Page:Africa by Élisée Reclus, Volume 4.djvu/559

 approaches, which render it quite inaccessible to vessels of heavy draught. Yet a few Creole traders have already settled at Andovoranto, defying the pestiferous atmosphere of the surrounding swamps and stagnant waters.

Farther north follows a succession of sugar-cane plantations and cocoa-nut groves; but all attempts have been given up to cultivate the coffee shrub, which has been attacked and destroyed by hemileia vastatrix. Near the route leading from Andovoranto to Tananarivo is situated a far-famed and still much-frequented

thermal spring, where the Hovas formerly assembled to perform sanguinary rites.

Tamatave, or Toamasina, the St. Thomas of the early Portuguese navigators, although 60 miles farther from the capital than Andovoranto, is the busiest seaport in the whole of Madagascar. At this spot the coast develops a narrow promontory projecting eastwards and terminating in a coral reef which forms the parting-line between e northern and a southern bay. The former is further sheltered from the surf and breakers by another barrier reef, which stretches for