B O O K II. CHAP. VII. 31 



breach of his truft, he would be hable to a regimental punifhmeiit. 

 The terr r of this would form a fecurity for his good behaviour; 

 the men would be much better pleafed, and beyond any doubt more 

 healthy. 



The town is partly under a civil and partly military police ; a 

 kind oi divifum hnperhan, which tlie civil power exercifes by day, 

 and the military by night. The civil government confifts of a 

 cit/ios, or chief magiftrate, and the inferior juftices of peace and 

 conflables. The centinels here, after the day is clofed, according 

 to an antient ufage, which has fubfilled ever fince the days of 

 Cromwell, challenge all paflengers, as in a regular garrifon, and 

 patrol the ftreets at certain hours, to apprehend all offenders againft 

 the peace, and prevent robberies. It is a certain proof of the more 

 regular lives of the families here, as well as in Kingrton, than here- 

 tofore, that at eleven o'clock at night it is very rare to fee a light in 

 any houfe, except the taverns ; and even thefe are now very feldom 

 infefted with riots and drunken quarrels, which formerly were fo 

 common. The town was antiently a regular garrifon, the ditch 

 ftill remaining which was thrown up by the Spaniards towards the 

 favannah, and terminated at a baftion flanked with a fortified 

 building, called the Fort-houfc, the name of which is (liU pre- 

 fcrved. The plain, of which the favannah is a part, extends, in 

 its whole length, not lefs than twenty-two miles ; but its breadth 

 is unequal, being in fome parts ten miles, in others five, and, to- 

 wards St. Dorothy's, grows more and more contracted, till it docs 

 not exceed three. After leaving this end of it, and paffing to the 

 N. W. among the Clarendon Hills, w^e meet with fmaller levels 

 here and there, as the Palmeto and Lime favannahs, till we come 

 to St. Jago favannah, where the champaign again enlarges to the 

 extent of about ten by fifteen mile^. Thefe tracls were formerly 

 exceeding beautiful, having only fome clumps of graceful trees 

 irregularly Icattered over their face, which gave but little interrup- 

 tion to the profpeCl. I have been informed by an elderly gentle- 

 man, a native of the ifland, that he could remember the time when 

 they were nearly in this ftate ; but at prefent they are overfpread 

 and disfigured in moft parts with the achaia, or American opo- 

 pinax, a dwarf prickly tree, which it is found aimed impoffible to 

 3 eradic.ite. 



