BOOK ir. CHAP. vn. 83 



«' The church uas not hnilhed. It was twenty paces broad, and 

 thirty long. There were two rows of pillars within ; and over 

 the place where the altar was intended were foine carvings under 

 the ends of the arches. Th^e houfes and foundations fland for fe- 

 veral miles along (thefe were probably the houfes of detached fet- 

 tlements, not of the ftreets). Captain Heming faid, he forae- 

 times found pavements under his canes three feet covered with earth, 

 feveral wells, and burial -flones finely cut. There are the be- 

 ginnings of a great houfe called a monaftery; but I fuppofe the 

 houfe was defigned for the governor. There were two coats of 

 arms lay by, not fet up; a ducal one; and that of a count; be- 

 longing I fuppofe to the family of Columbus, proprietors of the 

 ifland. There had been raifed a tower, part brick, part hewn 

 flone, as alfo feveral battlements on it ; and other lower buildings 

 unfinilhed. At the church lie feveral arched flones, to compleat 

 it; which had never been put up, but are lodged among the canes. 

 The rows of pillars within were for the moil: part unornamented. 

 It was thought, that in the time of the Spaniards the Europeans 

 had been cut off by the Indians ; and fo the church left uncom- 

 pleated. When the Englilh took the ifland, the ruins of this city 

 were fo overgrown with wood, that they were all turned black. 

 Nay, I faw a mammee, or baftard mammee-tree, growing within 

 the walls of the tower, fo high as that it mufl have been a very 

 large gun to kill a bird on the top of it ; and the trunks of many 

 of the trees, when felled from this place, to make room for the fu- 

 gar-canes, were lixty feet or more in length. A great many wells 

 are on this ground. The Weft gate of the church was of very fine 

 work, and flands entire. It is feven feet wide, and as high to the 

 Ipring of the arch. Over the door, in the centre, is our Saviour's 

 head, with a crown of thorns, between two angels; on the right 

 fide, a fmall round figure of fome faint, with a knife ftruck into 

 his head ; and on the left, a madona, her arm tied in three places 

 after the Spanifli fafhion. Over the gate, and beneath a coat of 

 ai'ms, was this infcription : 



M 2 PETRVS. 



