90 VISITS TO MADAGASCAR. chap. iv. were regaled with a sort of sweetened drink, or syrup, and we returned to M. Cheron’s, where a company of between twenty and thirty sat down to what was designated a dejeuner, but in reality a substantial dinner, under the broad verandah out side the house. M. Cheron is a person of colour, and a man of great force of character, as well as energy and intelligence; a respectable and prosperous planter, owning more than one estate, and employing 356 Indian labourers. He is a member of the church under the pastoral care of M. Le Brun, in Port Louis, and a zealous and efficient coadjutor in the promotion of measures for the instruction and spiritual benefit of the people in the district in which he resides, and where he is held in high and deserved estimation. Towards evening I walked with M. Cheron over part of his plantation, admiring the view of rich and varied land scape of cane-fields and mountains, which successive elevations afforded; and almost astonished at the size attained by the canes, which in some places were twelve or fifteen feet high. Soon after nine the next morning I joined the family assembly in the great house. It was quite a patriarchal gathering. Besides M. and Mme. Cheron, and their oldest son and daughter in the prime of youthful life, the father and mother of the former Mme. Cheron, and one of her sisters, were permanent members of the household. Then there was another sister, a widow, and several daughters, besides others more or less related to the hospitable host. All appeared to constitute one harmonious family. The breakfast-table was spread at one end of a large verandah, perhaps eight feet wide, and extending the whole length of the house. The viands were abundant, rice being the substitute for bread, and, as a guest, I was provided with tea. In the forenoon I accompanied M. Cheron to his sugar- works, where the new processes of preparing the sugar by