Sugar is the life of Mauritius, and it is losing its grip.

Its downward course was checked by the depreciation of the rupee--for the planter pays wages in rupees but sells his crop for gold--and the insurrection in Cuba and paralyzation of the sugar industry there have given our prices here a life-saving lift; but the outlook has nothing permanently favorable about it.

It takes a year to mature the canes--on the high ground three and six months longer -- and there is always a chance that the annual cyclone will rip the profit out of the crop.

In recent times a cyclone took the whole crop, as you may say; and the island never saw a finer one.

Some of the noblest sugar estates in the island are in deep difficulties.