s, and of Central America at
Cape Gracias-a-Dios; while it lies so immediately in rear of the
Windward Passage that its command of the latter can scarcely be
considered less than that of Santiago. The analogy of its situation,
as a station for a great fleet, to that for an army covering a
frontier which is passable at but a few points, will scarcely escape a
military reader. A comparatively short chain of swift lookout
steamers, in each direction, can give timely notice of any approach by
either of the three passages named; while, if entrance be gained at
any other point, the arms stretched out towards Gallinas and
Gracias-a-Dios will give warning of transit before the purposes of
such transit can be accomplished undisturbed.

With such advantages of situation, and with a harbor susceptible of
satisfactory development as a naval station for a great fleet, Jamaica
is certainly the most important single position in the Caribbean Sea.
When one recalls that it passed into the hands of Great Britain, in
the days of Cromwell, by accidental conquest, the expedition having
been intended primarily against Santo Domingo; that in the two
centuries and a half which have since intervened it has played no part
adequate to its advantages, such as now looms before it; that, by all
the probabilities, it should have been reconquered and retained by
Spain in the war of the American Revolution; and when, again, it is
recalled that a like accident and a like subsequent uncertainty
attended the conquest and retention of the decisive Mediterranean
positions of Gibraltar and Malta, one marvels whether incidents so
widely separated in time and place, all tending towards one end--the
maritime predominance of Great Britain--can be accidents, or are
simply the exhibition of a Personal Will, acting through all time,
with purpose deliberate and consecutive, to ends not yet discerned.

Nevertheless, when compared to Cuba, Jamaica cannot be considered the
preponderant position of the Caribbean. The military question of
position is quantitative as well as qualitative; and situation,
however excellent, can rarely, by itself alone, make full amends for
defect in the power and resources which are the natural property of
size--of mass. Gibraltar, the synonym of intrinsic strength, is an
illustration in point; its smallness, its isolation, and its
barrenness of resource constitute limits to its offensive power, and
even to its impregnability, which are we