Superintendent, with a few hundred settlers, negroes, and All that could be done was to spike the guns and retreat In April, 1782, Admiral Rodney's victory put renewed heart into the Mosquito colonists, and on August 7 an expedition was despatched from Jamaica for their relief, consisting of 150 of the Royal American Rangers, with arms and ammunition, provisions and presents for the Indians. The colonial forces to the number of 1,000, of whom 80 were regulars, advanced against Black River settlement. The Spaniards opened a conference, ending in a capitulation, by which the place was surrendered on August 31, with 715 officers and soldiers as prisoners of war. In those turbulent times the colonists of the Mosquito Shore and those of British Honduras were always wide awake, as an old Belize paper shows, to the value of the assistance they received from the Mosquito Indians. In January, 1783, a definitive treaty was concluded with Spain, which specifies that His Britannic Majesty's subjects shall evacuate all parts on the Spanish continent, or any of the islands dependent on the same, except such parts as shall by the treaty remain in the possession of Great Britain. But two years after this the discussion of British and Spanish claims was renewed, and after a debate of ten months a convention was made, signed in London in 1786, under which the British Government ordered the evacuation of the Mosquito territory by all British subjects. The plea put forth by the English Ministry was the compensating concession made by Spain of some further privileges for the EVACUATION OF MOSQUITO TERRITORY 13 British settlement of Honduras, thus seeking to propitiate a nation hereditarily inimical (and soon after this actively hostile) by ruining one colony for the partial benefit of another, and abandoning to their enemies those Indian allies who had faithfully adhered to the English through every trouble which the country had ever sustained. Loud complaints and strong reclamations were made by the cruelly-wronged colonists. The affair caused a great outcry in England, and a threat was made in the House of Lords of impeaching the Ministry. But through the fierce factions in England at that time, and the lowering aspect of the Revolution then threatening in France, the Mosquito troubles were soon forgotten. Most of the colonists, filled with indignation, removed with most of their slaves to British Honduras, where they introduced the cutting of mahogany, which has since been the principal export of that colony. But some settlers disregarded the orders for evacuation, and remained at their plantations on the coast. As for Spain, she was too much pressed elsewhere to attempt the conquest and occupation of the Mosquito Shore. She made an attempt on the Black River, but this the Mosquito Indians repelled, and she made no other attempt during that century. Then came the independence of the Spanish colonies. Meanwhile the Mosquito Indians maintained the dominion of the whole coast as if nothing had happened, imposing tribute on the subject Indians as far south as King Buppan, not far from Porto Bello, and also imposing tribute on the Spaniards themselves for permission to trade at Greytown and Salt Creek, or Moyn. The British Government received favourably the renewed advances of the Mosquito Indians at Jamaica and Belize, and from that time till 1856 the Mosquito Kings were educated and then crowned at Jamaica or at Belize. English settlers in smaller numbers returned to the coast with their slaves, and engaged in trade and mahoganycutting, the West Indian world seeming to have quite forgotten the pranks of the British Foreign Office. Thus we see the queer anomaly that although the English had been ordered in 1787 to evacuate the country, yet the protectorate over the Mosquito Shore was officially retained by Great Britain. In April, 1806, Captain John Bligh, of H.B.M.S. Surveillant, captured the island of St. Andrews, and drove out the Spanish Governor and his troops, as the island was considered to be a dependency of the Mosquito Shore. On January 14, 1816, Sir George Arthur, Superintendent of British Honduras, addresses a despatch to Prince George as follows: Your request to be crowned in the settlement in presence of your chieftains and such of your people as are assembled here, I shall most cheerfully comply with, and I sincerely trust that you will not be disappointed in the advantage you expect to derive by its being understood by your subjects that you are in a particular manner under the protection of the British Government. . . .' Again, in 1840 the British Commissioners for the Mosquito Shore appointed Messrs. Samuel and Peter Shepherd as Sheriffs and Commandants of the southern half of the kingdom from Little Snook Creek to King Buppan Bluff. The Messrs. Shepherd reply to the British Commissioners, accepting the appointment offered, but they observe that the port of San Juan (Greytown) must be exempted from the liability to pay duties, the use of the harbour having been granted to the State of Nicaragua for a fixed sum to be paid annually to the Mosquito King. In 1841 King Robert died, and by his will left his son and three daughters, then very young, in charge of James Stanislaus Bell, whom at the same time he appointed Sheriff and Commandant of the kingdom and its dependencies. BRITISH OFFICIALS APPOINTED 15 In 1846 the British Government appointed Patrick Walker Consul-General and Superintendent of the Mosquito Shore. In 1846 the young King George was crowned at Belize. He died about 1862, leaving no children, and the son of his sister Victoria succeeded as King of the Mosquito Indians, who had fallen on evil times. CHAPTER I. Inhabitants-Habits-Creole language and character-Mixed breedsEarly recollections-Ma Presence-Ta Tom'-' Ma Presence' a praying soul-Christmas at Blewfields-'Wakes.' THE village or town of Blewfields is situated on several low hillocks or ridges which project into the lagoon, with creeks between each ridge. The town is surrounded by primeval forest that has never felt the edge of the axe or been scorched by fire. The town in my day was inhabited by 500 or 600 blacks and mulattoes, and by two or three whites. The settlement was surrounded by a small extent of clearing, covered by grass and bushes, over which grazed pigs, goats, and fowls. The houses were mostly wattled, but three or four, our own among them, were of a better style, the floor elevated on posts 6 feet above the ground; walls, floor and partitions of American lumber; roof thatched with palm leaves; tables, chairs, beds, etc., all good furniture; but the kitchen here also a detached building. The lagoon is a beautiful sheet of water, 16 or 18 miles long by about 5 wide, dotted with wooded hilly islands, enclosed from the sea by a strip of low land a mile wide, densely covered by forest, with an opening opposite the town under Blewfields Bluff, a hill 260 feet high, and another opening at the far south end, opposite some pretty islands inhabited by Rama Indians. The Blewfields River enters the north end of the lagoon by an extensive low delta, through which it |