As was the case in other West Indian islands, the aborigines were quickly exterminated by the Spanish conquerors and their places filled with negro slaves. A number of French and Creole settlers came to Trinidad in 1780, and about the middle of the following century Portuguese refugees from Madeira joined the colony. After the abolition of slavery by Great Britain in 1834, many Hindus were brought in under contract. The soil of the island is very rich and well adapted to the growing of sugar cane and other tropical products. The sugar plantations are found in the level country bordering on the Gulf of Paria, where the soil is a dark clay, and which has been described as one of the finest stretches of sugar land in the West Indies. As a result of the financial distress of 1895, which caused the home government to pass relief measures, a number of plantation owners were compelled to dispose of a portion of their land to farmers, who grew cane upon it and sold the crop to the sugar factories. It is estimated that today about twenty-five per cent of the cane worked up by the factories is furnished by these small growers, the remainder being raised by the owners of the estates. Grinding begins in January and is finished in May or June. Trinidad has its own agricultural station, which is chiefly devoted to the study of sugar-cane culture. It has been of great service to the industry in determining the kinds of cane that can be most profitably grown, in fighting cane diseases and pests and in working out fertilization problems. From 1855 to 1887 an average crop of 59,774 tons was turned out by ninety estates. Of this total, 28,500 tons were vacuum-pan sugar and the rest muscavado. In 1896, 62,975 tons of sugar were made by thirty-nine estates. Seven of these made 2000 tons of common muscavado, six made 5500 tons of centrifugal muscavado, and the remaining twenty-six made vacuum-pan sugar. A report made in that year concerning sugar estates in Trinidad sets forth that advantage has been taken of the most modern improvements in boilers, furnaces, multiple evaporators, crushing mills and other machinery. Trinidad produces a large amount of what are known as “yellow crystals,” which are sold in the British market for direct consumption and command a premium over the ordinary raw sugar. Statistics compiled in 1909 show that the colony then had sixteen sugar factories, which turned out 52,972 tons of sugar, and the recovery represented 8.74 per cent of the weight of the cane; 451,801 tons of this cane were grown by the estates and 154,663 tons by the small farmers. There were 11,401 of the latter, 6077 of whom were East Indians and 5324 West Indians. Trinidad is the only West Indian colony where the attempt to fill the places of negro laborers with coolies from India has been successful. The production of sugar since 1900 has been as follows: