Although climate change is seen as a very 21st-century concern, back in the eighteenth and early nineteenth century naturalists around the world in places as far apart as Mauritius in the Indian ocean and St Vincent in the Caribbean were becoming aware of what they referred to as desiccation, the drying of the land and absence of rainfall due to the cutting down of large swathes of forest trees. This book traces the connections between those naturalists, scientists and men of letters to reveal the surprising truths that they discovered and which must inspire us to follow the trail they blazed.