Southern Christian Advocate

THE WEST INDIA ISLANDS.

There is a part of the new world where nature appears clothed with the brilliant colours and decked out with the gorgeous array of the tropics. In the Gulf of Mexico the extraordinary clearness of the water reveals to the astonished mariner the magnitude of its abysses, and discloses, even at the depth of thirty fathoms, the gigantic vegetation which, even so far below the surface, is drawn forth by the attraction of a vertical sun. In the midst of these glassy waves, rarely disturbed by a ruder breath than the zephyrs of spring, an archipelago of perfumed islands is placed, which repose like baskets of flowers on the tranquil surface of the ocean. Everything in these enchanted abodes appears to have been prepared for the wants and enjoyments of man. Nature seems to have superseded the ordinary necessity for labour. The verdure of the groves, and the colours of the flowers and blossoms, derive additional vividness from the transparent purity of the air, and the deep serenity of the azure heavens. Many of the trees are loaded with fruits, which descend by their own weight to invite the indolent hand of the gatherer, and are perpetually renewed under the influence of an ever-balmy air. Others, which yield no nourishment, fascinate the eye by the luxuriant variety of their form, or the gorgeous brilliancy of their colours. Amid a forest of perfumed citron trees, spreading bananas, graceful palms, wild figs, of round-leaved myrtles, of fragrant acacias, and gigantic arbutus, are to be seen every variety of creepers, with scarlet or purple blossoms, which entwine themselves around every stem, and hang in festoons from tree to tree. The trees are of a magnitude unknown in northern climes; the luxuriant vines, as they clamber up the loftiest cedars form graceful festoons, grapes are so plentiful upon every shrub, that the ocean, as it lazily rolls in upon the shore with the quiet winds of summer, dashes its spray upon the clusters, and natural arbours form an impervious shade that not a ray of the sun of July can penetrate. Cotton, planted by the hand of nature, grows in wild luxuriance; the potato and banana yield an overflowing supply of food: fruits of too tempting sweetness present themselves to the hand. Innumerable birds, with varied but ever splendid plumage, nestle in shady retreats, where they are sheltered from the scorching heats of summer. Painted varieties of parrots and wood-peckers create a glitter amid the verdure of the groves, and humming-birds rove from flower to flower, resembling "the animated particles of a rainbow." The scarlet flamingoes, seen through an opening of the forest in a distant savannah, seem the mimic array of fairy armies; the fragrance of the woods, the odour of the flowers, load every breeze. These charms broke on Columbus like Elysium. "One could live here," said he, "for ever."

Alison's History of Europe.