called also St Domingo, the largest of the Antilles or Caribbee islands, extending about 420 miles from east to west, and 120 in breadth from north to south; lying between 17° 37' and 20° of N. Lat. and between 67° 35' and 74° 15' W. Long. The climate is hot, but not reckoned unwholesome; and some of the inhabitants are said to arrive at the age of 120. It is sometimes refreshed by breezes and rains; and its salubrity is likewise in a great measure owing to the beautiful variety of hills and valleys, woods and rivers, which everywhere present themselves. It is indeed reckoned by far the finest and most pleasant island of the Antilles, as being the best accommodated to all the purposes of life when duly cultivated.

This island, famous for being the earliest settlement of the Spaniards in the new world, was at first in high estimation for the quantity of gold it supplied: this wealth diminished with the inhabitants of the country, whom they obliged to dig it out of the bowels of the earth; and the source of it was entirely dried up, when they were exterminated, which was quickly done, by a series of the most shocking barbarities that ever disgraced the history of any nation. Benzoni relates, that of two millions of inhabitants, contained in the island when discovered by Columbus in 1492, scarce 153 were alive in 1545. A vehement desire of opening again this source of wealth inspired the thought of getting slaves from Africa; but, besides that these were found unfit for the labours they were destined to, the multitude of mines, which then began to be wrought on the continent, made those of Hispaniola no longer of any importance. An idea now suggested itself, that their negroes, which were healthy, strong, and patient, might be usefully employed in husbandry; and they adopted, through necessity, a wise resolution, which, had they known their own interest, they would have embraced by choice.

The produce of their industry was at first extremely small, because the labourers were few. Charles V., who, like most sovereigns, preferred his favourites to everything, had granted an exclusive right of the slave-trade to a Flemish nobleman, who made over his privilege to the Genoese. These avaricious republicans conducted this infamous commerce as all monopolists are conducted; they resolved to sell dear, and Hispaniola, they sold but few. When time and competition had fixed the natural and necessary price of slaves, the number of them increased. It may easily be imagined, that the Spaniards, who had been accustomed to treat the Indians as beasts, did not entertain a higher opinion of these negro Africans, whom they substituted in their place. Degraded still farther in their eyes by the price they had paid for them, even religion could not restrain them from aggravating the weight of their servitude. It became intolerable, and these wretched slaves made an effort to recover the unalienable rights of mankind. Their attempt proved unsuccessful; but they reaped this benefit from their despair, that they were afterwards treated with less inhumanity.

This moderation (if tyranny cramped by the apprehension of revolt can deserve that name) was attended with good consequences. Cultivation was pursued with some degree of success. Soon after the middle of the 16th century, the mother country drew annually from this colony ten millions weight of sugar, a large quantity of wood for dying, tobacco, cocoa, caliss, ginger, cotton, and poultry in abundance. One might imagine, that such favourable beginnings would give both the desire and the means of carrying them further; but a train of events, more fatal each than the other, ruined these hopes.

The first misfortune arose from the depopulation of the island. The Spanish conquests on the continent should naturally have contributed to promote the success of an island, which nature seemed to have formed to be the centre of that vast dominion arising around it, to be the staple of the different colonies. But it fell out quite otherwise: on a view of the immense fortunes raising in Mexico, and other parts, the richest inhabitants of Hispaniola began to despise their settlements, and quitted the true source of riches, which is on the surface of the earth, to go and ravage the bowels of it for veins of gold, which are quickly exhausted. The government endeavoured in vain to put a stop to this emigration; the laws were always either artfully eluded, or openly violated.

The weakness, which was a necessary consequence of such a conduct, leaving the coasts without defence, encouraged the enemies of Spain to ravage them. Even the capital of this island was taken and pillaged by that celebrated English sailor, Sir Francis Drake. The cruisers of less consequence contented themselves with intercepting vessels in their passage through those latitudes, the best known at that time of any in the new world. To complete these misfortunes, the Castilians themselves commenced pirates. They attacked no ships but those of their own nation; which were more rich, worse provided, and worse defended, than any others. The custom they had of fitting out ships clandestinely, in order to procure slaves, prevented them from being known; and the assistance they purchased from the ships of war, commissioned to protect the trade, infured to them impunity.

The foreign trade of the colony was its only resource in this distress; and that was illicit; but as it continued to be carried on, notwithstanding the vigilance of the governors, or, perhaps, by their connivance, Hispaniola, the policy of an exasperated and short-sighted court exerted itself in demolishing most of the sea-ports, and driving the miserable inhabitants into the inland country. This act of violence threw them into a state of dejection; which the incursions and settlement of the French on the island afterwards carried to the utmost pitch. The latter, after having made some unsuccessful attempts to settle on the island, had part of it yielded to them in 1697, and now enjoy by far the best share.

Spain, totally taken up with that vast empire which she had formed on the continent, used no pains to dissipate this lethargy. She even refused to listen to the solicitations of her Flemish subjects, who earnestly pressed that they might have permission to clear those fertile lands. Rather than run the risk of seeing them carry on a contraband trade on the coasts, she chose to bury in oblivion a settlement which had been of consequence, and was likely to become so again.

This colony, which had no longer any intercourse with the mother country but by a single ship, of no great burden, that arrived from thence every third year, consisted, in 1717, of 18,410 inhabitants, including Spaniards, Moors, Negroes, or Mulattoes. The complexions and character of these people differed according to the different proportions of American, European, and African blood they had received from that natural and transient union which restores all races and conditions to the same level. These demi-savages, plunged in the extreme of sloth, lived upon fruits and roots, dwelt in cottages without furniture, and most of them without clothes. The few among them, in whom indolence had not totally suppressed the sense of decency and taste for the conveniences of life, purchased clothes of their neighbours the French in return for their cattle, and the money sent to them for the maintenance of two hundred soldiers, the priests, and the government. It doth not appear that the company, formed at Barcelona in 1757, with exclusive privileges for the re-establishment of St Domingo, hath as yet made any considerable progress. They send out only two small vessels annually, which are freighted back with six thousand hides, and some other commodities of little value. See St Domingo.