326 ISLES OF ST'':\r^rEft. 



By the terms of the treaty of peace, the title of the king of 

 Great Britain to the Bahamas was established. Since that time, 

 for nearly a hundred years, the islands have remained one of 

 the out-lying portions of the British Empire. Situated at one 

 of the gates of entrance to the Gulf of Mexico, near to our shores, 

 and in the path of our commerce, nothing prevents Britain's 

 l^ossession from being a menace but their insignificance and 

 weakness in a military point of view. 



The late war of the rebellion demonstrated the capabilities of 

 Nassau and its harbor for mischief when occupied in time of 

 war by a professedly neutral, but covertly hostile power. Except 

 during the period covered by our late Vv'ar — 1861 to 1865 — the 

 history of Nassau from 1783 to the present time, has been as 

 dull and devoid of interest (outside of that which accompanies 

 wrecks and hurricanes,) as the still and shallow waters of a 

 mangrove lake. But, as has been well said, a nation is most pros- 

 perous when it furnishes the least for the historian to record; 



"And noiseless falls the foot of time 

 Which only treads on flowers. " 



One event, of an extremely radical and revolutionary character, 

 should not, however, be passed by unnoticed — the abolition of 

 slavery. This result was accomplished without the loss of a life, 

 the firing of a gun, or disturbance of any kind. By the silent 

 operation of a law enacted upon an island some four thousand 

 mibs away, upon the other side of the wide and stormy Atlantic, 

 all of the enslaved Bahama negroes were changed from chattels 

 into men, and became at once free citizens of that great empire 

 which circles the world, and upon which the sun never sets. 



