A Handbook of St. Kitts-Nevis. By Katherine Janet Burdon. (West
India Committee, and the Croy,* Agents for the Colonies.) —Mrs. Burdon, the wife of the Administrator of St. Kitts, Nevis and Anguilla, has written a very complete and interesting account, with good maps and photographs, of the three little islands, which played a considerable part in our eighteenth- century wars. St. Kitts, where Thomas Warner settled in 1623, was our first West Indian colony. The adjacent island of Nevis was colonized five years later by aparty from St. Kitts. Anguilla, which lies to the north with several French and Dutch islands intervening, was also colonized from St. Kitts about 1660. Nelson, then commanding the Boreas,' was married at Nevis in 1787 ; it was there, too, that he had the troublesome law-suit about some prizes which compelled him to stay on board for two months lest he should be arrested. Alexander Hamilton, of the Federalist, was born at Nevis. The many vicissitudes of St. Kitts are well summarised by Mrs. Bunion. Her description of the islands at the present time is lucid and on the whole encouraging. The high price of sugar is at any rate beneficial to the West Indies. What the islands need most is a regular
steamship service from the mother-country, not only to convey tourists but also to encourage trade. The importance of out West Indian colonies is, we fear, insufficiently realized in this country.
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