114 TSLBs OF SUMMER. 
in the shade as though ‘‘to the manor born.” It requires the 
stimulus of a steamer nearly ready to return to the States, to 
energize one sufficiently to write aletter home. It isa luxury to 
breathe and feel the soft air, but it inclines to repose; it puts us 
in astate or condition of rest. Bold enterprise and tireless energy 
are quickened into life by cold winds from the snow-fields. 
«“There’s iron in our northern winds, 
Our pines are trees of healing.” 
Not only is ambition not indigenous in the Bahamas, but, 
like many other exotics, it has but a sickly and short-lived exist- 
ence when introduced from abroad. The primal curse that 
doomed man to a life of labor, does not seem to have extended 
to these isles of unending sammer. In fact, it is only in such a 
climate as these islands possess that labor is a curse and not a 
blessing. Indolently reposing in the shade of a tropical orchard, 
fanned by the sea-god’s invisible wings that seem ever in motion, 
the inhabitants of these favored islands have no occasion to work 
(as we of the north understand that word) in order to supply 
their simple wants. It is therefore apparent that the original 
Garden of Eden must have been less favorably situated for lazy 
people than this part of her majesty’s possessions. 
New Providence has been called by one of its enthusiastic ad- 
mirers, in the pages of Scribner, ‘“‘The Isle of June.” It may 
with equal propriety be named The Isle of Indolence. At all 
times, in sunlight and starlight, it seemed as if unseen spirits 
‘Spread forth their downy pinions, scattering sleep 
Upon the drooping eye-lids of the air.” 
Man there soon passes into a semi-torpid state, and while the 
wear and waste incident to an active life is avoided, the recuper-. 
