: Essays 67
Lucia; which in this, as well as other respects,
would be more valuable possessions, and which, I
doubt not, the peace will secure to us. Nor is it
nearly so well situated for that of the rest of the
Spanish Main as Jamaica. As to the greater safety
of our trade by the possession of Guadaloupe, experience
 has convinced us that in reducing a single
island, or even more, we stop the privateering business
 but little. Privateers still subsist, in equal if not
greater numbers, and carry the vessels into Martinico
which before it was more convenient to carry into
Guadaloupe. Had we all the Caribbees, it is true,
they would in those parts be without shelter.
Yet, upon the whole, I suppose it to be a doubtful
point, and well worth consideration, whether our
obtaining possession of all the Caribbees would be
more than a temporary benefit; as it would necessarily
 soon fill the French part of Hispaniola with
French inhabitants, and thereby render it five times
more valuable in time of peace, and little less than
impregnable in time of war, and would probably end
in a few years in the uniting the whole of that great
and fertile island under a French government. It is
agreed on all hands, that our conquest of St. Christopher’s,
 and driving the French from thence, first
furnished Hispaniola with skilful and substantial
planters, and was consequently the first occasion of
its present opulence. On the other hand, I will
hazard an opinion, that, valuable as the French possessions
 in the West Indies are, and undeniable as the
advantages they derive from them, there is somewhat
 to be weighed in the opposite scale. They

i760]