n sun was faintly tinting with
orange. We had passed Morant Bay, the scene of Gordon's rash attempt to
imitate Toussaint l'Ouverture. As so often in the Antilles, a level
plain stretched between the sea and the base of the hills, formed by the
debris washed down by the rivers in the rainy season. Among cane fields
and cocoa-nut groves we saw houses and the chimneys of the sugar
factories; and, as we came nearer, we saw men and horses going to their
early work. Presently Kingston itself came in sight, and Up Park Camp,
and the white barracks high up on the mountain side, of which one had
read and heard so much. Here was actually Tom Cringle's Kingston, and
between us and the town was the long sand spit which incloses the lagoon
at the head of which Kingston is built. How this natural breakwater had
been deposited I could find no one to tell me. It is eight miles long,
rising but a few feet above the water-line, in places not more than
thirty yards across--nowhere, except at the extremity, more than sixty
or a hundred.

[Illustration: PORT ROYAL, JAMAICA.]

The thundering swell of the Caribbean Sea breaks upon it from year's
end to year's end, and never washes it any thinner. Where the sand is
dry, beyond the reach of the waves, it is planted thickly all along with
palms, and appears from the sea a soft green line, over which appear the
masts and spars of the vessels at anchor in the harbour, and the higher
houses of Kingston itself. To reach the opening into the lagoon you have
to run on to the end of the sandbank, where there is a peninsula on
which is built the Port Royal so famous in West Indian story. Halfway
down among the palms the lighthouse stands, from which a gun was fired
as we passed, to give notice that the English mail was coming in.
Treacherous coral reefs rise out of the deep water for several miles,
some under water and visible only by the breakers over them, others
forming into low wooded islands. Only local pilots can take a ship
safely through these powerful natural defence works. There are but two
channels through which the lagoon can be approached. The eastern
passage, along which we were steaming, runs so near the shore that an
enemy's ship would be destroyed by the batteries among the sandhills
long before it could reach the mouth. The western passage is less
intricate, but that also is commanded by powerful forts. In old times
Kingston was unattackable, so strong had the position been made by
n