SETTLEMENTS ON THE DEMERARY, &C. 311 



lation and good conduct in others ; they will be handed down 

 to posterity as marks of distinction and approbation. 



This business being so happily got over, the planters and 

 merchants turned their attention to their own particular situa- 

 tion. Belonging to a country which could neither protect 

 them, nor their trade, whose European government and inha- 

 bitants were divided by factions, which have finally made 

 them a dray horse to a Corsican usurper. Something was ne- 

 cessary to be done to enable them to open their ports, and ship 

 from the colony the produce which had been accumulating 

 for several years. A little trade with North America, and a 

 heavy barter trade for negroes and produce with the English, 

 were the only vents they had for any of their productions, and 

 these, at the utmost, did not dispose of more than one-third 

 of the annual crop. The English contraband trade, from a 

 small beginning, increased so much, that the government was 

 obliged to take notice of it, and a Dutch sloop of war, which 

 was lying in the river, constantly kept out boats of observa- 

 tion, to prevent a continuance of the trade. The English ves- 

 sels used to anchor off the coast as regularly as in a harbour, 

 and kept always prepared a warm reception for these Dutch 

 cruizers, in case they should come athwart them with hostile 

 views. On the appearance of any vessels on the coast, these 

 immediately returned into the river, and by feeing persons 

 supposed to be in good understanding with the fiscal, every 



