" PARLIAMENT " PKOROGUEO. 219 



the negroes had a portion allotted to them, several of them being 

 members of the lower house. 



The Governor's speech was ably written, and effectively de- 

 livered. It covered matters of practical importance, and would 

 compare well with the speeches and messages of our State execu- 

 tives. 



The address concluded by a suggestion that sounded very 

 homo-like, that the present session of the Assembly might be 

 even shorter than the last, which in brevity surpassed its prede- 

 cessors. 



After delivering his speech, His Excellency and his suite with- 

 drew, and the members of the lower house retired to their cham- 

 ber. Both houses afterwards voted replies. As the Governor 

 left the building a salute was fired from three field pieces, the 

 troops concluded their escort duty, and all the colored population 

 of Xassau which had assembled to see the show, followed His 

 Excellency's example, satisfied and gratified with the short epi- 

 sode which had broken the monotony of their every day life. 



Before we left Nassau in 1879, the Bahama Parliament was 

 prorogued by the Governor with imposing formalities. At the 

 appointed hour. His Excellency, accompanied by his Secretary 

 and other high officials, was escorted from the Government 

 House, (as his residence is called,) to the building in which the 

 Senate holds its sessions, by the colored troops, while martial 

 music imparted life and spirit to the indolent air. The semi- 

 royal pageant was a god-send to the negroes, as it broke in pleas- 

 antly upon the dull monotony of their every day life, and, in Bay 

 street where the procession passed, they constituted, to the eyes 

 of northern strangers, the most interesting part of the show. 



The legislative " dissolving views " were witnessed by those only 

 who had been favored Avith tickets wliich secured them a free 

 pass to the Senate Chamber, and, being numbered among the 



