of first-rate talent. There was so much wealth passing from hand to
hand, and so many disputed titles in the continual mutations of
ownership among the estates under the reckless system of conducting them
prevalent, that the disciples of the law found a rich harvest, and it
was worth while for a first-rate man to settle in the island. It is
thought that the lawyers of Jamaica used to receive not less than
L500,000 annually. Whether this was reckoned in sterling money or in the
island currency, I do not know, but probably the latter, equivalent to
L300,000 sterling. Of men not lawyers, Bryant Edwards is the only one of
the last century or the early part of this of any note whatever among
those permanently settled in the island. His chief claim to distinction
is found in his carefully prepared and judicious 'History of the West
Indies.' Beckford, the author of 'Vathek,' and Monk Lewis, christened
Matthew, the patent ghost-story teller of half a century ago, and more
honorably connected with the history of the island as a proprietor,
whose inexperienced kindness toward his negroes had almost led to his
prosecution, both resided in the island for a while. Jamaica had almost
drawn to herself a name far more illustrious than any or all which had
appeared in her annals--that of Robert Burns. It is known that he had
already engaged his passage to the island, when the course of events
turned him from it. He celebrates his expected departure in some verses
more witty than moral, in which he addresses our islanders as follows:

'Jamaica bodies, use him weel,
And hap him in a cosy biel,
Ye'll find him aye a dainty chiel,
And fu' of glee;
He wadna wrang the very deil,
That's ower the sea.'

Poor fellow! had he really gone, the admonition to 'Jamaica bodies' to
'use him weel,' would probably have been obeyed by making him drink
himself to death ten or twelve years earlier than he did in Dumfries,
and thus would one of earth's great, though stained names, have been
lost in the inglorious darkness of a Jamaica bookkeeper's short life, as
many a young countryman of his, perhaps not less gifted than he, had
perished before him.

Among the distinguished personages of Jamaica, I ought not to omit
mention of the Duke of Manchester, governor soon after the beginning of
this century, who was able to boast that no virtuous woman had crossed
the threshold of the King's House in Spanishtown during his
administration. So th