300 ISLE3 OF StMMER, 



neighboring keys, set like jewels in liquid colors so peculiarly 

 rich in shades of green and blue that written language is too 

 poor to furnish terms with which to describe them — and then, 

 turning to a new world of trees, shrubs, vines and flowers, we 

 seemed to commune witli that great spirit of the past, and to par- 

 ticipate in the wonder and astonishment with which his mind 

 was absorbed and filled, when, nearly four hundred, years ago, he 

 preceded us in making the acquaintance of those fairy isles in 

 that dreamy and seemingly unreal part of the world. Indeed, 

 at times, it seemed as if we could almost feel the gaze of his gray, 

 thoughtful and prophetic eyes. 



The foot-fall of the great Genoese discoverer upon one of the 

 long, low, Bahama islands, has ennobled the whole group. The 

 subtle influence of that grand historic event pervades the sur- 

 rounding air, and imparts a brilliant and prismatic radiance to 

 objects in other respects insignificant. The woods and waters, 

 the flowering shrubs, the climl)ing vines, the trees with their 

 y.'ich. glossy foliage and luscious and golden fruits, and even the 

 sable forms and faces of the happy negroes, glow with an added 

 lustre in the light of that ever memorable event. Were those 

 coral isles to-morrow "in the deep bosom of the ocean buried,'' 

 their memory would remain, for the Genius of History will ever 

 keep and guard it in her imperishable archives. Ocean has no 

 abyss deep and dark enough to liido it from the view of the men 

 of the future. 



A dial3olical presence also — the ghosts of bad men who have 

 passed away — seems at times, even in our day, to lurk in the 

 shadows, and to infect with distrust the light, upon the island 

 of Xew Providence. Strong natures cannot be wholly shut up 

 in hades. It is more than a hundred and fifty years since Black 

 Beard rendezvoued at Nassau, and held his court under one of 

 its trees. No robber of the sea, ancient or modern, surpassed 



