GRENADA, the most southerly of the Caribbee islands in the West Indies, is situated between 12° 20' and 11' 58' North Lat. and between 61° 20' and 61° 35 West Long. It is twenty leagues north-west of Tobago, and the same distance from the nearest point of the American continent. It is about twenty-five miles in length from north to south, and Keen at its greatest breadth, contracting gradually towards both extremities. A chain of mountains traverse the whole island from north to south, and give rise to a great number of small rivers ; and in the highest ground is a circular lake called Grand Etang, from which several of these streams derive their source: There is a bay on the north-west coast (which has been recently fortified at great expence,) so capacious and secure, that sixty men of war may ride in it safely almost without casting anchor. The air is salubrious, and the soil fruitful in the produc tions of the climate.
Grenada was discovered by Columbus in 1498, and was at that time inhabited by a warlike people called Charai lies or Caribbees. The Spaniards do not appear to have made any attempt to form a settlement on the coast, and the natives remained free and undisturbed till the year 1650. At this period, the French governor of Martinico, Du Parquet, landed on the island with 200 adventurers, who seem to have been resolved upon a wanton destruc tion of the unoffending inhabitants, and an unwarrantable possession of the country ; but being hospitably received by the unsuspecting objects of his unjustifiable attack, they pretended to make a purchase of the island for a few knives and hatchets, a quantity of glass beads, and a bar rel of brandy to the chief. Immediately assuming the sovereignty, and having roused the natives to resistance by their tyrannical proceedings, they took measures to ex tirpate the whole race as lawless rebels. This they are said to have speedily accomplished by a course of atroci ous massacres ; and a few wretched survivors of their butcheries having thrown themselves headlong from a steep rock, rather than fall into the hands of such merciless enemies, the French settlers, with characteristic levity, gave to the spot the name of Le Horne des Sauteur, the Hill of the Leapers. The perpetrators of these enormities
soon began to quarrel among themselves, and to suffer, in their turn, the oppressions of tyrannical governors. By a succession of calamities and revolutions, the narration of which would interest few readers, the prosperity of the settlement was so much impaired, that, in the year 1700, more than twenty years after the sovereignty had been vested in the crown of France, there were found on the whole island only 151 white inhabitants, 53 free negroes or mulattoes, 525 slaves, 64 horses, 569 horned cattle, 3 plantations of sugar, and 52 of indigo. Above fourteen years afterwards, howeVer, an active commercial inter course was opened with the island of Martinique, cultiva tion was rapidly extended, and, notwithstanding the inter ruption which these improvements sustained by the war in 1744, Grenada was found, in 1753, to contain 1262 white inhabitants, 175 free negroes, 11,991 slaves, 2298 horses or mules, 2456 horned cattle, 3278 sheep, 902 goats, 331 hogs, 33 sugar plantations, Stc.; and in 1762, when it surrendered to the British arms, it is said to have yielded annually, together with its dependencies the Gre nadines, a quantity of clayed and muscovado sugar, equal to 11,000 hogsheads of 15 cwt. each, and 27,000 lbs. of indigo. Having been finally ceded to Great Britain by the treaty of peace in 1763, a duty of 4i per cent. upon all exported produce was ordered to be levied, in place of all customs and ditties formerly paid to the French king ; a measure which gave rise to a great constitutional question, in which, after a long and elaborate law discussion, judg ment was given by Lord Mansfield against the crown, and the duty was abolished in Grenada and the other ced ed islands. Great commotions and divisions also were ex cited in the island, respecting the election of Roman Ca tholic inhabitants as members of assembly. By these party-contentions, the colony continued to be disturbed till its recapture by the French in 1779: and they were again renewed, with additional violence, after its restoration to Great Britain in the general pacification which took place in 1783.