close, in the corners of the veranda. From 12 on Friday till 5
p.m. on Saturday we planted the first 1,500, and more than 700
of a second lot. You cannot dream how filthy we were, and we
were all properly tired."[23]

[Illustration--Black and White Plate: Samoa: A New Clearing for Cacao.]

Three years later he records:

"I have been forbidden to work, and have been instead doing
my two or three hours in the plantation every morning. I only
wish somebody would pay me £10 a day for taking care of cacao,
and I could leave literature to others."

Cacao cultivation in this island of Upolu has since that date
developed wonderfully, and is attracting much attention, the first
produce having been sold in Hamburg at a very high price. The consular
report on Samoa published in February, 1903, states that "the mainstay
of Samoa is cocoa," and it will be interesting to follow the progress
of an industry of which the versatile Scotchman was an early pioneer.


FOOTNOTES:

[20] Florida even boasts a town of the name of Cocoa, but inquiries on
the spot have failed to discover that any attempt was ever made to
cultivate the plant there.

[21] Two of the coloured plates in this volume are reproductions of
pictures by members of one of the oldest French families in the