St Clair has long been known as the finest real estate in the island. In a recently bygone era of colonialism it was the preserve exclusively of the uppercrust of the ruling classes where elegant mansions were set in extensive grounds. Today, many of those fine homes still exist, but some have been turned into office space, particularly for government ministries. 

St Clair was developed as a sugar estate, as part of the Peschier family holdings in the late 18th century. When the Peschiers sold off what was later to become Queen’s Park Savannah in 1817, St Clair was retained. By 1876 the canes had given way to pasture and the government veterinary officer, Mr J B White, clamoured for the formation of a stock farm and breeding station which would raise cattle to supply a decent quality of milk for public institutions like hospitals and asylums while simultaneously improving the genetic stock of the cattle in Trinidad.

Subsequently in 1879, the stock farm was inaugurated with two head of cattle being the initial herd. Gradually, the aims and objectives of the farm were realised since not only did the herds produce milk, but also disseminated superior breeders to the small cattle owners of the island. At the end of every year, a grand auction was held wherein some of the animals were disposed of. In 1885, J H Collens raved about the good work of the farm:

“Mr White has not only a practical knowledge of farming, but he is also an experienced veterinary surgeon, and the natural consequence is that the cattle are in prime condition, while the milk is exceptionally rich and pure. For these purposes, the shorthorn from England and the large variety of the zebu from India have been introduced, the last named with marked success and value to the colony.

At the end of December, 1885, the stock comprised 220 cows, 16 zebu (Bos Indicus), and four Indian buffalos (Bos Bubalus)—total, 240. Within the last year a stallion of the Norfolk Hackney breed has been added to the establishment.”

The superintendent of the stock farm also had jurisdiction over the Queen’s Park Savannah as far as its use as a pasture was concerned. A large number of Madrassi milk-sellers had settled in what is now Boissiere Village and St James and they kept a fair number of cows. These animals were allowed to forage in the Savannah at the cost of one dollar per month. In at least one funny incident, a strolling pair of lovers were put to sudden flight when they were charged by an angry bull. 

The colonial government acquired Valsayn estate from the Guiseppi family in 1899 and by 1901, all the cattle had been transferred under the management of C W Meaden, Mr White’s successor.  The St Joseph farm as it became known was later vested in the Imperial College of Tropical Agriculture at St Augustine in 1924 and still survives as the UWI Field Station. With no more cows, the pastures at St Clair were laid out in residential lots from around 1898 becoming the place it is today. 

While the place was still a home for cattle, however, in 1878, a powerful man by the name of Alexander Gray owned the estate. He constructed a magnificent residence for his family called Sweetbriar House. Gray had such authority, that his was one of the few homes being supplied with piped water directly from the Maraval Reservoir, for which he paid no water rates.

In 1884, the colonial government purchased all the land with the exception of Sweetbriar House, and laid out St Clair Ave with leases of 199 years for lots at a peppercorn rent. This was the genesis of St Clair as a fashionable upper crust suburb. 

In 1903, George Bushe (whose father, John Scott Bushe had been a Colonial Secretary until his death in 1887 and lies buried in the Botanical Gardens) bought Sweetbriar House from Alexander Gray and remodelled it for the opening of the exclusive and posh St Clair Club. This soon became the snooty precursor to the Country Club, and was the place where the cream of society met to quaff cocktails and be waited upon by immaculately uniformed servants. 

George Bushe died in 1910, and his moiety in the property was leased by a consortium of members of the St Clair Club. The lease on the land was sold to Tatil in 1969 who promptly demolished the house. In 1975, the Tatil skyscraper was erected on the spot, obliterating all memory of Sweetbriar House and the St Clair Club. 

Just like Charles Dickens, the great Michael Anthony shows in his writings—The Year in San Fernando and the classic coming-of-age novel, Green Days by the River—what life was like through the eyes of a child in a certain period of history. We ask ourselves then, what was it really like in T&T without comprehending the vast differences in lifeways which existed in one very small nation just about a century ago. 

The scions of the wealthy merchants and plantocracy had a safety net upon which they could rely. This means that they would be educated by private tutors until they could be sent abroad for further education and lived lives of relative ease.

When local secondary schools of a higher calibre came into existence such as St Joseph’s Convent (PoS), the College of the Immaculate Conception (St Mary’s), and Queen’s Collegiate School (QRC), some chose to be schooled locally at the secondary school level.

Much like it was in the American south, it was expected that rich mothers did not have too much of a hand in raising their own broods and instead the job was relegated to an army of coloured nannies as one would have seen in the award-winning movie, The Help. The nurses and their charges were often seen in spick and span livery, promenading on the Pitch Walk at the Queen’s Park Savannah in the cool of the evening. 

The reality of life was very different for the children who dwelt in the squalid barrack-yards of the city at this time. Growing up in one-room homes, with their parents at work most of the day and leaving them largely unsupervised, there was much more scope for the freedoms of life.

Those whose parents could afford it, sent them to the few public schools available in the downtown area, particularly the government primary institution on Charlotte Street known as the ‘Market School’ for its proximity to the old Eastern Market. 

Though the government education was free, the other financial strains of schoolbooks and uniforms put pressure on the family monies. Not a few attended class barefoot because their parents could not buy them shoes. Entertainments were few and it depended on the ingenuity of the children themselves to fill the gaps in their time. Discarded bits of tin and wood were transformed into zwills, trucks and other playthings.

Girls made dolls from the remnants of cloth sold cheaply, known as ‘tay-lay-lay’. Cricket and other games were not allowed in the green spaces of the city such as Brunswick (Woodford) Square, so the stony bed of the East Dry River (paved in the 1930s) became a playground. 

Little girls and boys whose parents could spare the few extra shillings sent them to ‘fairs’ on Saturday afternoons, which were really like tea parties held in the upstairs premises of the friendly societies and dancehalls on Henry, Park, Queen, and Charlotte Streets. There would be music and dancing as well as ice cream, under strict adult supervision. If six or ten cents came to hand, there was the Saturday Matinee at most of the city cinemas. Mayfairs and Carnival were events eagerly anticipated as well. 

For those whose parents could not afford them regular secondary education after the mandatory school-leaving age was attained (14), it was ambition beyond hope that their children would take a commercial course and become typists at the large firms downtown, and the boys, store clerks, thus escaping menial labour and working in “collar and tie” jobs.

The aforementioned premier secondary schools had high fees for those who did not win one of the three or four government ‘exhibitions’ or scholarships offered at the turn of the century. There would be no free universal secondary education until the middle of the 1960s. 

For the parents who did not possess the wherewithal for their children to take a commercial course, there were less desirable career options. Boys were apprenticed to craftsmen and so in time would be able to support themselves as wheelwrights, carpenters and blacksmiths.

Womenfolk who worked as cooks and laundresses in the rich households could sometimes secure positions for their daughters as maids, and at times there were connections at church which would enable young ladies to become teachers at a preschool level. At all times, the parents sought to have their children move away from the back-breaking pseudo-slavery of poverty and illiteracy.

Next week we will take a look at how children in the countryside fared.

Last week we examined the existence of a typical lower to lower-middle-income child in the city of Port-of-Spain over a century ago. Today we look at what it would have been like for their counterparts in the countryside, particularly in the sugar cane belt. 

The very least advantage that urban children had over rural ones was that education was more accessible. Ward (Government) schools had indeed been scattered around the country districts from the early 1850s onward and these made little difference in the potential for upward social mobility of the child since the tutelage was often substandard and absenteeism was high. Least of all did the ward schools attract a student population from among the offspring of the indentured Indian immigrants who began arriving in earnest in the 1850s. 

Firstly, these people placed no great emphasis on a western cultural acclimatisation and though many opted to remain in the colony instead of being repatriated at the end of their contracts, they saw children as a labour force rather than as the future of their kind in a strange land.

It was only with the coming of missionaries from the Presbyterian Church of Canada’s Mission to the Indians (CMI) did schools catering mainly to the children of the indentureds appear. Even so, it would take many decades from their coming in the late 1860s before these schools had the desired impact. With some reluctance, boys were allowed to attend classes sporadically and girls, almost not at all in the early days. 

Children living in the noisome barracks of the sugar estates were looked down upon by their fellows whose parents had managed to purchase or rent a piece of land after their articles expired and were living in semi-independence. ‘Bong coolie chirren’ became a slur of derogation and shame.

Work began almost as soon as children were out of infancy. Little boys and girls of ages five to nine were employed at about ten cents per day in the grass gangs which saw their little palms becoming bloody as they pulled tough weeds from among the roots of the green canes.

As they grew older, the boys could graduate to taking care of the massive water buffalos or ‘hog cattle’ and then eventually at around age 13 to 14, work for a man’s wages doing task work of harvesting the cane at a shilling a task. Girls were needed in the home to care for younger siblings while their mothers were out in the fields and were also expected to take a meal out to them when noontime came and the felling of the canes stopped. 

This is not to say that there was no room for children of the cane to enjoy their lives a bit. For the boys it was cricket and pitching marbles with friends or perhaps spinning top which is a pastime that has gone the way of the dodo. Limewood and balata were carved into intricately tapered tops, balanced on ‘makfan’ or blacksmith-made nails.

Smoothed to a sheen with a piece of broken bottle, the tops were beautifully decorated with stripes and spun by winding a bit of cord around them and then pulling it free. A master spinner was held in high regard and even young men with a certain amount of idle time could be seen spinning. Girls had less scope for childhood games since they were expected to be married off as quickly as possible and thus absolve their parents of the responsibility of having to feed them.

As soon as a dowry and match could be arranged, the girls were wed in the ancient custom of child marriage, often to much older men, thus perpetuating a system of abuse which exists legally to this day and is shamelessly defended by some prominent people.  

Nevertheless, there were some avenues of escape, mainly provided by the CMI and its educational institutions. The growing realisation that their offspring could be freed from a life in the cane, spurred many parents to send their children to school and thus gave them the wherewithal for progress.

Such was the change in attitudes that by the end of the 19th century and early 20th century, a new professional class began to emerge with doctors and lawyers making up the majority of those who had been educated abroad and were now coming home. The existence of the child of the working class in Trinidad so many years ago, regardless of ethnic background is one of struggle against enormous odds.

This year would have marked the 110th birthday of Seepersad Naipaul, who died quite suddenly in 1953. An unobtrusive man with a penchant for written drama he spent years as a correspondent for this very newspaper, the Trinidad Guardian, after contributing his first article in 1929. His desire to write evocative stories set in the world that he knew saw no fruit until these sketches were published long after his demise. 

Seepersad Naipaul might have spent his life in relative obscurity but for one posthumous event. In 1961, his son, then a moderately successful novelist, Oxford-educated and living in England penned one of the great works of modern literature. A House for Mr Biswas stands immortally from the genius of Seepersad’s son, Sir Vidiadhar Surajprasad Naipaul as one of the outstanding literary works of our time. 

Based largely upon his father’s biography, Sir Vidia took the seemingly hapless, tragic hero, Mohun Biswas and created a new Odysseus. Long considered by critics to be the finest living writer of the English sentence, Sir Vidia to those of us who have been exceedingly fortunate to have met him is interchangeably supercilious, disdainful, engaging, acerbic or simply nonchalant.

He distances himself from his Trinidadian roots and has long been loath to reconnect to the landscapes of his early novels which show that in spite of his denial, Sir Vidia is indelibly a son of our soil. 

From 1957 until 1961 and then again in 1967 with A Flag on the Island, he has shown us how deeply he grasped the nuances of being born and raised in the society that at once clung to its somewhat prejudiced identities while attempting to forge ahead in a changing environment that would trade the long-cherished mores of colonialism for something of a different stripe.

Without intending to step out of my depth and examine the merits of the first novels, this column and the few that will follow seeks to put into perspective, the world of Naipaul as he made his homeland famous through his works. 

The books which earned him his fame are familiar to many schoolchildren today—The Mystic Masseur, The Suffrage of Elvira, the ever-delightful Miguel Street and A House for Mr Biswas—are all stories which have overlapping elements. The NGO founded by Prof Kenneth Ramchand, Friends of Mr Biswas is the custodian of all things Naipaul, situated as it is in the home Seepersad bought in St James and here is where the spiritual nexus can be felt most intensely. 

It was a time of war and Trinidad was being turned upside down by the arrival of thousands of American soldiers who brought chaos in their wake. These books show a life before, during and after the Yankees came. Who could forget Edward, Hat’s brother of Miguel Street, who was the archetypal Trini youngblood of the period falling under the American spell:

“Edward surrendered completely to the Americans. He began wearing clothes in the American style, he began chewing gum, and he tried to talk with an American accent. We didn’t see much of him except on Sundays, and then he made us feel small and inferior. He grew fussy about his dress, and he began wearing a gold chain around his neck. He began wearing straps around his wrists, after the fashion of tennis-players. These straps were just becoming fashionable among smart young men in Port of Spain.”

In continuing the theme of constant paradigm change, The Suffrage of Elvira comically assesses the ground level impact of electoral politics during its infancy in postwar Trinidad. This book was serialised some years ago by the Trinidad Guardian and was a hit, introducing a new generation of readers to a scenario that at once had shades of déjà vu—“Elvira, you is a bitch!”.

The rich descriptiveness of Trinidad enshrined in A House for Mr Biswas and The Mystic Masseur provides at once a kaleidoscope into the period as well as the sundry historical characters made memorable by the master writer himself. Sir Vidia’s eye for detail opens a spectrum to us which only our senior citizens can remember with any clarity.

Scanning some old newspapers a couple of years ago, I became indelibly aware of just how connected the Nobel Laureate Naipaul had been to Trinidad and in spite of his rejection of the place of his birth, he exhibits a keen understanding of the place and its people. Thus, over the next columns, we will learn that ‘Red Rose Tea is Good Tea’, be dosed on Sanatogen and live in the Trinidad of Naipaul.

“With this boy, whose name was Alec, Mr Biswas became friendly. The colours of Alec’s clothes were a continual surprise, and one day he scandalized the school by peeing blue, a clear, light turquoise. To excited inquiry Alec replied, ‘I don’t know, boy. I suppose is because I is a Portuguese or something.’ And for days he gave solemn demonstrations which filled most boys with disgust at their race. It was to Mr Biswas that Alec first revealed his secret, and one morning recess, after Alec had given his demonstration, Mr Biswas dramatically unbuttoned and gave his. There was a clamour and Alec was forced to take out the bottle of Dodd’s Kidney Pills.”

Everyone who has read the masterpiece of Sir V S Naipaul, A House for Mr Biswas would be familiar with these lines. Alec, the bosom buddy of the protagonist, Mohun Biswas and his blue urine are an outstanding example of comic relief in the novel which explores many coming-of-age themes in a way unlike that of other authors. What of Dodd’s Kidney Pills? These were a type of patent medicine that enjoyed some widespread popularity in Trinidad during the 1920s-40s. 

The manufacturers claimed many astonishing feats for these tablets in a way not unlike some modern day snake oil salesmen use televised pitches to sell remedies for illnesses which either do not exist or else are downright dangerous to the consumer. According to some period literature found in a box of Dodd’s:

“DO YOU KNOW that Dodd’s Kidney Pills have earned a record of many hundred cures of Heart troubles, Shortness of breath, Asthma, Dropsical swellings, Mental decline, Loss of sexual power; any or all of which are preventible by the timely use of Dodd’s Kidney Pills?”
One of the sales promotions that the makers ran was the Dodd’s Almanac which is a period relic also noted by Naipaul:

“For a week the school’s urinals ran turquoise; and the druggist attributed the sudden rise in sales to the success of the Dodd’s Kidney Pills Almanac which, in addition to jokes, carried story after story of the rapid cures the pills had effected on Trinidadians, all of whom had written the makers profusely grateful letters of the utmost articulateness, and been photographed.”

Long after he became an adult, Dodd’s Kidney Pills were a running joke with Mr Biswas. In a period of organisational change at the newspaper where he worked as a journalist, we read his wry comments about the new arrangements for the use of lavatories:
“Guess what? Editor peeing in a special place now, you know. ‘Excuse me. But I must go and pee—alone.’ Everybody peeing in the same place for years. What happen? He taking a course of Dodd’s Kidney Pills and peeing blue or something?”

Shortly after the chapter in which Mr Biswas becomes a driver or sub-overseer on Green Vale estate (owned by his in-laws, the overbearing Tulsis), he suffers a nervous breakdown which is described in spectacular detail by Naipaul and is given a huge element of poetic tragedy. When Mr Biswas is brought back to the Tulsi stronghold of Hanuman House for convalesce, a doctor is sought who prescribes among other things, “a tonic called Ferrol with reputed iron-giving, body-building qualities.”

It is quite noteworthy that today, more than 80 years after the events in the novel, one can walk into almost any pharmacy in T&T and purchase a bottle of that very same Ferrol in the identical familiar black bottle in a blue box with a white fish printed on it. This mixture is a malt extract which had been manufactured in British Guiana since the early years of the 20th century and became something of a Caribbean classic. Everyone from children to the elderly who seemed listless and lethargic could be dosed on Ferrol and be revived. 

The original importer in T&T was the well-known department store chain of Smith Brothers and Co, otherwise known as the Bonanza. The Bonanza drugstore on Frederick Street was the distributor of many patent medicines but Ferrol was its biggest seller. By the 1930s, the concern was taken over by D Hope Ross and Co. 

The new owners quickly dissipated the near-monopoly that the Bonanza held through their lack of marketing zeal and among other brands, the manufacturers of Ferrol removed them as the local agents and instead gave the franchise to a local commission agent of Chinese ancestry, Louis Jay Williams. 

Next week, we shall delve more into the world of the novels of Naipaul.

The epic novel of Sir V S Naipaul, A House for Mr Biswas is based largely on the life of his own father, Seepersad Naipaul. Mr Biswas, the ailing and forever futile hero of the book owned two main modes of transportation throughout his entire life—A Royal Enfield bicycle and a Ford Prefect. The Enfield makes its appearance during his sojourn as a contemptible and nervous overseer or driver at the Green Vale estate owned by his overpowering in-laws, the Tulsis. 

This is the bicycle, on the handlebars of which he had carried an expensive doll’s house for his daughter Savi’s Christmas, only to have it destroyed by his wife, Shama, to appease the gossips of Hanuman House. It is also the mode of conveyance which he relied upon during the majority of his time as a reporter for the Trinidad Sentinel (the real-life Naipaul worked for the Guardian). It was whilst assigned to a segment called Deserving Destitutes and being compelled to go into the seedier areas of Port-of-Spain that the bike was stripped systematically:

“His bicycle suffered. First the valve-caps were stolen; then the rubber handlegrips; then the bell; then the saddlebag in which he had transported his plunder from Shorthills; and one day the saddle itself. It was a pre-war Brooks saddle, highly desirable, new ones being unobtainable.”

The actual Ford Prefect Seepersad Naipaul acquired during a short stint at the unestablished Community Welfare Department of the Government was registered PA1192. It was bought from Charles McEnearney and Co, now part of the Ansa McAL group. The thrill of new car ownership is something many of us can relate to as described by Naipaul:

“The rule of the house was followed again. The children were sworn to secrecy. Mr Biswas brought home glossy booklets which had the aromatic smell of rich art paper and seemed to hold the smell of the new car. Secretly he took driving lessons and obtained a driving licence. Then, on a perfectly ordinary Saturday morning, he drove to the house in a brand-new Prefect, parked it casually before the gate, not quite parallel to the pavement, and walked up the front steps, ignoring the excitement that had broken out.”

The fascination of that indescribable new car smell and the shiny nickel trim was soon to be lost. It was in short order the family realised the nuances of new car ownership—how the paint attracted dust and left fine scratches if cleaned with a dry rag, the tinkling of an ill-fitting ashtray cover, the rattling of the ignition key chain on the dashboard, and finally the green-eyed monster of envy as Mr Biswas’ rich uncle, Ajodha, seemed ruffled that his nephew could actually be the owner of a new car and tried hard to denigrate the machine on its maiden outing to Balandra:

“Car?” Ajodha said, puzzled, petulant. “Mohun?” “A little Prefect,” Mr Biswas said. “Some of those pre-war English cars can be very good,” Ajodha said. “This is a new one,” Mr Biswas said. “Got it yesterday.” “Cardboard.” Ajodha bunched his fingers. “It will mash like cardboard.”

The real life PA1192 was a ten horsepower model and this figures in the scene where Anand Biswas points out the fact on an inspection of the car which draws Ajodha’s derision again:

“Six horse power?” he said. “Eight?” “Ten,” Anand said, pointing to the red disc below the bonnet. “Yes, ten.” He turned to Shama. “Well, niece, where are you going in your new car?” “Balandra.” “I hope the wind doesn’t blow too hard.” “Wind, Uncle?” “Or you will never get there. Poof! Blow you off the road, man.”

Eventually towards the end of the novel, the car loses its lustre and becomes just another possession. It did, however, allow Mr Biswas to finally keep a promise he had made to Anand during the dog days of World War II. He had committed to buying his son a bicycle upon the condition of the latter winning a college exhibition or scholarship which was one of 12 offered in the island. Though delayed by the privations of war and his own small salary, the Prefect gave the oath fulfilment as follows:

“On Monday Anand cycled to school on the Royal Enfield, and the promise in the Collins Clear-Type Shakespeare was thereby partly fulfiled. War conditions had at last permitted; in fact, the war had been over for some time.”

“He cycled down the High Street. Just past the shop with the Red Rose Tea Is Good Tea sign, he looked back. Anand was still under the arcade, next to one of the thick white pillars with the lotus-shaped base; standing and staring like that other boy Mr Biswas had seen outside a low hut at dusk.”

Several times in A House for Mr Biswas does this sign appear. It is one of the more memorable images of the novel, but we ask ourselves, ‘WHY’ is Red Rose Tea GOOD tea? It is understood that in a British colony like T&T was at the time, tea was a beverage widely consumed. The tea most people knew was sold  raw by the ounce at shops across the countryside. The lowest grade was compressed tea dust, available in plugs the length of an index finger which was so compact it could be boiled several times.

In the 1890s, a Canadian brand emerged, distributed by Rust, Trowbridge and Company that was the first to sell boxes of teabags at a reasonable cost. Backed by an aggressive marketing drive that included giveaways and coupons, Red Rose Tea is Good Tea soon became a popular sight in Trinidad.

A totally different drink which features prominently in the Naipaul novels is Coca-Cola. When Ganesh Ramsumair had attained fame and fortune, he usually received people in his new palatial house with glasses of Coca-Cola served by his wife, Leela. It is given to the deputation of Swami, Partap, and the boy who visit Ganesh and ended up inspiring his political ambitions—four frosted bottles on a glass-bottomed tray, poured out into ‘prutty prutty glasses’ as Leela called them.

A large pseudo-political meeting at Ganesh’s place saw diluted Coca-Cola being doled out in enamel cups to dozens of taxi drivers, solicitor’s touts and the like. Moreover, in the Mystic Masseur, it is the drink of reconciliation. We recall the scene where Ramlogan, his fat shopkeeper father-in-law reappears without warning after a bitter quarrel. At Ganesh’s nod, Leela hands around Coca-Cola, causing Ramlogan to comment, “It have years now I selling this Coca-Cola and I never touch it before”

Coca-Cola had been on the local market almost since the beginning of the 20th century but it was imported from the United States and thus fairly expensive when compared to the dozens of brands of aerated water manufactured in the island. Every drugstore in Port-of-Spain at one point seemed to have a bottling operation as a sideline and the taste for fizz extended as far as Cedros, Siparia, and Sangre Grande.

In 1938, the large grocery operation of Canning’s acquired the rights to bottle and distribute the world’s most popular soft drink. The plant was on Queen Street. The price fell dramatically and Coca-Cola was here to stay. During the war years (1939-45) which is when the latter half of Mr Biswas is set, Coca-Cola soared in popularity since it was the preferred mixer for the thousands of Yankee soldiers who flooded Trinidad, spreading the taste for all things American.

Of course, from this is where we derive the melodic refrain “Rum and Coca-Cola,” composed by Lord Invader and taken to the world in its cover by the Andrews Sisters. It was the bait that drew Anand Biswas away from Hanuman House, overcoming his reluctance to move to Port-of-Spain. It was his uncle Owad (in real life the future Dr Rudranath Capildeo) who laid the trap:

“They have a new sweet drink in Port-of-Spain. Something called Coca-Cola. The best thing in the world. Come with me to Port-of-Spain, and I will get your father to buy you a Coca-Cola and some real ice cream. In cardboard cups. Real ice cream. Not homemade.”

The ice cream in a tub incidentally was also a product of Cannings and many of us can remember when there was nothing more heavenly than a small cup of Cannings Orange Pine or Chocolate. The transition to Coca-Cola led to one embarrassing situation for Mr Biswas.

When he sipped the Coca-Cola he said, “It is like horse pee.” Which was what some cousin had said of a drink at Hanuman House. “Anand!” Mr Biswas said, smiling at the man behind the counter. “You’ve got to stop talking like that. You are in Port-of-Spain now.”

One of the most complex characters in Sir V S Naipaul’s The Suffrage of Elvira is Ramlogan, the fat, hairy rumshop keeper who constantly feuds with his neighbour, the Goldsmith, over a multitude of grievances, mostly the fruit trees which border their properties. This work of Naipaul pokes fun at the second full-adult franchise general elections of 1950 and the colourful people who made pre-party politics in Trinidad more of a comedy sketch than real campaigning. 

One of Ramlogan’s daily rituals is taking an afternoon bath, following which he greases himself liberally in Canadian Healing Oil. His anointing would take place with the theme music of the Indian movie Jhoola being hummed incessantly. This concoction also finds its way into A House for Mr Biswas as one of the many remedies used to assuage the hypochondriac Mrs Tulsi. 

Canadian Healing Oil, like Ferrol Compound and bay rum is one of those West Indian classics that have survived time and marches in medical research. It is still considered a universal remedy for sprains, fevers, arthritis and migraines to name a few.

Manufactured in British Guiana since the early 1900s, it is still sold in its familiar black box. Booker’s Drug Stores distributed this and Ferrol throughout the British West Indies where medical attention was expensive, scarce and often viewed with suspicion.

Booker’s also published an annual almanac which not only entertained with puzzles and games, but also contained testimonies of the wonders of the drugs that it sold. There are many who will tell you of the miracles performed merely by slathering the oil effectively.

Canadian Healing Oil is a pungent brew of essential oils, particularly eucalyptus oil which is combined with a few other unguents to create a product which if ineffective for everything else, at least assails those near the user with a proper “sick room”  smell, thus reassuring non-believers of its potency. 

In the novel The Mystic Masseur, Leela, newly wedded to Ganesh, packs her things in a cardboard suitcase or “grip”—it contained her clothes as well as family photographs. The grip also appears in A House for Mr Biswas as one of Shama’s possessions and equally with Leela, it served as a vault for personal secrets such as letters to an expatriate pen pal.

Anchor cigarettes were an entry-level brand of the John Player Navy Cut cigarette range. Player’s as it was simply known, had been sold in Trinidad for a long time but without resounding success. These smokes were sold only in flat, black metal tins of 20 and so were generally out of the reach of the lower income smoker. Trinidadians were generally pipe smokers, both male and female.

They smoked a cheap locally grown leaf which was sold cured and wadded in most shops. Those who wanted something different could buy wrapping papers and mince the leaves to produce hand-rolled cigarettes. There was as yet no such thing as the “retail” cigarette sold singly until Anchor hit the market in the 1920s. 

Anchor cigarettes eliminated the expensive tin case of Player’s and substituted a cardboard box with eight cigarettes inside, wrapped in a silver foil paper. The price was also right since a cent bought two Anchors. Realising that it was up against a market of pipe smokers, Anchor’s promotions were aggressive. For people who collected the right number of boxes there was the famous Anchor cardboard grip.

There were also mugs, glasses and even fancy cigarette cases to be had. Anchor was successful in gaining a significant share of the local smoker’s market and did quite well until the introduction of tariffs on imported tobacco combined with the rise of the West Indian Tobacco Company forced it out in the 1960s. 

This column concludes our look at the Trinidad of Sir Vidia Naipaul since we began to examine the landscape and its literary road markers five weeks ago. It is important that students of English literature be steeped in his early works, not only for their value as the works of a great author, but for the roadmap to a Trinidad that is long gone that spreads itself across the pages.

The NGO, Friends of Mr Biswas, which was founded by Prof Kenneth Ramchand, has done yeoman work in spreading appreciation for the works of Sir V S Naipaul, but there is a woeful deficiency of even the most basic knowledge of the Nobel Laureate at the secondary and primary levels. It is hoped this will not be the case in the near future. 

In 1887 James Henry Collens noted with amazement about his observances among indentured Indian labourers and the depth of their faith, particularly their knowledge of the Hindi epic, the Ramayan:

“The philosophy of our coolies in this colony is substantially that which their forefathers adopted some 2,500 years ago in the philosophic age; their theology, or rather mythology, is that of the Puranas of much more modern date. In the preface of the Ramayan it is stated that he who constantly hears and sings this poem will obtain the highest bliss hereafter, and become as one of the gods.

Hence the wily Babagee who reads to his ignorant countrymen accounts from the Ramayan, or “Book of the Exploits of Earn”, expects to get, and is tolerably sure of receiving, a large offertory for his pains. It is, nevertheless, astonishing how familiar the Trinidadian coolies are with them; even amongst the humble labourers who till our fields there is a considerable knowledge of them, and you may often in the evening, work being done, see and hear a group of coolies crouching down in a semicircle, chanting whole stanzas of the epic poems, Ramayan, etc.”

It would seem all the more impressive when one considers the trials of coming to an alien land and remaining largely un-integrated into a British West Indian colonial environment. Preservation of identity subliminally occurred and though at times there were setbacks, from early in the indentureship experience there were toeholds.

It was almost impossible on the estates to have built religious edifices but this was to change. Incentives offered up to the 1880s to encourage Indians to settle in the colony saw entire communities emerge both near the towns and in the wide open countryside. 

Early panchayats and other assemblies often took place in the open air under trees but with time, mud-walled mandirs and tiny masjids began to spring from the ground. A decade before Collens, the famous traveller and writer, Lafcadio Hearn visited Trinidad and was taken on a drive through the old Peru Estate, even then already called Coolie Town and now known as St James. Hearn visited a humble mandir and wrote:

“The carriage halts before a shed built against a wall—a simple roof of palm thatch supported upon jointed posts of bamboo. It is a little coolie temple. A few weary Indian labourers slumber in its shadow; pretty naked children, with silver rings round their ankles, are playing there with a white dog. Painted over the wall surface, in red, yellow, brown, blue, and green designs upon a white ground, are extraordinary figures of gods and goddesses. They have several pairs of arms, brandishing mysterious things—they seem to dance, gesticulate, threaten; but they are all very naive—remind one of the first efforts of a child with the first box of paints.”

Hearn could have very well been describing the Moose Bhagat Mandir in Tableland near Princes Town, had it existed in his time. This historic sacred edifice is like many other mandirs of the 19th and early 20th centuries in that it is of very humble proportions and is decorated by murals which might seem primitive to jaded eyes, but are preserved lovingly, becoming at once folk and religious art at the same time. The mandir was established in 1904. 

Moose Bhagat, a pundit of Tableland and a small landowner, removed some water-rounded stones from a stream near his home and in a vision of Lord Shiva was inspired to construct a permanent home for the sacred stones. The vision predates the mandir by four years and the latter structure was erected under the supervision of another ex-indentured labourer, Durga Dass.

There are two shrines on the spot, one dedicated to Lord Shiva and a slightly later building dedicated to Lord Rama. Inside are original murals painted around the time of construction.

These have been modified with time but retain the same simplicity of the people who created them. One must recall that of the tens of thousands of immigrants who came and remained, very few were artists and the majority were agrarian peoples, so that in executing their religious images, their faith and devotion were the driving factors rather than what Eurocentrics would term “artistic influence.” 

Bhagat’s son-in-law, Jagdeo Sadhu became the pundit and it is his line of descendants who have preserved the mandir and its integrity to this very day. 

The roof of the Rama shrine has been changed from the original but much remains intact including the cool open eaves where people gather to hear the epics which are still preserved in Sanskrit.

Before bake and shark, before doubles, before accra, there were oysters. At the Banwari Trace midden in south Trinidad (the oldest human habitation site in the West Indies), the first people hunter-gatherers of 6,000 BC made mangrove oysters their protein staple. The discarded shells make up a hill more than 20 feet high. Almost every Amerindian midden in Trinidad contains oyster shells, evidence that these molluscs were an essential food source. 

The swamps at Cocorite and the nearby Caroni estuary meant that oysters were readily available in Port-of-Spain. At the wedding feast of Governor Lord Harris and Sarah Cummings in the 1850s, these delectable shellfish were part of the menu. The Chinese were well known for their purveying of this well-liked treat. The popularity of oysters as an entrée was so great that in 1865 Daniel Hart wrote:

“Trinidad can boast of a large supply of magnificent oysters principally on its Eastern and Southern coast, The Nariva, Mayaro, and Moruga oysters are reported the best in the colony. This does not include the oysters growing on the mangrove roots in many of the swamps of the island, and in several places on our sea-board, nor the Rock Oysters of Point Gourde, &c., &c.

The Mangrove and Rock Oysters are generally small. Those of Nariva, Mayaro, and Moruga are large, of a size averaging about 3x2 inches. In the dry season they are particularly well in flesh; there are several beds of oysters about Cocorite, but through the apathy of the people, oysters are very seldom found in our markets. A new branch of industry has recently started in San Fernando in that line; several Chinese have opened a regular oyster trade and supply their customers and others with oysters already shelled.” 

The San Fernando oysters were considered to be the finest and the gathering depot was on King’s Wharf from whence the shellfish could be sent by steamer to Port-of-Spain. Dr W V Tothill, a Scottish medical man working at Usine Ste Madeline in the 1920s, wrote that it was not unusual for a cocktail party to be assembled at the Usine Club on a Sunday morning, with one hundred dozen oysters being consumed by only four men.

Fresh oysters were also on the menu for dances and even breakfast at the Paramount Hotel on Circular Road, which is now the headquarters of the OWTU. 

Silam Achee was a Chinaman well known in the trade who became quite prosperous as a supplier of shellfish treats to Port-of-Spain. He developed a system whereby he employed several harvesters who took to Cocorite and Caroni every morning to gather the shellfish from the mangrove roots. They would be brought in by the sack to his premises on Prince Street, where they were immersed in clear water to purge them of impurities.

Silam Achee had regular orders from restaurants and large caterers and so would load the unopened oysters in tubs of ice for delivery. One of the odd treats that utilised oysters as a primary ingredient was oyster pie which was a popular thing during Lent when fish was in high demand.

This seems to have vanished from the local palate. What remained was opened on the spot and served up to retail customers, particularly men, who wanted to down a half dozen or so. He also engaged vendors to take up strategic positions outside the key rumshops of the city, particularly the Standard Hotel, Black Cat Bar, and Peep of Day.

Oyster vendors took many forms. The most popular was the Chinaman with his basket and blunt knife. With lightning speed, he would shuck the oysters into a dish, add a sauce of crushed yellow pepper and chadon beni, and receive a few pence. This was a popular bar snack and favoured as a ‘cutters’ by the Port-of-Spain rumshop crowd along with black pudding and souse.

The other kind was the mainly Indo Trini vendor with his wares stacked on a dirty trestle table, a pitch-oil flambeaux casting a flickering and smoky light on his features as he opened shells at two for one cent. The oysters could either be put into a glass and a cocktail of peppersauce and green seasoning added, or they could be slurped from the shell, a bit of pepper being poured in for good measure. Health ordinances now prohibit the time honoured practice of eating oysters from the shell.

Around 1769 the capital of Tobago moved to Scarborough from Studley Park and thus needed some sort of garrison. By May 1770, barracks, a powder magazine, military hospital and cistern had been erected on Scarborough Hill on the site of a French battery known as Fort Castries.

The garrison and its military hospital suffered badly from the nearby swamp in Bacolet which spread malaria and yellow fever with the clouds of mosquitoes which descended in the evening. Moreover, alcoholism seemed to decimate the soldiers. This citadel failed to defend the island from a French recapture in 1781 despite a gallant defense by the governor and his regulars and militia.

The Treaty of Amiens in 1802 formally ceded Tobago to France, but 1803 was the year for the return of the British who finally held on to their colony by way of treaty in 1814. Thereafter followed a period of peace wherein the complex at the fort performed many civil functions, including accommodating the gaol.

Both the fort and garrison are described thus in 1837: “Fort King George is on an eminence above Scarborough, the ascent to which is steep, though a good carriage road leads to the summit, which is just a mile from the court house. From many miles round, in every direction, the eye rests upon this fort, and the view from it is extensive.

It is small, but compact: contains good barracks, a hospital, magazines, stores, and seven large tanks supplied by rain water, of which they always contain a sufficient quantity for the use of the garrison, excepting in seasons of great drought.”

The West India Regiment remained encamped at the stockade. In 1854 post-emancipation Tobago was enjoying a period of bucolic serenity and it was decided to withdraw the military garrison from the island and replace it with a civilian militia and police force.

The decision was recounted thus in 1866: “It was in the month of January, 1854, that the troops composing the garrison of Fort King George, and kept there by the British government for the protection of the island, were withdrawn—her Majesty's Government having resolved to concentrate the forces stationed in the smaller islands at Barbados, and to leave those colonies to their own resources for the preservation of internal peace and order.

It was, however, promised by the home government that provision should be made for a ship of war to be constantly within call of Barbados, for the conveyance of troops to any of the islands in case of necessity; and all the military buildings, with a proportion of small arms in the several colonies whence the troops were removed, were placed at their disposal.

“An act was passed on the 11th January, immediately before the troops left, titled An Act to augment the Police Force, by which an efficient armed police, consisting of an inspector-general, a superintending sergeant, two sergeants, six corporals, and twenty- four privates, were embodied.

These were instructed in the use of the firelock and in military movements, so as to render them, as far as their numbers would permit, not only civil constabulary, but an available military body. At the same time an act was passed to legalise the embodiment of armed volunteer corps.

These measures of defence proved neither unnecessary nor premature, as a plot to burn and pillage the town, murder the white inhabitants, and violate the females, was discovered by the confession of an accomplice.

“Two of the ringleaders, emigrant negroes from Barbados, named Joseph Arthur and Thomas Millington, were arrested and tried for a conspiracy; and, being found guilty, were sentenced to two years' imprisonment, to pay each a fine of ten pounds, and on the expiration of their imprisonment to find security for their good behaviour for six years, and to continue in prison until such security should be given. This sentence was, in effect, one of imprisonment for life, from the inability of the parties to give the required security; but Millington, being threatened with blindness, was released from prison by Governor Shortland; and on the 5th April, 1858, Governor Drysdale, by an exercise of the Eoyal prerogative of mercy, released Arthur from confinement. This measure, although at the time strongly opposed by the local authorities, was approved of at Downing Street; and Arthur is now a steady and respectable man of his class in the island.”

Before the removal of the garrison in 1854, the Royal Gaol had been in downtown Scarborough, in a cramped stone building best suited for about 20 persons but accommodating 50, both male and female.

The roof leaked badly and the Superintendent, Kaye Rowland, was at great pains to best care for the inmates. With the garrison gone in 1854, it was decided to move the gaol to Fort George, in the buildings occupied formerly as barracks. The Public Works Department undertook hasty renovations and the move was effected. It was described in 1866 as follows:

“While the colony was under the rule of Governor Shortland, an act was passed to convert the military prison and cells at Fort King George into a convict prison; and Mr Keens, while he administered the government, sought to render the buildings at the Fort more available for the public service by converting the military hospital there into a common gaol, by which accommodation might be provided for all classes of prisoners under one establishment.

“But it was reserved for Mr Drysdale’s Government to mature this very excellent arrangement, by which all persons suffering imprisonment were removed from the confined and unhealthy prison at Scarborough to the airy and capacious buildings at Fort King George, where classification, so necessary to discipline and good order, could be well perfected, and imprisonment be rendered a punishment.

“The prisoners were also indebted to Governor Drysdale in providing them with the means of religious consolation: under his management a chaplain of the jail was for the first time appointed, and this pastoral care is still afforded to inmates of the prison, indeed it may be considered permanent.”

The gaol received regular visits from the District Medical Officer who both resided and practiced at the military hospital in Fort George as well as from a minister of St Andrew’s Anglican Church, which formed the chaplaincy of the prison.

In 1877 the prison had its greatest intake, comprising almost the entire village of Roxborough. The manager of the estate was attacked and apparently killed for he was chased into the high woods and never seen again. The estate house was burnt down.

As unrest spread, the five policemen in the village, led by Cpls Belmanna and Reid, came to the fore. A scuffle ensued between the police and rioters, and allegedly, a civilian was shot. This was the spark to the powder keg and the police fled and barricaded themselves in the station (still in the same location atop a hill today). The crowd surrounded the building, threatening to burn it with all inside if Belmanna was not handed over. A small band of militia from Scarborough arrived on the scene, but was repulsed, sending them packing back with the news to authorities that a very serious threat was at hand. Belmanna had been seized by the insurrectionists. He was beaten badly and mutilated. A woman, called Ti Piggi (because of her porcine appearance) was said to have gouged out Belmanna’s eyes and then stabbed him fatally. The other four policemen in the station were also brought out to face the wrath of the mob. All were beaten, stripped and humiliated.

For a week, the rioters held sway until a warship hove into sight. Its captain, Adams, realised that the risk to a landing party of marines would be too great, nor was he inclined to wholesale slaughter of the rioters by shelling the village with the great cannons of the ship. Using great tact, Captain Adams sent a boat ashore with an emissary, who thanked the rioters for ‘keeping the peace’ and not destroying public property. He invited the mob aboard to be decorated for their service. The rioters fell for the ploy and went aboard by the dozen. When he was satisfied that the ship could hold no more, the insurrectionists were clapped in irons and taken to Scarborough to stand trial. Many were exiled for life and others were sentenced to life in prison. As a result, the colonial authorities realised that Tobago, weakened by recession and unrest, had to be allied to another colony. This led to the political annexation of Trinidad and Tobago in 1889.

Prisoners from Tobago were sent thus to Carrera Island in Trinidad, reducing overcrowding at Fort George. The gaol remained at Fort George until the large and extensive police complex at Bacolet was erected in the 1950s. There, a fairly ample prison block was constructed and since the long-term prisoners were sent to Golden Grove in Trinidad, the Scarborough Jail was closed, ending an existence of almost a century. Today the buildings have been restored as part of the Fort George historical complex.

The Bonanza looks regal too, with its elegant wrought-iron façade, designed by the great architect and contractor, Mr George Brown, who was responsible for bringing the design elements of wrought iron made in Scotland and handmade gingerbread wooden fretwork to the island. Inside, the Bonanza is different from other older buildings since it is lighted naturally by a lantern roof, also a piece of genius on the part of Mr Brown. The Bonanza stocks every imaginable staple, dry and fancy item imaginable. From groceries, toys, millinery and shoes, to Yost typewriters and Butterick dress patterns, the Bonanza has it all. Messrs Smith and Co are even opening a department for the repair and outfitting of motor cars and lorries, a few of which we see on the street.

While the children are mesmerized by dolls, tin soldiers, whistles and toy ‘cap’ guns, mother and father can browse the dizzying array of fabrics and draperies, while upstairs (yes, the Bonanza also offers second-floor shopping) is jam-packed with furniture of every description. All that is needed to furnish even the most palatial of homes (it is said that Mr Gordon of Gordon Grant and Co buys furniture for his mansion, Knowsley, here) can be found on this floor, including cast-iron four-poster beds with their brass accents, to bentwood rockers, morris chairs, washstands with marble tops, and even kitchen ‘safes’ with baize netting on the doors to prevent ants from getting at the food which will be stored within. Truly, it is said that good, local handmade furniture at low prices can be had from Mr Dick’s ‘Little Store’ on Charlotte St or at Mr James Todd’s place, but the Bonanza store’s variety is impossible to match. If next year’s cocoa crop is as profitable as this year’s we may also terminate our agency contract with Arnott, Lambie and Co and freight our cocoa beans to the Bonanza instead, since they are also produce agents, and stock all the hardware necessary for the sugar and cocoa industry.

Shopping is thirsty work and our energies must be boosted with something cool and refreshing. Happily, nearby is the Merry Widow, which boasts the finest confectionery and pastry as well as ice cream sodas. The jolly proprietor, Mr Dalla Costa, formerly worked in the tea room of the famous Macy’s department store in New York City and returned to Trinidad where this year (1910) he opened his ice cream parlour and tea room. A brass soda fountain is a fixture of the store. It operated with the soda water being stored under pressure. Plain soda is dispensed into a highball glass, and then flavouring added from another tap—cola, orange, vanilla etc. Ice cream can be added to make the ice cream sodas which have the children in ecstasies. Mr Dalla Costa is a charitable man, and has a great deal of sympathy for widows of the upper classes whose dead husbands did not provide for them. He has provided these unfortunate ladies with a room where they can chat and sip tea while they knit elaborate lace and wonderful tea cosies which he displays for sale near the soda fountain. We buy a few dozen pastelles from the Merry Widow, a delicacy for which they are famous and which they take orders for from the great houses of the city, and which they deliver wrapped in banana leaves.

We must once again repair to the hot and dusty Frederick St where we now visit the wrought-iron bedecked store of Mr James Todd where we can get new oil lamps for the home, the old ones being so sooty now that we can no longer read the ‘Home Sweet Home’ painted on the shade. Mr Todd also sells stationery, and we can now purchase blotters, fountain pens and slates for the children in preparation for the new school term which begins after the Christmas holidays. We also check into Miller’s Public Supply stores (also a gem of Mr George Brown’s architecture) where father purchases boxes of shotgun cartridges which are a must on a cocoa estate or else bushy-tailed squirrels and noisy green parrots would soon destroy all the pods which are the livelihood of the family. Father is secretive in his manner because while at the counter paying for the ammunition, he is also paying for a new Triumph bicycle for his eldest son, which will be delivered in time for Christmas as a surprise. He also did not forget mother, and a cast-iron cookstove had already been purchased and is awaiting delivery, so that she need no longer slave over a dirty coal pot to prepare meals.

While we are on this section of Frederick St we pay a visit to the Colonial Dispensary of WC Ross and Co which has been in business for many years. While the children are treated to chocolate bonbons from the confectionery section, mother purchases raw, bitter quinine since malaria is still a killer in the forested regions of the island this substance is the only remedy for the deadly mosquito-borne fever. Also on the list is a bottle of Ferrol compound to build healthy bodies as is Stearn’s Wine of Cod Liver extract.

Back down Frederick St and a brief stop at the stores of Stephens and Co, Mr Bruce Stephens, a resident of Demerara opened his department store in 1896 and is now a rival to the Bonanza as a large, and well stocked emporium. The façade boasts a clock which has never carried erroneous time and is referred to by all and sundry who wish to know the hour. Mr Stephens is also a philanthropist and has established a fund for the destitute children of the city. We only tarry here to buy a few articles of ready-made clothing, particularly a corset for mother and long-johns for father. Although second place to the Bonanza, Mr Stephens still asserts that his emporium is “the best place to buy everything”. Mr Stephens has decorated his store with white cotton wool to resemble snow and has strewn tinsel everywhere. He has imported a curiosity we have never seen before. It is an artificial fir tree and looks near enough to the real article to confuse even the sharpest eyes. He has a few for sale, but at nine dollars each, they are much too expensive for simple country proprietors.

We are now laden with the spoils of shopping and the fading light means that the wonderful savour of Christmas plenty on Frederick St is now drawing to a close. For two shillings, we are chauffeured in style in a horse-drawn cab with its brass lamps and frock-coated cabman who is very polite and speaks patois as do almost all the people on the street. We are now back on the platform of the Trinidad Government Railway and the idling, puffing steam engine is ready to take us home….exhausted and exhilarated after the unique experience of shopping in Port-of-Spain in 1910.

Monos Island is now best known as a holiday resort, but for the latter part of the 18th century and well into the 1920s it was an actual community with public officers, a chapel, and families who resided there all year round. The bays of the island were each occupied by a family, foremost among them being the Tardieus who were the great whalers and fishermen of Trinidad in a bygone era.

Brave, hardy and hospitable, the Tardieus were well known as boat builders as well as fishermen and were synonymous with Monos for nearly two centuries.

Outsiders were few in the isolated island paradise. In 1849 one of the Tardieu girls married a ruddy Scotsman named William Morrison.

He settled in La Vallette (later called Grand Fond) Bay and held the post of government bailiff (sort of like a ward officer charged with collection of rates and taxes) at the puling salary of one pound 18 pence per month.

As such, he farmed and fished to support his wife and family, and who live like the Swiss Family Robinson in their solitude.

The great English author, Charles Kingsley visited Trinidad and Monos, too in 1870. He was enchanted by the lifestyle of Morrison and his brood and soliloquised thus:

“We beached the boat close to the almond-tree, and were welcomed on shore by the lord of the cove, a gallant red-bearded Scotsman, with a head and a heart; a handsome Creole wife, and lovely brownish children, with no more clothes on than they could help.

“An old sailor, and much wandering Ulysses, he is now coast-guardman, water-bailiff, policeman, practical warden, and indeed practical viceroy of the island, and an easy life of it he must have.

“The sea gives him fish enough for his family, and for a brawny brown servant. His coco-nut palms yield him a little revenue; he has poultry, kids, and goats’ milk more than he needs; his patch of provision-ground in the place gives him corn and roots, sweet potatoes, yam, tania, cassava, and fruit too, all the year round.

“He needs nothing, owes nothing, fears nothing. News and politics are to him like the distant murmur of the surf at the back of the island; a noise which is nought to him. His Bible, his almanac, and three or four old books on a shelf are his whole library.

“He has all that man needs, more than man deserves, and is far too wise to wish to better himself.

“I sat down on the beach beneath the amber shade of the palms; and watched my friends rushing into the clear sea, and disporting themselves there like so many otters, while the policeman’s little boy launched a log canoe, not much longer than himself, and paddled out into the midst of them, and then jumped upright in it, a little naked brown Cupid whereon he and his canoe were of course upset, and pushed under water, and scrambled over, and the whole cove rang with shouts and splashing, enough to scare away the boldest shark, had one been on watch off the point.

“I looked at the natural beauty and repose; at the human vigour and happiness: and I said to myself, and said it often afterwards in the West Indies: It is not true that nature is here too strong for man.

“I have seen enough in Trinidad, I saw enough even in’ little Monos, to be able to deny that; and to say, that in the West Indies, as elsewhere, a young man can be pure, able, high-minded, industrious, athletic : and I see no reason why a woman should not be likewise all that she need be.

“A cultivated man and wife, with a few hundreds a year—just enough, in fact, to enable them to keep a Coolie servant or two, might be really wealthy in all which constitutes true wealth and might be useful also in their place; for each such couple would be a little centre of civilisation for the Negro, the Coolie and it may be for certain young adventurers who, coming out merely to make money and return as soon as possible, are but too apt to lose, under the double temptations of gain and of drink, what elements of the “Gentle Life” they have gained from their mothers at home.”

In the 1820s Carenage was a community of free coloured fishermen and small farmers which began to grow after Emancipation in 1834 with the settling of many ex-slaves in the district. The Rev Fr Patrick Smith—himself later to ascend to prominence as the first Archbishop of the Archdiocese of Port-of-Spain—was the parish priest of Carenage from around 1827 and in 1832, and managed to construct a large, gothic stone church which has since been replaced by a mundane concrete structure.

It was dedicated to St Peter, and on the consecration day, June 30, 1832, the Governor, Sir George Fitzgerald Hill and Lady Hill made the trip via the good ship Spartan to Carenage amidst a flotilla of smaller craft for the blessing of St Peter. Even with all this prestige, the settlement remained poor economically (though rich in community spirit) as described in 1857 thus:

“The ward of Carenage extends to the sea on the south. Besides the small river of Cuesa, which traverses the valley from one end to the other, another mountain torrent descends the hills, not far from the mouth of the Diego Martin. There are coco palm plantations along the beach, and a village has been formed in the neighbourhood of the catholic church, which is a neat stone-building, and on which the inhabitants of that impoverished district have spent in labour above 3,000 dollars. On the northcoast, and corresponding to the Carenage valley, is the bay of Maqueripe. The port of Carenage belongs to this ward: the population is mainly composed of fishermen. The district is unhealthy, as also the ward of Chaguaramas. This latter consists of the extremity of the north-west peninsula and the islands of Monos and Gasparillo, with Long and Begorrat’s islands.

This ward is entirely hilly, scantily inhabited, and more scantily cultivated; vegetables and manioc, or bitter cassava, are the principal productions, to which may be added some coffee. The port of Carenage is partly situated in this ward. Petit-Bourg, a miserable assemblage of huts, stands at the lower extremity, and is, from its position, one of the most unhealthy spots in Trinidad. Carenage is separated from Chaguaramas by a large promontory, connected with the mainland by a mere neck 2,000 feet wide, and so low that it is used as a portage.”

Even though it was dedicated to the patron saint of fishermen, the parish church was still inland, and the pious fisherfolk of Carenage longed for a chapel near the sea. In 1870, the energetic Abbe Poujade (1825-87), a Frenchman, was transferred from Chaguanas and began to think about the need for a church near the sea. He was a doctor, builder, architect, shipwright and sculptor. While a man of practical skill, the poor parish could ill afford to fund another church, so the abbe sought other solutions to the need for building materials. His outstations at Teteron and Scotland Bays could only be reached by boat in those days, and on one of these trips, he noticed that at the bay known as L’Anse Paoua, there was an abundance of squarish, castellated stone which would make excellent building blocks with a little work.

From then onwards, at the admonishment of the good father, Carenage fishermen would every day bring back from L’Anse Paoua, a few of the stones which were deposited on a rocky spit of land jutting out to sea, just south of the village. Once the material for the walls had been gathered, work began on the church in earnest. Since the menfolk were out all day trying to earn a living from the sea, the task fell to the women of Carenage to build the church. Using money from his own meagre priest’s salary, the good cleric bought some land in upper Carenage valley from which wood was cut for the rafters of the chapel. Under the instruction and guidance of Abbe Poujade, the women and children took up mallet and chisel to shape the stone for the walls, mortared them into place and, with adze and plane, shaped the rafters. Finally, in 1876 the chapel of Notre Dame de la Mer was completed and consecrated. The statue of St Peter was removed from the yard of the stone church in the village and erected behind the new chapel, facing the sea. Abbe Poujade spent the rest of his life maintaining his little chapel by the sea. First Communion, baptisms and, of course, the Feast Day of St Peter were regular observances. The good priest died on July 31, 1887. His parishioners erected a tablet to his memory in the little sanctuary of the chapel which still is to be seen and reads:

“S. Memoriae Ven. Sacerdos M. Antonii Poujade qui Gallia natus est et muniis boni pastoris laudibilter in hac parochia functus est per 18 annos. In sua patria reverses pie obit die 31 Julii 1887 annos natus 63 . R.IP.”

After the death of the worthy Abbe Poujade, the chapel continued to be a part of the parish, although it was sadly neglected, with fishermen hanging nets on the walls to dry and even a bathhouse being erected six feet from the door by an unscrupulous entrepreneur. In1887 it was described as follows:

“The shore is here indented by miniature bays, rocky headlands, and at high tide the passage round these is of some difficulty, the water being often up to the horse’s girths, while its muddiness obscures the masses of rock which obstruct the way. About two miles of this brings you to St Pierre, where the steamboat jetty has been recently repaired by anchoring the old steam-dredger at its extremity! At the shore end of the pier is a little Catholic chapel, and more inland is a good-sized Roman Catholic Church, with a large statue of the patron saint of the village outside. The late Abbe of the church, Bev Father Poujade, was well known as being a clever amateur organ-builder.”

In 1943 Fr S J Murphy replaced at a cost of $850, the wooden roof and floorboards which had been installed by Abbe Poujade over six decades earlier, but had rotted with the sea blast. Fr Murphy also refinished the walls in plaster, which sadly hid the wonderfully ingenious work of the women of Carenage who cut and fit the stones which were brought from L’Anse Paoua by their menfolk. Although the chapel is now closed most of the time, it is still the place from which the great tradition of St Peter’s Day in Carenage is observed every year. The legacy of Abbe Poujade is commemorated in the street in the village which bears his name today.

The hotel soon became THE venue for high-class entertainment. The dances on Thursday and Saturday nights were proverbial and entrance fee was $1.20 per head. The 1930s saw an in-house band, Roy Rollocks and his Orchestra, providing all the latest music.

The Old Year’s Ball was the premiere social event of the year, and many rich families began to have debutante balls for their daughters.

Dances in this era were the foxtrot and waltz.

Young ladies, up to the 1930s, were expected to be chaperoned, bearing dance cards (carnets de bal) tied to their wrists by a dainty silken cord.

A dance card was issued in advance of every soiree and listed all the various tunes and dances of the event.

On the evening, young men would approach the lady and with her permission, pencil in their names in an empty line next to a dance number which meant that her hand was his for that short interval.

A couple who shared more than two dances were considered to be lewd and improper.

At midnight, a late supper would be served, with parties of friends gathering around a bowl of sauterne or bottle of champagne.

Many of these dance cards were preserved long after these belles of the 1920s and 1930s became old women, as fond mementos of their youth and desirability.

The hotel hosted many dignitaries and in 1935, included among its guests, HRH The Duke of Kent and his new bride Princess Marina who were on a honeymoon tour of Trinidad.

The main building, the original home of the Warners, was demolished in 1937 and replaced by a five-storey block which was considered a triumph of architecture, being then the tallest building in the island…a veritable skyscraper by local standards.

Pan American Airways had been operating a seaplane passenger and mail service from a dock at Cocorite since 1929.

In 1939, they added a new wing to the hotel to accommodate their pilots and crew.

The PanAm wing was demolished in the 1960s, along with the remaining portion of the old Warner house to make way for a swimming pool.

In 1955 ownership of the hotel passed to JB Fernandes who also owned the Trinidad Country Club in Maraval.

This era was a ritzy period in the history of the hotel, as many Hollywood icons stayed here.

When Rita Hayworth and Glenn Ford were filming Affair in Trinidad in 1952, this was their base, as it was too for Rita, Robert Mitchum, and Jack Lemmon during the shoot for Fire Down Below in 1957.

Clark Gable also stayed here in 1948 and wowed legions of female fans, even posing with them for a few photos.

A less-successful visit was that of the main man of the silver screen, the dashing Rock Hudson.

The domination of the QPH as the finest hotel in the island was ended with the construction of the Trinidad Hilton in the 1960s, and the later coming of the Holiday Inn (later Crowne Plaza) with its innovative revolving restaurant.

In the 1990s, the building became the headquarters for British Petroleum subsidiary, bpTT, and now its heyday is just a distant, glitzy memory.

The tale of the La Diablesse originated on the island of Martinique more than three hundred years ago. One has to understand the demonising of the personalities even then and how women were viewed in the Caribbean landscape then and now. Women were viewed as slaves and servants, objects of abuse and the murder of women and instances of severe mutilation were often overlooked by the authorities, especially women of coloured descent.

La Diablesse is symbolic of a woman taking a stance against the atrocities of the time. While she was accused of several murders, she stands today in my painting and the writings of my son Angelo Bissessarsingh as being absolved by history and exonerated of her crimes. Her mutilated body is now depicted in disguise and what comes to us is a beautiful smiling coloured woman, not the horrible demon with vampire teeth and fiery eyes. Her image in the Caribbean landscape as a champion of woman’s rights to life and happiness rings through time in Angelo’s writing. —Rudolph Bissessarsingh

In the rich pantheon of local folkore, it is the fusion of French and West-African identities which gave us the colourful characters which have danced in the stories of our forefathers, handed down like cherished heirlooms from generation to generation.

Earlier this year, I wrote about how the African griot, or storyteller, found new material here in the sugar plantations of the Caribbean where he and his fellows were brutally enslaved.

Trinidad was to receive an infusion of French culture from 1783 when Roume de St Laurent (with the support of the Spanish crown) promulgated the Cedula de Poblacion which offered a land grant to Roman Catholic immigrants and their slaves.

Hundreds of French planters fleeing the seeds of revolution and their chattels came to the island and created a French colony with Spanish rule, which was later to be replaced by British dominion in 1797.

The La Diablesse looms tall in the annals of our mythology. She is the devil woman, the temptress and seductress whose wiles would entrap any man whose ill luck led him into her path.

She is both the paragon of womanly beauty and the image of demonic lust. La Diablesse is well known to all who cherish the stories of yesteryear. Almost every village in Trinidad (particularly in the hamlets of the Northern Range) has a yarn to weave about the beautiful woman in the Martiniquan dress—voluminous skirts, head-tie, hat perched jauntily on her head—who waits along the lonely paths for heedless menfolk who would digress from their courses to accommodate a pretty face.

Those skirts veil, however, the sinister feature for which La Diablesse is infamous, namely the cloven hoof; the cow-foot which distinguishes her from mortal women.

It is largely possible that Martinique was the place of origin of the La Diablesse, since many French settlers came from this island, and the devil woman herself almost always makes an appearance clothed in the style which has become synonymous with the French Antilles.

She appears on the nights when the full moon is the only light that pierces the darkness and she waits on those removed byways where a man is likely to pass.

The eminent 19th-century traveller and writer Lafcadio Hearn spent two years in the West Indies in the 1880s and though he visited Trinidad, the majority of his stay was in Martinique where he documented several aspects of the French Creole culture.

It was Hearn’s memoirs of his West Indian sojourn that introduced La Diablesse to the wider world. In a quarter of the city of St Pierre (which was destroyed with massive loss of life by a volcanic eruption in 1902) he wrote: “Mostly she haunts the mountain roads, winding from plantation to plantation, from hamlet to hamlet. But close to the great towns she sometimes walks: she has been seen at mid-day upon the highway which overlooks the Cemetery of the Anchorage, behind the cathedral of St Pierre.”

In Mr Hearn’s narration, La Diablesse is a tall woman of Afro extraction, simply but elegantly clad and all the men know and fear her. One of the more foolhardy, Fafa, sees her as she passes through his street and falls under her charming spell as she croons a bewitching patois rhythm and takes to a precipitous road leading to the heights above St Pierre.

Fafa’s compere Gaboux follows at a distance but after a while turns in horror and flees since he has seen her most terrible trait—the cloven hoof that hides beneath the sweeping hem of her madras skirts.

Onward and upward Fafa follows the temptress as the craggy roadway arches away from the last signs of humanity towards the gloom of the forest where the dread fer-de-lance makes his lair.

He is now beginning to feel fear but his infatuation supersedes this warning.

Now they are on the summit of a mountain and she reaches for his hand. Hers is as cold as ice as she speaks loving words to the spellbound Fafa. The account written by Mr Hearn terminates thus: “And she, suddenly—turning at once to him and to the last red light, the goblin horror of her face transformed, shrieks with a burst of hideous laughter: “KISS ME NOW.”

For the fraction of a moment he knows her name: then, smitten to the brain with the sight of her, reels, recoils, and, backward falling, crashes 2,000 feet down to his death upon the rocks of a mountain torrent.”

Carnival in Trinidad has its origins in the pre-Lenten masquerade balls staged by French emigrants who began arriving in the island in 1783 under the Cedula of Population.

Slaves mimicked the masked finery of their masters and, after Emancipation, took the celebration to the streets of Port-of-Spain in what soon became known as Canboulay (Cannes brulees or burnt canes, since the festival occurred during the sugar harvest when canes were fired to get rid of sharp leaves and vermin).

The Canboulay was strictly the preserve of the lower classes and its wild revelry was frowned upon by the upper and middle classes who looked upon the pleasures of the masses as sheer barbarism. This cultural conflict resulted in the Canboulay Riots of 1881.

Although the Canboulay clashes tempered the zeal of downtown masqueraders for fighting, they cast no cold water on the events of Carnival Monday and Tuesday.

In the early days of downtown mas, popular chantwells (calypsonians) were the organisers of the bands. The chantwells composed songs around popular themes and this in turn developed the costume design of the band. The compositions were often in patois and thus became the first road march jingles.

This is the era in which formal bands began to be organised, echoing the pretty mas of the upper classes. The planter and merchant classes, primarily the French Creoles, kept their own Carnival festivities in their grand houses and at public venues like the Princes Building (erected in 1871, now the site of the National Academy for Performing Arts), the grounds of the Governor’s (now President’s) House and from 1895, the ballroom of the Queen’s Park Hotel (the site of what is now the bpTT building).

These upper-crust festivities were more restrained than the Canboulay, but were great fun all the same. The music would be supplied by orchestras, and revellers would spend enormous sums to create fantastic costumes.

Elaborate portrayals of Ancient Egypt, Rome and the Court of the Sun King, Louis XIV, were popular themes, as were characters from Shakespeare. Children were not left out and miniature Don Quixotes, Robin Hoods and Queen Victorias played in the gardens of the great houses while their parents waltzed.

With the advent of the automobile in 1900 and the motor truck in 1910, this pretty mas took to the Queen’s Park Savannah, where gaily decorated floats were constructed, depicting everything from The Old Woman Who Lived in a Shoe to a mock-up of a World War I tank.

The pretty mas evolved into bands which were sponsored by major business entities like Neal and Massy and Bonanza Stores, and featured the creativity of many great Carnival artists who later inspired the likes of the late Wayne Berkeley.

The eventual blurring of class and culture lines in a post-emancipation Trinidad and the exodus of many of the white natives in the face of the Black Power Movement of 1970 saw an amalgamation of pretty mas and downtown mas into the great melting pot which is Trinidad Carnival.

Indentureship was not without its own abuse by the plantation owners who still had the consciousness of slave and master engrained in them. The East Indians were given the barest of rations and were sheltered in the same squalid conditions as the former African slaves. The East Indian women escaping poverty and plagues in India had brought with them their resolute tenacity for survival and optimism for a brighter future.

They supplemented theirmeagre rations with their backyard gardens and many of them reared a cow to supply the need for milk. Many of the communities also were self sufficient in paddy production and each village had at least one rice mill that would do a splendid job at grinding and processing the ‘lagoon’ rice. These would be stored in metal or earthen containers for months.

As our country faces the spectre of lean economic times, we must revisit this resoluteness and flexibility to adapt to the changing landscape. Angelo has captured the sacrifice and dedication of our ancestors to make T&T a great civilization, a civilization that stands as a model for the global village.

—Rudolph ``` Anyone from T&T who has dined on authentic Indian dishes, immediately realises that Indo-Trinidadian cooking is a Caribbean experience all on its own and owes as much to its evolution in the west as its origins in the east.

Shortly after the arrival of Indian Indentured Immigrants as a source of cheap, reliable labour, Trinidad’s Colonial Government, under Lord Harris (1846-54), realised that the newcomers had by necessity, to be fed on food that they were accustomed to in India or else they would suffer malnutrition.

Thus, large quantities of foodstuff began arriving in the colony. Paddy rice (Trinidad was already familiar with creole hill rice or red rice, grown by ex-American black soldiers of the Company Villages), split peas (dhal), ghee, and curry spices, all originally sourced exclusively for the Indians, began to find their way into shops and soon formed a foundational part of the national cuisine.

For new Indo-Trinidadians, the commissary of their assigned estates was supposed to supply them with food rations and clothing for the first year of their five-year contract.

This mandatory regulation was often ignored, and some unscrupulous planters even deducted the cost of the rations from the pittance paid to the Indians.

Strictly speaking, the standard allowance was as followed: For every male over 18 years of age per month: 45lbs of rice, 9lbs dhal, 1/4 gallon ghee or coconut oil, 1 1/2 lbs salt, 6 lbs salt fish, 2 lbs onions and chilliest. Women and children received half the rations of men.

At the depot for incoming Indians (up to 1917) at Nelson Island, provisions for the transients consisted of rice, pumpkin, freshly-slaughtered mutton, and chapattis. Most estates allowed the Indians provision grounds to supplement the rations. Where garden plots were allotted, and on small homesteads after their contracts expired, the immigrants grew an abundance of food, which by the 1880s had made them the primary source of vegetables, root crops and milk in the island.

Mangoes were a key ingredient, originating of course in India, as were several varieties of squash, including jhingee and lowkie. By infusing the bare ingredients of the commissariat issue with curry and adding the bounty of the vegetable gardens, wholesome talkarees were created.

These were largely enjoyed only by the Indo-Trinidadian community as good, hearty peasant fare until the advent of the roti shop in the 1940s. With the coming of thousands of American soldiers to the army and air force bases on the island, roti and curry found a new and enthusiastic connoisseur.

Perhaps the greatest example of cultural fusion and the flagship of Indo-Trinidadian food is the ubiquitous doubles, which was born in the 1940s when an enterprising vendor named Mr Ali combined curried chickpeas (channa) with two fried dough slices (bara) and gave T&T its staple fast food.

Today, roti, doubles and other Indo-Trini fare have spread to Europe and America through the diaspora, and remains as wildly popular as ever.

(Published May 10, 2015) 

In the 1850s, Siparia was a sleepy little village lost in the high woods with a population of a few dozen people of mixed Amerindian and African descent. There were no public buildings since it fell under the administration of the Ward of Oropouche which had its seat at St Mary’s Village, in the County of St Patrick.

In the humble tapia church, however, was a little wooden statue possibly made by an Amerindian craftsman or santero, for the purpose of devotion. This statue may have come to the town as early as 1808.

By the 1870s, the Feast of La Divina Pastora was already attracting thousands from across the island as a French priest, Fr Armand Masse noted in 1875:

“At Siparia there is a virgin of great renown in the whole of Trinidad. She is called La Divina Pastora. When they were obliged to leave Siparia, to save this statue from profanation, the Spaniard hid her in the nearby forest where she was found later.

“She was taken back to the village and placed in a shrine, and then the church. Like all Spanish Virgins, that of Siparia is dressed. Remarkable graces were obtained by the intercession of Our Lady of Siparia.”

Among the devotees were Warao, people from the Orinoco Delta and hundreds of Indian indentured labourers who identified with the little brown image and called her Siparee-ke-mai.

Fr Masse recorded the hodgepodge of humanity in his memoir:

“All along the way yesterday, on the eve of the feast, I met pilgrims of all colours going towards the sanctuary.

“They were counted in thousands…The road is very difficult and extremely uneven. Among the vehicles which try to come to Siparia, several broke down on the road.

“One cab tumbled into a ditch; many horses took flight and refused to go further.

“All eventually arrived at Siparia though. Some Waraoons dressed in nothing are at the door of the church. A band of coolies arrives. They sing all night long. At dawn they go to bathe and then come to the chapel. They have brought two cocks which they will offer to the virgin (they call her Siparee maie).

“To make this offering they go to the foot of the altar with the cock and saying their prayers in a loud voice with arms extended, they go to the back of the church, untie the cock and set it free in the church. The old sacristan captures the cock which the cure will soon eat.”

The road described by Abbe Masse is none other than the Siparia Old Road which wends its way towards Oropouche, through Avocat Village.

The presbytery was an elaborate spired wooden edifice which stood opposite the church. It was constructed in 1850, and demolished in the 1960s. In this period, the church itself was nothing more than a simple wooden structure.

There was no grotto for housing the image of the saint, instead a contemporary of Abbe Masse describes the statue as having been placed on a large mound of dirt, and adorned with flowers.

There is no river near Siparia, so the pilgrims would have washed in one of the several wells in the area which were opened by Abbe Masse. One at Well Road still exhibits its original paving. Abbe Masse describes a later episode of the feast as such:

“The road from Oropouche to Siparia was full of coolies. The savannah of the church, the huts, the church, and the village were full. Without precautions being taken they would have set the church on fire with the numerous candles they were lighting.

“The lamps, though there were huge numbers of them, were not sufficient; the oil spilled all over the floorboards. They were disputing among themselves, jostling to obtain the oil, which was burning in front of the virgin.

“The coolies have a noisy devotion. They pray at the top of their voices but then they are distracted. When they prostrate themselves with their forehead on the floor, it seems sometimes they will split their skulls, so hard do they hit their heads against the planks.”

Holy Thursday is still known by some older people as the “Coolie Fete” when La Divina Pastora is removed from the church to the nearby parish hall so Hindus may pay her homage. The procession of the statue through the streets takes place on a Sunday and forms a colourful part of the town’s calendar.