SANTA CEUZ. 



433 



During the first years of its commercial decay, the Danish Government offered 

 St. Thomas and St. John to the United States for £1,000,000, and the inhabitants, 

 when consulted, gave their unanimous consent to the arrangement ; but the offer 

 was declined, the price demanded being regarded as too high. 



St. John. 



St. John, which follows east of St. Thomas, does not, like its neighbour, lie 

 in the track of trading vessels, and its port of Coral Bay, on the east side, although 

 said to be the best harbour of refuge in the Antilles during cyclones, is visited 

 only by fishing-smacks and other small craft. The English call it Crawl Bay, a 



rig-. 209.— ViEGiN Islands. 

 Scale 1 ; 400,00i). 



68-5 



West or breenwicK 



66"45 



Oto 12 

 Fathoms. 



Depths. 



12 to 50 

 Fathoms 



50 Fathoms 

 and upwards. 



9 Miles. 



corruption either of the Spanish Corral ("enclosure"), or of Coral, from the 

 reefs encircling the harbour. The capital of the island is merely an obscure 

 village on the north side. 



Santa Cruz. 



Santa Cruz, the third Danish island, so named by Columbus at the time of his 

 second voyage, was inhabited by Caribs when the Spaniards arrived. But as it 

 possessed no precious metals, the strangers soon quitted it without massacring the 

 natives. But the Spaniards were succeeded by English buccaneers, and these by 

 the French, who sold the island to the Knights of Malta in 1(350. Thus the 

 ancient Ayay of the Caribs passed from hand to hand, until at last it was sold by 

 61 



