1

from the authorities of Herodotus and Cicero; the former recording the existence of it among the Nasamones, a people who inhabited the countries between Egypt and Carthage; and the latter relating the same circumstance of the ancient Persians. I am inclined to believe that this practice prevailed also in the country and age of the patriarchs;-for how otherwise are we to understand the Scripture phrase oF GATHERING UP THE FEET OF THE DYING? "And when Jacob had made Ian end of commanding his sons, HE GATHERED UP HIS "FEET INTO THE BED, and yielded up the ghost.||

Many other corresponding circumstances may be traced in Herodotus. Thus when he enumerates the army of Xerxes, he observes of the ancient Ethiopeans, that they used bows and arrows in battle, and painted their bodies with crimson.* The coincidence between these people and the Charaibes in both these respects, can hardly, I think, be ascribed to chance, and it is such as instinct could not have produced.

Equally prevalent among the Charaibes, and many of the ancient nations in the eastern part of the old hemisphere, were the superstitious rites of shortening the hair and wounding the. body, in religious ceremonies and lamentations for the dead. That these practices were usual among the heathens, so early as the days of Moses, is evident from the injunction which the Lord laid on the children of Israel to avoid them. "Ye shall "not round the corners of your head, neither shalt thou mar "the corners of thy beard. Ye shall not make any cuttings "in your flesh for the dead, nor print any marks upon "you."+ Again,-" Ye are the children of the Lord, your "God: Ye shall not cut yourselves, nor make any baldness

Gen. c. xlix. V. 33.

* Book vii.

+ Levit. c. xix. v. 27.

"between your eyes for the dead." Among the heathens however the same ceremonies were still continued; for in Samaria, in the days of Ahab, king of Israel, it is recorded of the prophets of Baal that, in worshipping their idol "they "cried aloud and cut themselves after their manner with "knives and lances till the blood gushed out upon them."§ At this day the islanders of the South sea express grief and lamentation for the dead in the very same manner.

But perhaps the instance the most apposite and illustrative, was the habit among the Charaibes of chewing the betele, preparing it with calcined shells precisely after the manner of the Indians in the east ;-a circumstance, which, though recorded by P. Martyr,|| had escaped my researches, until it was pointed out to me by Mr. Long. Some other resemblances, almost equally striking, might be collected; but the reader will probably think that more than enough has already been said on a subject, the investigation of which he may perhaps deem a mere matter of idle curiosity, neither contributing to the improvement of science, nor the comfort of life.

Here then I conclude. An attempt to trace back the Charaibes of the West Indies to their progenitors, the first emigrants from the ancient hemisphere, in order to point out, with any degree of precision or probability, the era of their migration, were (like the voyages I have been describing) to venture on a ♥ast and unknown ocean without a compass; and even without one friendly star to guide us through the night of conjecture.

Deut. c. xiv. v. 1.

§1 Kings, c. xviii. v. 28.

Decad. viii. c. vi.

CIVIL AND COMMERCIAL,

OF THE

BRITISH COLONIES

IN THE

WEST INDIES.

BOOK II.

JAMAICA.*

CHAPTER I.

Discovery of Jamaica by Columbus.-His return in 1503. -Spirited proceedings of his son Diego, after Columbus's death. Takes possession of Jamaica in 1509.-Humane conduct of Juan de Esquivel, the first Governor.-Establishment and desertion of the town of Sevilla Nueva.Destruction of the Indians.-St. Jago de la Vega founded. -Gives the title of Marquis to Diego's son Lewis, to whom the Island is granted in perpetual sovereignty.-Descends to his sister Isabella, who conveys her rights by marriage to the House of Braganza.- Reverts to the crown of Spain in 1640.-Sir Anthony Shirly invades the Island in 1596. and Col. Jackson in 1638.

JAN

AMAICA had the honour of being discovered by
Christopher Columbus, in his second expedition

* It may be proper to observe, that the governor of Jamaica is stiled in his commission Captain-general, &c, of Jamaica and the territories

to the New world. In his former voyage he had ex'plored the north-eastern part of Cuba, proceeding from thence to Hispaniola; but he had returned to Europe in doubt whether Cuba was an island only, or part of some great continent, of which he had received obscure accounts from the natives. To satisfy himself in this particular, he determined, soon after his arrival a second time at Hispaniola, on another voyage to Cuba, by a south-westerly course, and, in pursuance of this resolution, on the 24th of April, 1494, Columbus sailed from the, port of Isabella, with one ship and two shallops. On Tuesday the 29th, he anchored in the harbour of St. Nicholas. From thence he crossed over to Cuba, and coasted along the southern side of that island, surrounded by many thousand canoes filled with Indians, whom curiosity and admiration had brought together. In this navi

thereon depending in America. By these DEPENDENCIES were meant the British settlements on the Musquito shore, and in the bay of Honduras : But his jurisdiction over those settlements having been imperfectly defined, was seldom acknowledged by the settlers; except when they wished to plead it in bar of the authority claimed by their respective superintendants. On such occasions they admitted a superior jurisdiction in the governor of Jamaica, and applied to him for commissions civil and military. As both the settlements were surrendered to the crown of Spain by the Spanish convention signed at London on the 14th of July 1786, it comes not within the plan of my work to enter on a display of their past or present state. I formerly drew up a memorial concerning the settlement on the Musquito-shore, wherein an account was given of the country, its inhabitants and productions, and the question between Great Britain and Spain, as to the territorial right, pretty fully discussed, This memorial having been laid before the House of Commons in 1777 (by Governor Johnstone) was soon afterwards published in Almon's Parliamentary Register for that year.