6 



BAHAMAN TRIP 



decided to select some other island for our botanical work. Andros 

 was chosen as being the largest and least known of the group. Al- 

 though the nearest part of this island is only twenty-five miles from 

 New Providence, we could get but very meager information concern- 

 ing it. The Nassauans know scarcely anything of what they rather 

 contemptuously designate the ''out islands." Every one tried to 

 dissuade us from going to x\ndros, assuring us that "there were no 

 white people, no roads, and nothing to eat." We were finally fortunate 

 in meeting Mr. Alexander Keith, of Edinburgh, who had just bought 

 two thousand acres on Andros and started a sisal plantation. He 

 kindly told us of a little house we might hire at Nicol's Town, the most 

 northerly settlement. We added a camping outfit to our baggage, 

 hired a sloop, and then, with all our goods and chattels packed, were 

 fain to wait ten days on the pleasure of the wind. We had just had a 

 heavy "norther," and our captain could not be persuaded to start as 

 long as the winds were high, the east coast of Andros being fringed 

 with a dangerous reef and without a single harbor. Finally on 

 March 14 we crossed the Tongue of Ocean, making the thirty-five 

 or forty miles in about eight hours. We passed through a narrow 

 opening in the reef and disembarked at Nicol's Town on a beautiful, 

 curving, white beach with thatched huts showing here and there 

 through a fringe of waving palms. The justice of the peace, a stal- 

 wart negro, welcomed us to Andros and led the line of march to the 

 "mission house," where we were to stay. A large contingent of the 

 villagers followed, bearing our boxes and various pieces of baggage 

 on their heads. The house was only eighteen and a half by ten feet, 

 but it was divided into two rooms and boasted two doors and six win- 

 dows. It was what is called a "tabby house," one made of coral 

 blocks, plastered inside and out. Daylight could be seen here and 

 there through the shingled roof. The house was prettily situated on a 

 rise of ground, a little apart from the rest of the settlement. Orange 

 trees were in bloom just outside the windows, and gum-elemi and 

 cassada trees shaded the dooryard. The gum-elemi proved a great 

 attraction to the birds, and there would often be seven or eight on it 

 at once, representing three or four species. The most frequent visi- 

 tors were the mocking birds, cat birds, the Tom- James bird (Spin- 

 dalis zena), and the grassquit (Euetheia hicolor). When we passed 

 from the coppet to the pine-yard, these were replaced by the blue- 



