SETTLEMENTS ON THE DEMERARY, &C. 177 



The colonies in Guyana, independently of supplies they have 

 received from Africa, are daily getting more negroes from the 

 West India islands, some of which being nearly worn out from 

 long cultivation, the proprietors of estates there find it very diffi- 

 cult and expensive to make them produce what they used to do. 

 Circumstanced as they are, working on a withered soil, they 

 are certainly justified in abandoning that land for better in 

 Guyana, where there is such an extensive choice. The natural 

 consequence we are to expect from such a procedure in the 

 course of time is the total abandonment of the barren islands 

 for the more fertile soil of the continent. The islands I allude 

 to are Curasso, Eustatia, Saba, St. Martins, Tortola, Tobago, 

 Grenada, and St. Vincent, which will be either partially or 

 wholly forsaken in a few years. When I was at Tortola in 

 1805, there was neither a garrison to defend it, nor a governor 

 to govern it ; therefore it is visibly enough seen that the then 

 ministry did not think the revenue or value of it would war- 

 rant the expence of maintaining a regular establishment there. 

 Barbadoes is declining fast in its revenue and productions, but 

 its situation being to windward of all the other islands, and 

 having a good bay, makes it a most desirable place to be re- 

 tained by our government. It is now the head quarters for 

 the commander in chief, and Carlisle bay affords a secure an- 

 chorage for the navy on the station. But the planters of Bar- 

 badoes have as much capital employed in the colonies on the 

 continent, as they have actually in Barbadoes; this certainly is 



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