On this subject Long wrote: “From the resemblance which the language of these islanders bears in some respects to the Spanish, I am apt to suspect that many of their words have been altered by the Spanish mode of pronunciation, and the difficulty which the discoverers found in articulating and accenting them without some intermixture of their own patronymic. In some this is exceedingly obvious, where the letter _b_ is used indiscriminately for _v_, agreeably to their idiom. This perversion may easily lead us to ascribe a Spanish or Moorish origin to the names of places, such as rivers, mountains, headlands, &c., which in fact are of Indian derivation. Thus the article _gua_, so commonly met with both in these islands and on the Southern continent, was often prefixed or appended to the Indian names of places and things; and even of their provincial _caciques_. Of the latter were Gua-rionexius, Gua-canarillus, Gua-naboa, and others. Of the former a vast multitude occurs, as Gua-nama, Xa-gua, Gua-há-gua, Camayá-gua, Aicayazá-gua, Má-gua, Nicará-gua, Verá-gua, Xará-guo, Gua-ríco, Ni-gua (Chigger), etc., which may seem to confound them with derivatives from the Spanish or Moorish word _agua_ (water). So the terminations, _ao_, _ana_, _coa_, and _boa_ or _voa_, as Manabax-ao, Cib-ao, Gu-ana, Magu-ana, Yagu-ana, Ligu-ana, Zav-ana (Savannah), Furac-ana (Hurricane), Caym-ana, Guaiac-ana (Guiacum), Haba-coa, Cuana-boa, and so forth. The names therefore occurring in our island of Liguana, Cagua, Tilboa, Guanaboa, Guadibocoa, and others of similar finals are with more propriety to be traced from the Indian than the Spanish dialect.” With regard to the Spanish occupation of the island both history and archæology are almost as scantily supplied as in the case of the Arawâks. It is estimated that when Jamaica fell into the hands of the English the population of the capital was half Spanish and Portuguese or their descendants and half slaves; but it is a curious fact that a negro is mentioned as holding the position of priest of the Roman Catholic church. The more important islands of Cuba and Hispaniola, to say nothing of the rich mines of South America, offered greater attractions to the Spaniards than did Jamaica, where—then, as now—the field had to be ploughed before the harvest could be reaped. They utilized for their _hatos_, or pastures, the low-lying lands on the sea-coast, which had formerly been used by the native Arawâks for the cultivation of Indian corn and cassava. Of these hatos the principal were, going from east to west, Morante (the name of which still lives in Morant Bay), Ayala (Yallahs), Lezama (where Mona now is), Liguanea (Lower St. Andrew), Guanaboa (the name of which still exists), Guatabaco (about Old Harbour), Yama (in Vere), Pereda (Pedro Plains), El Eado (behind Bluefields) and Cabonico (near Savanna-la-Mar). [Illustration: JAMAICA, CIRCA 1661]