- 
3 
+% 
_ in 1788, destroyed by the red bug. In 1834 slavery we 
876 | An Isolated Community in the Bahama Islands. ; 
already been done by others, and the writer purposes in thi 
paper to attempt what he believes is a new task,—a description 
of the life of a small and almost wholly isolated community o 
Anglo-Saxons and Negroes in a tropical or sub-tropical region, 
from the point of view of biology, psychology, and physiology 
(or medicine); for it seems to him that the conditions are het 
furnished for the solution, in great part, of certain highly inter 
esting problems. The briefest possible glance at the history of the 
Bahamas will make the general treatment of the subject clearet 
Columbus, who visited St. Salvador (either Cat or Watling 
Island), thus wrote to Ferdinand and Isabella of the natives: 
“This country excels all others as far as the day surpass 
the night in splendor; the natives love their neighbors as thea 
selves ; their conversation is the sweetest imaginable; their faces 
This simplicity made them a prey to the perfidious Spaniard 
and forty thousand of them are said to have been transported ! 
1509 to the mines of Hispania. a 
The English visited the Bahamas in 1629, and soon took poss* Ẹ 
sion, on the plea of ridding them of the pirates with which ng 
were infested. In 1718 the first crown governor was appoint 
and soon after the pineapple was introduced into New Provides 
During the American war of independence many colon 
took up residence in the Bahamas, bringing their slaves 
them; and cotton was largely cultivated, till the entire crop 
a 
ished by purchase. ; 
In 1865 blockade-running was common. Wrecking had 
prevalent, but gradually declined, though it has left 4" 
negroes, for “ Swamp fever” (malaria) in a severe form $ 
mon; Green Turtle Key is, however, free from any P p 
form of disease, as the island is, throughout, high en? asic 
escape stagnant water. The population on this key, OO 
Whites, mostly of English descent, many of them reta bt 
characteristic accent of their forefathers, and of Black , 
