"I
had an account from a gentleman who was possessed of a large estate in
the island that a company in the year 1733 came there and cleared a
large sum of money, where they might have made moderate fortunes if
they had not been too busy with the growth of the country. They
received three hundred and seventy pistoles the first night of the
'Beggar's Opera,' but within the space of two months they buried their
third Polly and two of their men. The gentlemen of the island for some
time took their turns upon the stage to keep up the diversion; but
this did not hold long; for in two months more there were but one old
man, a boy, and a woman of the company left. The rest died either with
the country distemper or the common beverage of the place, the noble
spirit of rum-punch, which is generally fatal to new-comers. The
shattered remains, with upwards of two thousand pistoles in bank,
embarked for Carolina, to join another company at Charlestown, but
were cast away in the voyage. Had the company been more blessed with
the virtue of sobriety, &c., they might perhaps have lived to carry
home the liberality of those generous islanders.
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