euphonic laws. TheTrinidad dialect, which has been stud
. The earth and its inhabitants ... ,and cacao were cultivated. Since that time Trinidad has steadily increased in population and wealth, evenduring the wars which resulted in the British conquest. As in most of theAntilles, the bulk of the inhabitants are negroes and half-breeds, descendants,like their former owners, of immigrants from the other islands, and speaking theFrench créole patois. This is an extremely soft idiom of highly simplified6 66 SOUTH AMEEICA—THE ANDES EEGIONS. structure, though still possessing its own grammatical and euphonic laws. TheTrinidad dialect, which has been studied by Thomas, a native of colour, possessesquite a literature, consisting, like the Martinique and Haiti varieties, especiallyof wise sayings and proverbs. Nevertheless, there can be no doubt that in the near future the numericalpreponderance Avill cease to belong to these French or Gallicised ethnical large number of extensive plantations and of the agricultural factories have Fig. 21.—Wife of a Rich Hindu already changed hands, having been purchased from their former owners byEnglish and Scotch settlers. The latter have the reputation of being very grasp-ing, as illustrated by the local expression, Scotch friend, applied to themurderous lianas which entangle the trees in their deadly coils. Under analogousinfluences, negroes of English speech from Barbadoes and other islands are con-tinually replacing the French blacks, and driving them to the interior. Thelatter, rejoicing in their emancipation, and naturally anxious to take advantage of TRINIDAD. 67 tlie changed relations, have nearly all abandoned the plantations, and now culti-vate their own little plots, which yield enough for all their wants. There existover 20,000 such small holdings, belonging, for the most part, to theseAfricans. But the great landowners, deprived of the slaves who formerly garnered theircrops, have had to replace them by hands procured through agents from the FarEast. So ea
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Keywords: ., bookcentury1800, bookdecade1890, booksubjectgeography, bookyear18
