JAMES 



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JAMES 



century the native population was almost ex- 

 tinct. The island was captured by the English 

 in 1655, and British possession was confirmed 

 by the Treaty of Madrid in 1670. The island 

 was at that time the rendezvous of buccaneers 

 and pirates. 



The demand for plantation labor led to the 

 organization of the Royal African Company 

 in 1672, and Jamaica became the greatest slave 

 market in the W9rld. An insurrection of the 

 slaves in 1831 hastened emancipation, and in 

 1833 all slaves were liberated. This,, occurring 

 at the height of Jamaica's prosperity, had a 

 disastrous effect upon the industries of the 

 colony, for the liberated slaves were too indo- 

 lent to work. In 1866, parliamentary govern- 

 ment was abolished and the island was reduced 

 to the grade of a Crown colony. By 1884, 

 representative government was partially re- 

 established. 



On January 14, 1907, the prosperity of the 

 colony was again interrupted by a serious 

 earthquake, in which over 600 lives were lost, 

 and Kingston was almost entirely destroyed. 

 Five years later, the colony suffered another 

 disaster in the form of a cyclone which swept 

 the western part of the island. With rich re- 

 sources, an ideal climate anal plenty of labor- 

 ers^ Jamaica lacks only the spirit of labor to 

 make it the most valuable island possession 

 of Great Britain. E.B.P. 



Consult Fiske's History of the West Indies; 

 Henderson's Jamaica. 



JAMES, the name of two kings of England. 

 The accession of the first James marks the 

 beginning of the rule of the House of Stuart 

 in England. 



James I (1566-1625), who was the son of 

 Mary Queen of Scots and Lord Darnley, suc- 

 ceeded to the throne of Scotland in 1567, as 

 James VI. In 1603, on the death of Queen 

 Elizabeth, last of the English House of Tudor, 

 he was crowned king of England with the title 

 James I. Scotland and England were thus 

 united under one sovereign, though their politi- 

 cal union was deferred until the accession of 

 Queen Anne. James, like the other members 

 of the Stuart family, believed firmly that kings 

 ruled by "divine right." He quarreled fre- 

 quently with his Parliaments, whose deter- 

 mined opposition to his acts of tyranny had 

 an important influence in preventing the de- 

 cline of popular liberty in the kingdom. 



Early in his reign (1605) a number of Ro- 

 man Catholics, goaded by unjust persecution, 

 plotted to blow up the Parliament House on 



the opening day of the first session, but the 

 conspiracy was discovered and its leaders exe- 

 cuted. Two years later the first permanent 

 English colony was established in America and 

 named for the soverign. A second perma- 

 nent colony was founded in Massachusetts in 

 1620 by a band of Puritans who were driven 

 out of England by the king's threat "to harry 

 out of the land" all who refused to conform 

 to prescribed forms of worship. 



Other important events of this reign were the 

 publication in 1611 of the Authorized Version 

 of the English Bible, known as the King 

 James Version, which is yet the authorized 

 Scriptures; the colonization of the Irish prov- 

 ince of Ulster by Protestant settlers from Eng- 

 land and Scotland, the execution of Sir Walter 

 Raleigh, and the impeachment by Parliament 

 of the king's great chancellor, Sir Francis 

 Bacon (1621). In 1589 James had married 

 Princess Anne of Denmark, and the marriage 

 of their daughter Elizabeth to the German 

 elector of the Palatinate resulted, years after- 

 ward, in the founding of a new English 

 dynasty. 



James II (1633-1701), son of Charles I and of 

 Henrietta Maria of France, succeeded to the 

 throne on the death of his brother Charles II, 

 in 1685. Immediately after his accession he 

 endeavored to carry out two cherished plans: 

 to rule independently of Parliament and to 

 restore the Roman Catholic religion in Eng- 

 land. A rebellion headed by the Duke of 

 Monmouth was easily suppressed, but the 

 king's determined efforts to restore Catholi- 

 cism roused the entire nation against him, and 

 by the "Glorious Revolution of 1688" he was 

 forced to abdicate, the throne being given to 

 William Prince of Orange, and Mary, daughter 

 of James, whose reign is known as that of 

 William and Mary. The dethroned king fled 

 to France, where he was received with cor- 

 diality by Louis XIV. Assisted by troops fur- 

 nished by Louis, James sought to win back 

 his throne by invading Ireland, but in 1690 he 

 was hopelessly defeated by William at the 

 Battle of the Boyne. The rest of his life was 

 spent in retirement in France. 



Related Subjects. For a more detailed ac- 

 count of many of the events and personages con- 

 nected with these reigns the reader is referred 

 to the following articles in these volumes: 

 Bacon, Francis Hanover 



Bible Mary II 



Boyne, Battle of the Mary Stuart 



Divine Right of Kings Monmouth, Duke of 

 Elizabeth Puritans 



Gunpowder Plot Raleigh, Sir Walter 



