corn, peas, etc., more or less raised upon this calcareous
soil.
There is variety of life in the waters, of turtles,
fish, molluscs, and all manner of inhabitants of
shells; and the gathering of sponges, pearls, and
ambergris has been among the occupations of natives
and settlers time out of mind; but the land
fauna is scanty. T h e “ dumb d o g ,” as the Spaniards
called it, of the aborigines was probably the
raccoon, and there were a few small quadrupeds and
reptiles, including the ugly but harmless iguana.
There is no profusion of birds, but among those
worth noticing are the flamingo, the parrot, and
the humming-bird. Cattle, horses, sheep, and
domestic fowl, though not indigenous, thrive in
the climate. And that climate is o f the mild and
genial kind of the verge of the tropic zone surrounded
by the water and the air of the ocean.
T he temperature in summer ranges from 750 to
88° Fahrenheit, and in winter perhaps ten degrees
lower. There is a wet season from May to October
which varies in wetness, and the rest of the year
is delightful with warm sunshine and balmy breezes.
Here is the paradise of delicate lungs and sensitive
throats for those from harsher climes, though the
native negroes are often the victims of pulmonary
weakness. T h e Bahamas are in the occasional track
of the hurricane, which loses much of its strength
by the time it reaches this latitude, but sometimes
sweeps with destructive fury along their scattered
length.
In noting the general arrangement and characteristics
of the principal islands, we will begin with that
nearest the Florida coast, barely sixty miles off Palm
Beach. It is the Great Bahama, which retains the
native name of the whole group. I t is long and
narrow, but lies across the head of the plateau instead
of along its length like most of the others. ^ It
has always been sparsely peopled and of little importance,
and its present small population is mostly
descended from a few Scotch planters and their
slaves. T o the east of it are L ittle and Great Abaco.
Great Abaco was the Y u ca y a of the aborigines, who
called themselves Yucayos. This is one of the most
populous of the islands, having about 4000 inhabitants,
mostly whites and descendants of loyalists who
left the Carolinas after the revolutionary war. I t
is also one of the wooded islands which makes some
use of its timber. Its chief village is Hopetown,
built on a narrow peninsula.
Below these islands, which stand at the head of the
group, are the two branches of the Providence Channel,
and just where these flow into one lies the small
but important island of New Providence. It is
nearly oval in form, extending east and west, and is
barely sixteen and a half miles long b y six miles
wide; but it contains a population of nearly 15,000,
more than one fourth of that of the whole Bahama
group. Two thirds of the inhabitants live in the
town of Nassau, the capital of the colony and its
one important port. I t is the position of this island
at the converging of the channels and in the narrow
line of deep-water navigation, and the fact that its
harbour will admit vessels of fifteen feet draught,