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 218 BAHAWALPOOE BAHIA limes, lemons, &c., are among the products of the islands ; there are also several valuable woods, as mahogany, fustic, lignum vita?, &c. In the more southerly islands are large salt ponds. The principal exports are salt, sponge, pineapples, and oranges. The climate is salu- brious, and very beneficial to consumptives. The imports in 1869 amounted to 240,584, and the exports to 163,002. The government is administered by a governor, aided by an execu- tive council of 9 members. There is a legisla- tive council of 9 members and a representative council of 28 members. The capital is Nassau, on the island of New Providence, which during the civil war in the United States was a famous place of resort for blockade-runners. The com- mercial activity by which it was then charac- terized has since fallen away. San Salvador, called Guanahani by the natives, was the first land discovered by Columbus in 1492. The Bahamas were then inhabited by an inoffensive race, whom the Spaniards carried away and forced to labor in the mines of Santo Domingo and the pearl fisheries of Cumana. They then remained unoccupied till 1629, when the Eng- lish settled them. These were dispossessed by the Spaniards in 1641, and the islands repeat- edly changed masters until they were annexed permanently to the British empire by the treaty of 1783. At the close of the American revolu- tionary war many of the royalists settled in the Bahamas. BAHAWALPOOR. See BHAWAI.POOK. BAHIA (Port, and Span., bay). I. A prov- ince of Brazil, bounded E. by the Atlantic, N. W. and N. by Pernambuco and Sergipe, W. by Goyaz, and S. by Minas Geraes and Espiritu Santo; area, about 200,000 sq. m.; pop. in 1867, estimated at 1,400,000, includ- ing nearly 300,000 slaves. It is traversed Bahia. from S. W. to N. E. by a mountain range having various local names and sending forth lateral offshoots. The magnificent primeval forests are disappearing before the increas- ing cultivation of the soil, though many of them, especially in the Berra-Mar region, noted for their wealth of timber, still remain. The mountainous regions are the least fertile, owing to excessive dryness. The principal river is the Sao Francisco, which forms the N. and N. W. boundary, and has a rather fertile valley; but the most productive region of Bahia and the most densely populated of Brazil is the country along the coast, called the Reconcavo, with many villages, farm houses, plantations, and over 20 small towns. The province is rich in palm trees of prodigious size ; in ca- shew, nayha, and gum-yielding trees ; in medi- cinal plants, and in manioc, fruits, and vege- tables. Minerals abound, but are not worked. The discovery of diamond fields by a slave in 1844, in the Serra Sincura, led to a great influx of population. Bahia exports more sugar than all the rest of Brazil. It is famous for its tobacco and for the increasing produc- tion of cotton, rivalling that of Pernambuco. The rice is of superior quality ; the Brazil wood equals that of Pernambuco, but the cof- fee is inferior to that of Rio. It was one of the first of the Brazilian provinces peopled by Europeans, and the aborigines, who chiefly in- habit the mountains, are more rapidly declin- ing here than in any other part of the empire. II. Bahia, or San Salvador, capital of the pre- ceding province and of a district of the same name, situated on All Saints' bay (Bahia de Todos os Santos), about 800 m. N.'E. of Rio da Janeiro, in lat. 13 S., Ion. 38 30' W. ; pop. over