As  the  boys  started  out  to  see  what  sugaring  for  moths
would  produce  on  the  outskirts  of  the  town,  that  night,
the  Doctor  told  them  that  for  many  years  Cap  Haitien
had  been  known  to  historians  as  "the  ill-fated  City,"  and,
at  their  request  he  told  them  some  stories  from  its
history,  in  explanation  of  that  name.
The    town    had   been    first    settled    as    the    site   for   a


158  The  Butterfly  Hunters

European  colony  in  1670,  soon  after  the  French  bucca-
neers had  possessed  themselves  of  their  part  of  the  island
from  the  Spanish  conquerors.  The  French  were  quick  to
see  that  this  was  the  best  harbor  and  pleasantest  place  on
the  north  shore,  which  was  and  still  is  very  superior  to
the  south,  both  in  climate  and  fertility.  But  from  the
first,  and  always,  the  French  showed  that  their  fiery
tempers  made  poor  slave-owners  of  them,  and  in  1791,  at
the  very  height  of  its  prosperity  and  power,  when  it
claimed  to  be  the  chief  port  in  the  West  Indies,  on  the
night  of  August  22d,  the  slaves  on  the  plantations  in
the  interior  plains,  most  of  whose  masters  had  their  homes
in  the  wealthy  little  city,  rose  in  a  body  at  a  preconcerted
signal ;  and  before  any  one  was  aware  of  their  intention,
every  estate  had  been  put  to  the  torch.  Cane  fields  burn
like  tinder,  and  the  addition  of  storehouses  of  rum,  and
sugar  mills,  soon  lit  up  the  whole  heavens  with  a  vast
conflagration.  All  the  pent-up  hatred  of  long  years,  on
the  part  of  the  slaves  for  their  cruel  masters,  burst  forth,
and  they  rushed  upon  the  defenceless  planters  and  their
families,  butchering  them  by  the  hundred,  and  throwing
their  dismembered  bodies  into  the  flames.
