“De Ruyter now came up, and we suddenly stood on the elevated plain, called Vacois, in the centre of the island.  Our ascent had been very abrupt, winding, and rugged.  Before us, in the middle of the plain, on which we now rode, was the pyramidical mountain, Piton du Milieu.  Inclining to our right was the port and town of St. Louis.  To the south were large plains, in rich vegetation, divided by a fine river, with one solitary hill.  To the north were other plains, inclining to the sea, white as if the briny waters had recently receded from them, and only partially cultivated with sugar-canes, indigo, and in the marshy spots, with rice.  From south to east it was volcanic and mountainous, with jungle and ancient forests.  The north-east was, for the most part, level.  The plain, where we were, was full of little sheets of deep water, forming themselves into pretty lakes; which, overflowing during the heavy rains, at times made the plain swampy, and ever overgrown with canes, reeds, and gigantic grass.  Such was the diversified and beautiful scenery now disclosed, as the sun, having risen above the mountain in the east, dissipated the yellow mists, and laid bare the hitherto obscured beauties of this divine island, like a virgin unrobed for bathing.”

“We alighted under the shade of a group of the rose-apple trees, which seemed to have drawn a charmed circle round a solitary oak, on the brink of a lake, clear as a diamond, and apparently of amazing depth, the golden Chinese fish sporting on its surface, and green, yellow, and blue dragon-flies darting here and there above it.  The modest wood-pigeon and dove, disturbed in their morning ablutions, flew away to the woods.  The gray partridge ran into the vacour, which stood in thick lines on the brink, impenetrable from its long fibrous leaves, standing out like a phalanx of lances.  The water-hens dived, and the parrots chattered on the trees, as if they had been peopled with scolding married women; whilst the sluggish baboon sat, with portly belly, gormandizing with the voracity and gravity of a monk, regardless of all but the stuffing of his insatiable maw with bananas.”

“We were told that there were, in this lake, prawns as big as lobsters, and eels of incredible size, from fifteen to twenty feet long.  The two principal rivers took their rise from this plain, augmenting in their course by the tribute of an infinity of streamlets; till swollen into bulk and strength, like two rival monarchs, they ran parallel for a awhile, trying to outvie each other in pomp and velocity, springing over their rocky beds.  After some distance they separated to the right and left, and passed through their different districts, to pay, in their turn, tribute to the mightier ocean.”