N.\KKATi\'i': OK Bahama Expedition. 199 



j^ave to this colony a certain amount of land on the mainland 

 of Eleuthera to hold in common. Each person could claim 

 as much land as he cultivated, and keep possession so long as 

 the land was under cultivation. This system of land tenure, 

 although it would seem ahnost ideal, was, as a matter of fact, 

 about the most unsatisfactory that could have been devised, 

 and gave rise to innumerable quarrels and lawsuits. The 

 main point of difficulty was the definition of terms used in 

 the cfrant. Some indolent or trickv individuals claimed that 

 land once held by them remained theirs so long as e\'en a 

 single banana stalk or pine "•tree'" was growing on it. while 

 others claimed that all of the area must be in bona tide cuhi- 

 vation before the terms of the grant could be held as com- 

 plied with. And so this quarrel has become a traditional one. 

 and is a pregnant source of strife among the colonists. When 

 one comes to look at their •• farms," his chief wonder is what 

 there is to quarrel over. There is not a spot on the whole 

 plantation where a plow coukl be run for a single yard. The 

 whole surface is not onlv rock\', but is solid coral rock, with 

 here and there a little accumulation of earth in the liollows. 

 Wherever a little soil has lodged, a pine-cuttinu" is Sit. In 

 spite of the hopeless appearance of things to a man from the 

 Iowa prairies, they do manage to raise considerable quan- 

 tities of pine-apples on just such land as this. Most of the 

 fruit is bought bv Baltimore firms and shipped to Baltimore or 

 Key West to be canned. The amount of money realized bv 

 an individual worker in the Spanish Wells plantation must be 

 pitiably small. Indeed I imagine that not many of these men 

 see more than twenty-five dollars in cash in a year. So far 

 as I know, the school-master receives the highest regular sal- 

 ary of an}' one on the island. His pay is fifty pounds, or two. 

 hundred and fifty dollars per 3'ear, and with this he lives 

 better, and dresses better, and supports a family in better 

 style than most of his fellows even in fortunate America. In 

 spite of their poverty, the people are almost without excep- 

 tion thoroughly self-respecting. God-fearing and honest, and 

 among them are some of the best types of sterling Christian 

 manhood that I have ever known. 



