TO JOSEPH ATKINSON, ESQ. FROM BERMUDA. * March. "THE daylight is gone-but, before we depart, "One cup shall go round to the friend of my heart, *PINKERTON has said that "a good history and description of the Bermudas might afford a pleasing addition to the geographical library;" but there certainly are not materials for such a work. The island, since the time of its discovery, has experienced so very few vicissitudes, the people have been so indolent, and their trade so limited, that there is but little which the historian could amplify into importance; and, with respect to the natural productions of the country, the few which the inhabitants can be induced to cultivate are so common in the West Indies, that they have been described by every naturalist who has written any account of those islands. It is often asserted by the trans-atlantic politicians, that this little colony deserves more attention from the mothercountry than it receives, and it certainly possesses advantages of situation, to which we should not be long insensible if it were once in the hands of an enemy. I was told by a celebrated friend of Washington, at New York, that they had formed a plan for its capture, towards the conclusion of the American War; "with the intention (as he expressed himself) of making it a nest of hornets for the annoyance of British trade in that part of the world." And there is no doubt, it lies so fairly in the track to the West Indies, that an enemy might with ease convert it into a very harassing impediment. The plan of Bishop Berkeley for a college at Bermuda, where American savages might be converted and educated, "To the kindest, the dearest-oh! judge by the tear, "That I shed while I name him, how kind and how dear!" 'Twas thus, by the shade of a calabash-tree, With a few who could feel and remember like me, though concurred in by the government of the day, was a wild and useless speculation. Mr. Hamilton, who was governor of the island some years since, proposed, if I mistake not, the establishment of a marine academy for the instruction of those children of West-Indians, who might be intended for any nautical employment. This was a more rational idea, and for something of this nature the island is admirably calculated. But the plan should be much more extensive, and embrace a general system of education, which would entirely remove the alternative in which the colonists are involved at present, of either sending their sons to England for instruction, or entrusting them to colleges in the States of America, where ideas by no means favourable to Great Britain are very sedulously inculcated. The women of Bermuda, though not generally handsome, have an affectionate languor in their look and manner, which is always interesting. What the French imply by their epithet aimante seems very much the character of the young Bermudian girls-that predisposition to loving, which, without being awakened by any particular object, diffuses itself through the general manner in a tone of tenderness that never fails to fascinate. The men of the island, I confess, are not very civilized; and the old philosopher, who imagined that, after this life, men would be changed into mules and women into turtle-doves, would find the metamorphosis in some degree anticipated at Bermuda. The charm, that to sweeten my goblet I threw, Oh! say, do you thus, in the luminous hour Of wine and of wit, when the heart is in flower Last night, when we came from the calabash-tree, |