Other nations took possession of smaller islands, unoccupied by Spain, and from these centres continued their raids, as privateers in war, and as pirates at other times. Sometimes they were united among themselves against the common enemy, sometimes at war with each other. France and Holland against England, England and Holland against France--nothing but quarrels and fighting. Now an island changed hands, and again it was restored or recaptured. The planters were never sure of being able to reap their crops, and often had literally to superintend the estate work, armed with sword and arquebuse, while their black and white slaves cultivated the soil. Now the West Indies became the great training ground for three maritime nations--England, France, and Holland. Spain lost her prestige, and the struggle lay among her enemies for over a century. At first the three disputants for her place were equally matched; then Holland dropped behind, leaving England and France to fight it out. The struggle was a very close one, which only ended with the fall of Napoleon, and it was in the Caribbean Sea where the great check to France took place. Here Rodney defeated De Grasse, and here Nelson and many another naval officer gained that experience which served them so well in other parts of the world. Here also was the scene of that great labour experiment, the African slave-trade. The atrocities of the Spaniards caused the depopulation of the Greater Antilles, and led to the importation of negroes. Whatever may be said against slavery, there can hardly be any question that the African has been improved by his removal to another part of the world and different surroundings. True, he has not progressed to the extent that was expected by his friends when they paid such an enormous sum for his enfranchisement; still, there are undoubtedly signs of progress. The white colonists in the West Indies never settled down to form the nucleus of a distinct people. Since the emancipation the islands have been more and more abandoned to the negroes and coloured people, with the result that although the government is mostly in the hands of the whites, they are in such a minority as to be almost lost. In Cuba there appears to be such a feeling of patriotism towards their own island that probably we shall soon hear of a new republic, but elsewhere in the islands our hopes for the future must lie in the negroes and coloured people.