KASSAU A CONFEDERATE POET. ^60 



Indeed, Gov. Rawson says, that ''without such an establishment 

 it would have been almost impossible to have provided for the 

 indux of persons connected with the blockade trade." But alas! 

 how unstable are human hopes! How speedily the shadows suc- 

 ceed to the sunlif^ht! Changes great and unexpected thwart 

 *■' the best laid schemes of mice and men." 



A few short and fleeting years since then have passed, and the 

 bold, rich and dashing Confederates are there nowhere to be seen, 

 but in their places come the once hated Northerners, including 

 not a few Yankees from troublesome IS'ew England, to repose in 

 the pleasant chambers, and feast in the banquet hall of the Royal 

 Victoria Hotel, so lately honored by the advocates and champions 

 of "the lost cause." The Great Republic meanwhile rises with 

 new strength and vigor from its baptism of blood, far more for- 

 midable than it ever was before as a rival in peace and an enemy 

 in war. 



Blockade running culminated in 1864: and the early part of 

 18C5. The imports of Nassau in 1860 were in value only £234,029 

 and its exports £157,350, but the imports in 1864 were of the value 

 of £5,346,112 and the exports £4,672,398. In January and Feb- 

 ruary 1865, twenty steamers ran the blockade, and landed at 

 Nassau 14,182 bales of cotton, which were of the total value of 

 two and three-quarters million of dollars. Every one was wild 

 with excitement. Fortunes were made in a few weeks or months. 

 Gold eagles, and twenty dollar gold pieces were pitched instead 

 of pennies, by fickle fortune's new favorites, in the Court of the 

 Royal Victoria Hotel. Money was spent and scattered in the 

 most extravagant and lavish manner; and, as a natural conse- 

 quence, immorality and crime affected the moral atmosphere, 

 and disease nestled and watched for its victims in the soft and 

 balmy air of this great natural sanitarium. 



In these calm and peaceful days a vivid imagination will find 



