A tour to the Angostura Bitters factory went on without me. I opted to stay behind and enjoy some solitude on Skylark. Ed learned some interesting things about the factory; here is what he told me. The famous bitters were developed by Dr. Siegert in 1824. He was a surgeon recognized during the battle of Waterloo for his work in the army for the Brits. One of the commanders in that battle was governor of Trinidad and so the Dr. learned about this area from him. After the war he moved to Angostura, Venezuela and did research on herbal medicine. He developed the herbal recipe distilled with alcohol to make this medicinal aromatic elixir used to treat a large range of ailments in humans. He also discovered it was great to be added to drinks and foods. At the time a war broke out in Venezuela Dr. Seigert had a Venezuelan wife and 5 children. They left that country and came to Trinidad where he started making angostura aromatic bitters. He never told anyone what herbs were used or what the recipe was. Only 5 men in the world have ever known it. Their agreement is that they are never to be in the same place at the same time so that if they die, the recipe won’t be lost. The board of directors decides who the next keepers of the secret recipe will be. Dr Seigert's sons owned a lot of the sugar factories in the Port of Spain during slavery so the family got into the rum business as well.