254 CRUSOE'S ISLAND. 



1781. — The French again took the island, effecting- a 

 landing at Plymouth, Great Courland Bay. Being 

 driven out of this place, they retreated to the woods 

 in the center of the island. There are traces of a 

 military road there yet, and old cannon lying in 

 the woods at Bloody Bay. 



1793. — Tobago once more English. -^ 



1802. — Ceded to the French. Tobago had a voice in the 

 election of Bonaparte. 



1802. — As the one-time residence of our great privateer, 

 John Paul Jones, Tobago may interest historians. 



i5(?.?.— Taken by the English. 



18111: — Finally ceded to the English, in whose possession 

 this unfortunate island, the bruised and shattered 

 shuttlecock of many wars, has since remained. 



For nearly ninety years, now, Tobago has been English, 

 and, although nearly all its inhabitants are blacks 

 or colored people, they are loyal to the crown that 

 emancipated them, in 1838. 



The journal of Sir William Young, in 1792, gives us a 

 good account of the island and clear conception of the 

 powerful currents that set in about Tobago, caused by the 

 water of the Orinoco : "Tuesday, 4 p. M., Tobago in sight, 

 our course close to the wind, making for the body of the 

 island. Wednesday, close in with the land, and most of 

 the day beating to windward with a strong lee current. 

 In the afternoon off Man-o'-war Bay. Thursday, found 

 our ship at daybreak nearly where she was the preceding 

 sunset. Friday, at sunrise, off Queen's Bay, on the lee- 

 ward coast, whence we ran down with both wind and cur- 

 rent in our favor, and anchored in Rocky Bay about 

 noon." 



Says an ancient historian, writing in 1666 : " The first 

 and most southerly of all the Caribbees is Tobago, or To- 

 bac (where tobacco was found, and from which it re- 



