The Land of the Pink Pearl, or recollections of life in the Bahamas

Front matter

CEIBA, OH SILK COTTON TREE. [Page 30. THE LAND OF THE PINK PEARL OB RECOLLECTIONS OF LIFE IN THE BAHAMAS BY L. D. POWLES L or the inner temple barrister at law LATE CIRCUIT JUSTICE IN THE BAHAMA ISLANDS LONDON SAMPSON LOW, MARSTON, SEARLE, & RIVINGTON Limited §t. Jtanstan'a J)<rost Fetter Lane, Fleet Street, E.C. 1888 [_AU rigl.ts reserved] LONDON : tfilNTED BT GILBEKT AWD RIVINQTON- LIMITED, st. John's house, cleekenwell road. PBEFACE. The day before I corrected the last proof of this work a prominent West Indian merchant said to me, " Why do you waste your time writing about the Bahama Islands ? We in the West Indies know no more about the Bahamas than we do about an Irish village." No doubt he said no more than the truth, for though included in the list of her Majesty's West Indian possessions, the Bahamas have so little in common with the other islands that I believe a man might spend his life travelling about the rest of the West Indies without ever hearing their name, and I am sure he might pass his days in the Bahamas and have no more idea of the mode of life or condition of the poeple in the rest of the West Indies than if he had never been beyond the limits of an English county.

What can be more noteworthy than the fact that Mr. Fronde, in his recently published work, never even mentions the Bahama Islands ? That he should not have visited them was natural enough, for there is no communication by steam between them and the other islands, and A Preface. IV the only way he could have reached their only city, Nassau, would have been by a chance sailing vessel or by going round by New York, and either plan would have occupied too much time. But that he should not even mention them goes far to prove how little they come within the range of thought or observation of the ordinary West Indian tourist. Again, Mr. Salmon, whose acquaintance I have had the honour of making during the progress of this work, tells me that until he met me, the idea of including the Bahamas in any scheme of West Indian Confederation never entered his head.

As my friend says, " they are as little known in the West Indies as an Irish village," whilst in the mother country their name is never heard outside the walls of the Colonial Office, unless it be among the supporters of the S.P.G.. or the Wesleyan and Baptist Missions. But many an interesting story has been told of an Irish village, and it may be my readers will find interest in my story of this obscure corner of her Majesty's dominions, which may well be termed the outpost of the New World, seeing that it was one of the Bahama Islands that Columbus first sighted. The present moment is not inopportune to write on West Indian matters, as Mr. Fronde has of late turned the attention of the English reading' public in that direction. His book has provoked a great deal of hostile Preface. V criticism from a portion of the press, principally on two grounds.

Chapter I

Discovery of the Bahamas — Difficulty of obtaining information about them — Start from Dartmouth — On board the Belair — Slow voyage — A mysterious visitor — Result of insubordination — Pass the Azores — Arrival at Bermuda — Hamilton Harbour — Three days at Hamilton — " The Devil's Hole " — A sad boat-accident — Start for St. George's — Stranded on a reef — " Freddy " — Joyce and Walsingham Caves — Tom Moore's calabash-tree — Sketch of Bermudian history — Bermudian birds — A clever boy — Start for Nassau

Chapter II

Arrival at Nassau — The Santiago — Landing — First case — Description of Nassau — Historical sketch — Murder of aborigines by the Spaniards — Discovery of New Providence — Grant by Charles II. — Early Governors — Blackbeard — " Expulsis Piratis " — Period of prosperity — Emancipation — Disappearance of the planters — Wrecking — Blockade-running — Decay of agriculture — Withdrawal of subsidy — Results — Failure of Government bank — Bankruptcy imminent — " Conchs " — Constitution — Corruption at elections — Circuit Justices' Act — Jobbery of Lower House — What might have been ...... Contents. PAGE

Chapter III

First circuit — The Eastern Queen— Berry Islands— An old negro's grave — The Biminis— Duties of a circuit justice — Wrecking— The slave trade — Ponce de Leon — Grand Bahama — Thoughts of Bierstadt — Life in the out-islands— School inspection— "Vargas's English — A dreary calm—" Guaccinango " — Sea-gardens — Diving for sponges — Sunday on board — Green Turtle Cay — Novel mode of assessment — Hopetown— The Queen's English— Abaco and the Abaconians — Mr. McDonald — Return to Nassau — Start again — A week of excitement — Captain Sam Rahmings — Mr. McGregor — A snow-white sea sprite — Andros Island — Evicting a squatter — Entertainment at Golden Cay— Home again .... 48

Chapter IV. Condition

of the coloured race in the BAHAMA ISLANDS. The truck system — Modern slavery — Sponge and turtle fisheries — Pine-apple industry — Sold in slavery to Surinam — Governor Blake's views — The Freeman — Letter from The Key of the Gulf — Cases of oppression and injustice — Difficulties in the way of equal justice between black and white — Possible results — Possible remedies . . . . . . .84

Chapter V

Nassau society — The upper crust — Children of Ham — Social conservatism — Indifference to the outer world — The nobles of the land — Accent and pronunciation — " Boa-constrictor meal " — Afternoon visits — Scandal — Sterling good qualities — Dancing — Hospitality — Difficulties as to food — Government House etiquette — Opening of the Houses — Debate in the Lower House. ....... Contents. IX PAGE

Chapter VI

The lower crust of Nassau society — Obligations to Mr. Drysdale — Coloured settlements — Soil of New Providence — Is the negro really lazy t— Question of feeding — Thoughts on Emancipation — Market weights and measures — Food of the people — Nassau pigs — Unhealthy nature of negro settlements — Duty of Imperial Government — Inner life — Manners and customs — Dance-houses — Fire dances — Houses of the coloured people — Nassau dogs and cocks — Grog-shops — Costume — Boots and shoes — Nassau negrology — Swearing — Names — Money — African thatch — Shouter hymns — Negro proverbs — Mr. Drysdale's " Evening at Morley's " — Mr. Drysdale on the lower crust . , . . . . . .137

Chapter VII

Royal Victoria Hotel — Climatic advantages of Nassau as a health resort — No fear of yellow fever — Road from England — Ward line of steamers — Management of Hotel — Life at Hotel — Polo and base ball — Practical jokes — Visit to Shouter Church — Some visitors to Nassau — General Armstrong of Hampton, Virginia, and his work — Sights of Nassau — Fort Charlotte — Fish market — Tortoiseshell shops — Queen's Staircase — Eastern Parade — St. Matthew's Churchyard — Thompson's folly — Fort Montagu — Sandilands and Foxhills — The Lake of Fire — Lakes Killarney and Cunningham — Caves — Adelaide — Clifton — Departed glories . . . . . . . . .178

Chapter VIII

Start on second circuit — The Albury and Malone — Dunmore Town, Harbour Island — Curious land tenure — Highly paid officials — What the bell says — Contents. X PAGE 202 Spanish wells — The blutf — A formal reception — " 'Count o' dem hogs " — Race prejudice — " Current Settlement " — The narrow passage and the glass windows — The Cove — A morning's tossing — Hatchard's Bay — A deputation — Starving through the truck system — Asked to license bigamy — Governor's Harbour — Carey again — Mr. Drysdale's namesake — Genuine hospitality — The Cay Lawyer — Agricultural prospects — Onions and pineapples — A lucky loss — An honest wreck — St. Patrick to the rescue — Demoralization of Lulu — Savannah Sound — The brothers Gibson — An African schoolmaster — Struck blind — Pretty birds — Tarpum Bay — A vindictive policeman — Rock Sound — The Ocean Hole — A handsome Sambo — Captain Billy — Wemys's Bight — Millar's Sound — " Dem hogs again " — San Salvador or Cat Island — Arthur's Town — The Bight — Spot for an Agricultural College — Past and present — Rev. F. Barrow Matthews — Work of the Anglican Church — Obeah — The cemetery — Savannah cuckoos— Port Howe — Mrs. Smith's hospitality — A precocious child — Landfall of Columbus — Modern theories versus ancient tradition — Origin of name of Cat Island — Longevity of inhabitants. .....

Chapter IX

Catching a kingfish — Rum Cay — Another highly paid official — A flying mail— Sail versus steam — A new lighthouse — Watling's Island — Lighthouse tender Richmond — Captain Clapp — Grave of Captain Savage — Negro superstition — Hunting in couples — " De ole standard " — Jem Arnett again — " Isaiah " — Arrival at Fortune Island — Firing a salute — Life at Fortune Island — Miss . — Rum stops the way — Off again — A solemn pelican — The Margate fish The Conch and the Pink Pearl — A monarch of the Contents. XI PAGE 245 305 sea — Running for shelter— Jamaica Bay — A good afternoon's fishing — A Job's comforter — A tedious journey — Catching a dolphin — Inagua past and present — A Devonshire lady — Post-office eccen tricities — A fat shark — Ragged Island — Her Majesty's birthday — Hauling — The House of Assembly and the out-islands — A curious career — The magistrate on the Cubans — Another tedious journey — Long Island — A tropical walk — Mr. O'Con nor — A lizard at dinner — Good-bye to the Inspector — Slow locomotion — Man proposes — " Jem " the pig — Warnings despised — A short tornado and narrow escape — Will the coloured people work? — Long Cay again — Generous hospitality — A fair wind at last — ■ Return to Nassau — The out-islanders — Their opinions — Their kindness and hospitality — More evils of present Constitution — Ave Imperatrix — Conclusion .

Appendix

. History of the Lightbourn Case MAP OF THE BAHAMAS AND NEIGHBOUEING ISLANDS, for "THE LAND OF THE PINK PEAEL," By L. D. POWLBS, of the Inner Temple, Barrister-at-Law, late Circuit Justice of the Bahama Islands.

Chapter I

Discovery of the Bahamas — Difficulty of obtaining information about them — Start from Dartmouth — On board the Belair — Slow voyage — A mysterious visitor — Eesult of insubordination — Pass the Azores — Arrival at Bermuda — Hamilton Harbour — -Three days at Hamilton — " The Devil's Hole " — A sad boat-accident — Start for St. George's — Stranded on a reef — " Freddy " — Joyce and Walsingham Caves — Tom Moore's calabash-tree — Sketch of Bermudian history — Bermudian birds — A clever boy — Start for Nassau. On an October night, towards the close of the fifteenth century, Christopher Columbus stood on the deck of the Santa Maria and watched a light moving upon the dim horizon, which satisfied him that the crowning success of his life was near at hand. Next morning, October 12th, 1492,1 he set foot for the first time on the outskirts of the New World.

He had discovered the Bahama Islands ! 1 This date is variously given ; I have taken Sir Arthur Helps as my authority. h Well-nigh 400 years had rolled away since then, yet when in the summer of 1886 I was appointed to the post of stipendiary and circuit justice in the Bahama Islands, I knew little more about them than Christopher Columbus when he first saw that light. I had an idea they were in the West Indies, that was all. Wherever I applied for information among my own countrymen, I found the same ignorance prevailing about them and everything connected with them, and even persons well acquainted with the rest of the West Indies scarcely seemed to know their name. On one or two occasions I came across persons who volunteered to give me information, but after a minute or two I invariably found they thought I was inquiring about Barbadoes.

On the other hand, all the Americans I came across — and they were not a few — knew some thing about the Bahamas. But then they only knew the principal city, Nassau, as a pleasant winter health-resort, a sort of tropical Mentone, where there was an excellent hotel open during the season. Of the inhabitants, their habits, the expense of living outside the hotel, and other details, they could tell me nothing. At the Colonial Office I learned that Nassau was inaccessible by the ordinary West India mail route, and that there were in fact but two ways of Start from Dartmouth. 3 getting there, the one via New York, the other by Messrs. Scrutton & Co.'s steamers, running direct from London to Belize, in British Honduras, and calling at Nassau en route. I chose the latter line, and on Monday, October 4th, 1886, my wife and I joined our vessel at Dartmouth, where we discovered for the first time that we were to call at Bermuda on the way out, instead of going direct to Nassau, as the owners had distinctly told us we should.

The idea was by no means unpleasant in itself, as it meant a visit to a beautiful and interesting island which we should most probably never have the chance of seeing again, but unfortunately, in our case, it meant also the loss of at least a fortnight's full pay. If, however, we might complain of being mis led on this point, on another the owners had certainly not deceived us. They had promised us we should be very comfortable, and very comfortable we were. Our steamer, the Belair, of Glas gow, was of 1500 tons, and had capital accommo dation for a limited number of passengers. We were but thirteen in the saloon ; and the com mander, Captain D , we shall always remember with friendship. Our fellow-passengers consisted of a Govern ment official, two ladies, a little boy and girl, and a maid bound for Belize ; four young men, three of whom were going to take orders, a i. coloured woman, and our two selves, bound for Nassau.

Besides the human passengers we had four foxhounds, on their way to form the nucleus of a drag pack at Belize, and a pug belonging to one of the ladies. When not on duty the captain devoted his time mainly to his passengers, who were always glad of his company. As there was no doctor on board, he watched over our physical condition with a solicitude that did him infinite credit, though I fear his favourite remedy for sea-sick ness — charcoal and water — was not universally successful. We were welcome to his chart-room at all hours, save for half an hour at noon, and there we picked up a good deal of information about navigation and geography. The bridge was also always open to us, except in the Channel or when going in or out of port, a privilege we could not possibly have enjoyed on board an Atlantic liner.

Besides an excellent collection of English charts, Captain D carries those published monthly by the American Hydrographic Office, and presented to captains of vessels and others in a position to give valuable information, who will keep special logs for the Society. Every voyage he takes, Capain D keeps one of these, containing the most On Board the " Belair." 5 minute information as to wind and weather, or any thing else worth noting. On his last voyage ho met with a floating wreck in lat. 32°, which may still be knocking about the Atlantic highway, to the great danger of anything passing in the dark. This fact was at once communicated to the American Hydrographic Office, and the exact spot marked on the next "monthly publication of the Society. The service thus rendered to navi gation is enormous.

Apropos of charts, how wonderful it seems that every part of the Atlantic should have been exactly measured, and each day at noon, when the navigator takes his observations and finds out where he is, he has but to glance at his chart to see exactly what depth of water he is in ! 2 Our voyage was not specially remarkable in any way except for its extreme slowness. 2 I was not aware till I learned it from our skipper, that the Board of Trade regulations not only require all vessels to carry charts with all the latest improvements, but also hold the captains responsible for shipwrecks arising from the use of old charts. This is not fair. Many shipowners require captains to find their own charts, and even chronometers, on a salary of 10Z. or 12Z. a month. Why should not the present liability be shifted from the captain on to the owner ?

Again, why should not shipowners be liable to punishment when their captains fail to burn proper lights at night 1 At present it is very common to meet sailing-vessels in the Atlantic burning no lights at night, to economize oil. Collision or no collision, this is an oifence that ought not to go unpunished. One day when we were at least several hundred miles from land, a little bird like a mule canary paid us a visit and remained with us about two days, during which time it got so tame that it would come close up to us to be fed. All of a sudden it disappeared mysteriously, probably through the agency of the officers' cat. One night we had a severe lesson against acting on our own responsibility. The captain had ordered all the ports on the starboard side of the vessel to be closed. About two in the morning, all we who slept on that side seem to have obeyed a common impulse which caused us to awaken and open our ports at the same moment.

For this act of insubordination we were rewarded by getting everything in our state-rooms drenched with salt water. On the 9th of October we passed the Azores, between Mores and Corva, though the weather was so thick we could not see them, and it was not until about 5.30 on the afternoon of Thursday, October 21st, we arrived off St. David's Light house, Bermuda, having only averaged 175 miles a day up to this point. It was quite dark by the time we got close in, so we burned a blue light for a pilot, who shortly afterwards came on board. As he could not take us into harbour till daylight, we had to lay to all night. I have had some experience of laying to Arrival at Bermuda. 7 in a sailing-vessel, since then, and it is not a pleasant process ; but I think I never went through anything more disagreeable than that night's wobble.

As soon as it was light, we were on the move and most of us on deck, for we had all been reading Lady Brassey's account of the Sunbeam's voyage to this place, and were on the look-out for St. George's Narrows, of which she gives so graphic a description, and through which we had to pass on our road to Ireland Island at the entrance to Hamilton Harbour. We had been fully an hour on our road, looking out on all sides for the first glimpse of the Narrows, when we suddenly discovered to our astonishment that we had been in them all the time. Our imagination had led us completely astray. We had pictured to ourselves a sort of river, bounded by fantastically-shaped coral rocks coming at least half-way up the vessel's side. Instead of this nothing was visible above the surface of the water, the road being through subaqueous coral reefs and marked out by buoys.

The whole coast of Bermuda is protected in this way by reefs stretching as far as from ten to fifteen miles out to sea, and if the buoys were removed the island would at once become impregnable, as no vessel of any size could get in. The coast-line from St. David's Lighthouse to Ireland Island is very pretty. It is bounded all the way by coral rocks and caves, above which rise gently-sloping heights clothed with cedar woods, and studded with houses, of which even the roofs are pure white. We were about two hours passing through St. George's Narrows, and between 8 and 9 a.m. arrived off Ireland Island, where we had to wait for the afternoon tide to take us up to Hamilton. We were soon boarded by the steamer's agent, who carried off our captain and one or two of our passengers to Hamilton in a Bermudian dingy, a capital class of sea-boat, very broad in the beam, cutter rigged with a shoulder-of-mutton sail.

Meantime we were left at anchor to contemplate the scene around us, refreshing enough to eyes that for nearly three weeks had gazed on nothing but the ocean. On one side of us lay Mount Langton, the richly-wooded residence of the governor of the island, and on the other the celebrated Bermuda floating dock. Lying close by us were the Himalaya and Orontes troopships, both under orders to sail next day, the former for England, the latter for Halifax. We could see the redcoats crowding the decks and wharfs, or moving busily to and fro between the two. Inside the dockyard lay the Canada, in which Arrival at Bermuda. 9 H.R.H. Prince George of Wales made his first voyage. On the other side of us lay a big steamer from Hartlepool, and a barque on board of which a windmill was at work. This had attracted our captain's eye as soon as we got in sight of her.

He told me the windmill was pumping her out, and expressed it as his opinion that she was probably a condemned English ship which had been purchased cheap by some German who was prepared to send her to sea and run the risk of her sinking or swimming, in order to take the bread out of English sailors' mouths by under carrying them. Everything German is a red rag to Captain D , and I regret to say that some months later the sudden appearance of a British steamer about the same class as the Belair, produced a very similar effect on the first officer of an American mail steamer called the Santiago. He was a particularly quiet, civil man, but at the sight of this apparently harmless British steamer sailing quietly into the harbour of New York, he burst out with a torrent of abuse unfit for publication, and said, " provided it could be done without loss of life, he should like to see every ship sunk that sailed between Great Britain and the United States under the Union Jack."

I asked why he was so bitter against our ships ? He replied, " Because you work them so cheap you take all the bread out of our Yankee seamen's mouths. I guess you are meaner than the Italians, and they're about the meanest lot out ! " Between 1 and 2 p.m. we got once more under weigh and started for the town of Hamilton. Lady Brassey compares Hamilton Harbour to a Nor wegian fiord, and if youreduce the hills in the latter and substitute the cedar for the pine, the likeness to some of the more southern fiords is complete. You seem to pass from one little landlocked sound into another all the way, the banks are undulating, and covered with cedars, which at a little distance are scarcely distinguishable from Norwegian pine-trees. We had just passed the guardship, the Terror, built shortly after Sir John Franklin's time, and called after his famous vessel, when our captain rejoined us, bringing with him a fine water-melon and some fresh bananas.

The day was hot, and they were very refreshing, but instead of thank ing him, we all exclaimed at once, " Where are the peaches ? " The poor captain looked crest fallen, and was obliged to confess there were none to be got in Hamilton. For the last three weeks he had assured us every day at dinner that as soon as we arrived at Bermuda we should be in the midst of a plethora of fine peaches. And Three Days at Hamilton. 1 1 when our spirits sank within us at the slowness of our voyage, we had kept them up with the prospect of those peaches. Some of us had even dreamt of them ! And now where were they ? I afterwards learned that they used to be very common, but that an insect which appeared a few years ago has exterminated them throughout the islands. As soon as we neared the wharf at Hamilton, my old friend, the Chief Justice of Bermuda, came on board to meet us.

Not only did he give us a cordial welcome, but showed us much practical kindness during our stay in Hamilton. We dined at his house nearly every day ; he made me an honorary member of the Royal Bermuda Yacht Club, introduced us to several nice people, and made our stay generally agreeable. Hamilton is a pretty town, something like the older part of Bournemouth. The only part of it that looks at all like a street is " Front Street," facing the harbour, where all the business of the town is carried on. The rest consists of houses, very much detached standing in their own grounds, and in groves of cedar. Cedar-wood is in common use in Bermuda for most purposes, and very valuable wood it is. Lying alongside °f us in Hamilton Harbour was a barque called the Sir George Seymour, built entirely of cedar-wood.

She is as old as the Crimean war, and recently made a voyage from Bermuda to the Start Point, on the Devonshire coast, in twelve days, a fact which speaks well for cedar. Bermuda abounds iu artificial fish-pools made for the purpose of storing live fish. We visited two of these, " The Devil's Hole," and the private pool of the captain-superintendent of the dock yard. The former is a regular show place, where they charge Is. admission, and during the season, when the place is crowded with American visitors, the proprietors must reap a rich harvest. It is a very deep hole, or rather pond, situated in a cave, and crowded with fish. These are so used to being fed that, directly a visitor appears on the scene, they all come to the surface with their heads right out of the water, and their mouths wide open.

The foremost inhabitants of this watery colony — or prison — are called groupers ; a large, unwieldy fish of a dirty reddish colour, with an enormous mouth and big, fleshy lips, very strong, ferocious, and voracious. A few years ago a poor dog fell into this hole, and was devoured by the groupers before he could escape. The rock-fish is a large, dark species something like a very big black bass.3 3 Such was my description of this fish written at the time. "What I subsequently caught in the Bahamas under the same name was totally different in appearance. A sad Boat Accident. 13 There are also some striped fish called " hamlets," and an imitation of our old friend the turbo t, called here" turbit." There is also a parrot-fish, with a body much the same colour as a gold-fish, only about ten times the size, and striped with green down the back, and with a green head and tail.

But the gem of all the fish in these latitudes is the " angel-fish," of which it is very difficult to give any idea without a coloured illustration. Its shape is peculiar, and its colour blue and gold, but a blue of a greenish character shading off into turquoise. There are also " cow-fish," with faces just like their bovine sponsors, hog-fish with snouts, and a pretty little fish called a sergeant major, with yellow stripes round his body like those of a non-commissioned officer. In the midst of this crowd a lively-looking turtle swims rapidly about, apparently absorbed in the pleasure of his exercise, and absolutely regardless of any thing that is going on around him. Such are the inhabitants of the "Devil's Hole;" and to have seen one Bermudian fish-pool is to have seen all. On the Saturday daring our stay in Hamilton a sad boat accident happened, and singularly enough, the news arrived at the Royal Yacht Club just as somebody was boasting that no accident ever happened to a Bermudian sailing boat.

The boat was seen to capsize with four men in it, but though assistance was quickly on the spot, up to the time I left Bermuda no trace either of boat or men had been discovered. The great event of the Sunday was the arrival of the mail steamer Trinidad, from New York, with American newspapers only three days old. As the season had not fairly begun, she brought very few two-footed passengers, but a great many four-footed ones, for all the beef consumed in Bermuda is imported from the States ready for killing. The following day, Monday, we spent the morning at The Cottage, Ireland Island, the residence of the captain-superintendent of the dockyard, and the afternoon and evening with our friend the Chief Justice and his family. This was our last night at Hamilton, for the Belair had completed her unloading as far as that port was concerned, and the next morning at 6 a.m. she once more got under weigh, and started for St. George's, at which port she was to discharge the remainder of her Bermuda cargo.