Summary

In Chapter 19, producers of vanilla on the island become known as vanillards. The vanillards become wealthy and influential on the island. Ferréol begins to think of himself as the person who brough all this about, because it was him who taught Edmond. In Chapter 20, Edmond resents Ferréol taking credit and wishes he had a way of asserting that it was he alone who made the discovery. He considers what it would be like to go to school, but is scared by the idea because of a commonly shared story on the island of a black man who was driven to psychosis after attending a school. The story is shared across generations and the black inhabitants of the island come to believe that education would be dangerous for them.

In Chapter 21, the narration recounts the abolitionist movement and the emancipation of slaves...