30 WONDERS OF THE DEEP 



discovery reached the ears of the original owner, 

 who claimed that the money received for the pearl 

 really belonged to her. But the woman who had 

 effected the sale disputed the claim. Matters now 

 became rather serious, and the original owner 

 threatened to take the matter into Court. Dis- 

 cretion proving the better part of valour in this 

 case, the vendor agreed to pay the other woman 

 a third of the money for which the pearl had 

 been sold. It afterwards transpired that the pearl 

 in question was an exceedingly fine one, and was 

 worth about two hundred pounds. 



Much of the history of these delightful islands 

 is "wropped in mystery." Red Leiric, a daring 

 navigator, is said to have visited the islands nine 

 hundred years ago, and spent twelve months there 

 with his storm-driven crew. Five hundred years 

 before that, so the legend runs, St. Brendan, an 

 Irish missionary, endeavoured to spread the princi- 

 ples of Christianity in this region. But these, and 

 other traditional accounts, must be regarded, 

 delightful though many of them are, as belonging 

 to the realms of myth and legend. It is not until 

 we come down to the fifteenth century that we 

 can feel we are on safe historic ground. 



Although the Bahamas were the first part of 

 the New World to be discovered by Christopher 

 Columbus, the Genoese navigator, during his 

 momentous voyage towards the close of the 

 fifteenth century, in quest of a westward route to 

 India, the Spaniards, in whose name the islands 



