THE BAHAMA ISLANDS 569 



was the sole public institution and the militia was but a name." °" In spite of 

 the famine and depression in trade during his administration of four years the 

 colonial debt had been reduced and a surplus revenue secured ; the poor estab- 

 lishment was enlarged and a hospital and dispensary established; a public 

 library was added to the equipment for education ; the militia was placed on a 

 substantial basis ; the civil list was adjusted to the existing needs of the Colony 

 arid the efficiency of the officials was increased; salt ponds were everywhere 

 worked, fruit growing extended and the tariff schedules readjusted; in every 

 department the colonial service experienced the touch of an administrator.™ 

 It was a hard fate that this man who had done so much for the Colony, the first 

 Governor in the nineteenth century who had been able to secure harmony in 

 the government service, should have become the mark of all the calumnies that 

 were heaped upon George B. Mathew. " A prophet is not without honor save 

 in his own country." 



LATER HISTORY OF THE BAHAMAS. 

 During the latter half of the nineteenth century the people of the Bahamas 

 have remained contented under British rule. The slavery question passed out 

 of men's minds and the control of local affairs was taken into other hands than 

 those of the radical, former slaveholders. The Colony now entered upon a 

 period of internal quiet, which with a few temporary interruptions has contin- 

 ued to the present time. Some of the more important topics in the recent 

 history of the Colony will now be discussed briefly. 



The Sepaeation of the Turks Islands from the Bahamas. 



Before the close of Governor MatheVs term of office in 1849, the territory 

 of the Bahamas was decreased by the separation of Turks Islands. This small 

 group of islands, situated 500 miles from the capital of the Colony, had never 

 been contented under the Bahama government. The people of Turks Islands 

 claimed that they did not belong to the Bahamas, and after refusing to partici- 

 pate in the government, submitted to it only by the order of a proclamation 

 from the Crown. Still it was odious to them to accept the government of a 

 Colony in whose interests they shared so little. While the Bahamas were 

 almost wholly agricultural, the Turks Islands produced nothing but salt. When 

 the former legislated to protect agricultural interests, the regulations often 



™' See Mathew to Grey, No. 71. 



•^ Mathew to Grey, No. 71, and the addresses above referred to. 



