The Capitulation to the French in 1782. 25 
What was to become, and to be called, Stabroek, the 
germ of the " finest city in the British West Indies," was 
then only being talked about. Where Georgetown now 
displays itself, amidst gardens, palms, and a rich variety 
of tropical plants and trees, the land was then lotted out 
in plantations of coffee and cotton. The sea-wall was, of 
course, not in existence one hundred and ten 
years ago; and the sea had not then washed away 
the foreshore which, even within the memory of 
persons now living, formed a promenade in front of 
where the Band House now stands. What is now 
Young Street formed, in 1782, the back-dam of 
three plantations, which lay between the Demerara 
River and the lands of plantation Thomas, Within a 
mile of the point at the entrance to the River, on its 
Eastern bank was a mud bank, which projected about 45 
or 50 feet at right angles with that bank. It served as a 
landing place for the plantation of which it formed part. 
Upon this point of land was Fort St. George, so-called : a 
Battery which had been constructed the year before by 
Captain Day, then of the Barbuda. Here, five guns 
pointed down the channel towards the sea. Three other 
guas bore abreast of "the Harbour." Four others 
pointed up " the Harbour." These guns were mostly 
9-pounders. The space between them, on the three sides, 
had been partly filled up by mud and sand, forming 
embrasures of a kind. On the land side, a small bank 
had been thrown up, and was palisadoed with staves of 
casks, about three feet high. There was a ditch next the 
land, about ten or twelve feet wide, and about three or 
four feet deep. In the wet season there was a little 
water in the ditch ; in the dry season none. To get from 
D 
