nd; which make it evident,
that the Spaniards of Porto-Rico, who are not further distant
than five or six leagues, had formerly settled there.

The English, observing that so promising an island was without
inhabitants, began to raise some plantations there towards the
end of the last century; but they had not time to reap the fruit
of their labour. They were surprised by the Spaniards, who
murdered all the men, and carried off the women and children to
Porto-Rico. This accident did not deter the Danes from making
some attempts to settle there in 1717. But the subjects of Great
Britain, reclaiming their ancient rights, sent thither some
adventurers, who were at first plundered, and soon after driven
off, by the Spaniards. The jealousy of these American tyrants
extends even to the prohibiting of fishing-boats to approach any
shore where they have a right of possession, though they do not
exercise it. Too idle to prosecute cultivation, too suspicious to
admit industrious neighbours, they condemn the Crab Island to
eternal solitude; they will neither inhabit it themselves, nor
suffer any other nation to inhabit it. Such an exertion of
exclusive sovereignty has obliged Denmark to give up this island
for that of Santa Cruz.

Santa Cruz had a better title to become an object of national
ambition. It is eighteen leagues in length, and from three to
four in breadth. In 1643 it was inhabited by Dutch and English.
Their rivalship in trade soon made them enemies to each other. In
1646, after an obstinate and bloody engagement, the Dutch were
beat, and obliged to quit a spot from which they had formed great
expectations. The conquerors were employed in securing the
consequences of their victory, when, in 1650, they were attacked
and driven out in their turn by twelve hundred Spaniards, who
arrived there in five ships. The triumph of these lasted but a
few months. The remains of that numerous body, which were left
for the defence of the island, surrendered without resistance to
a hundred and sixty French, who had embarked in 1651, from St.
Christopher's, to make themselves masters of the island.

These new inhabitants lost no time in making themselves
acquainted with a country so much disputed. On a soil, in other
respects excellent, they found onl