1836
"A Young Englishman's First Residence in Jamaica. By a Widow... Ashton, 1836"
"A very curious and extraordinary
phenomenon has lately (in the year 1810) occurred at a lake called Rio Hoe, in the Parish of St Ann, at no great distance
from here.
(The "Widow" wrote from "Spring Mount" in St
Ann.)
"It was always an object worthy of notice, receiving a considerable supply
of water without any visible outlet and finding its way through some subterraneous passage
into the sea. Since the month of June last, the water has been accumulating to
a vast body, rising each day upwards of six inches perpendicular, as well in the dry as rainy seasons; several houses, as
well as the buildings containing the sugar works of Rio Hoe Plantation, are completely overwhelmed, and it is estimated that
upwards of five thousand acres of land are now inundated, and the lake still continues to increase.
"From Walton School (which is situated on a considerable
eminence adjacent) the prospect of such an immense sheet of water, interspersed with small islands covered with palm and other
trees, is picturesque and romantic beyond description, and considerably heightened by the abundance of wild fowl skimming
about the surface of the lake.
