Bahamas, or LUCAYOS (Span. Los Cayos), a chain of British West Indian islands, stretching nearly 600 miles in a north-westerly direction from the neighbourhood of the north coast of Hayti, to that of the east coast of Florida. From Florida they are separated by the channel through which flows the Gulf Stream (q.v.); and from Cuba, by the Old Bahama Channel. These are the principal passages between the open ocean and the Gulf of Mexico. The chain extends in N. lat. from 21° 42' to 27° 34', and in W. long. from 72° 40' to 79° 5'; and it rests mainly on two shoals—the Great Bank to the south, and the Little Bank to the north. There are 20 larger islands, 653 islets or cays, and 2387 reefs. The chief members of the group, if reckoned from the NW., are these: Great Bahama, Abaco, Eleuthera, New Providence, Andros, Cat Island, San Salvador or Watling's Island, Exuma, Long Island, Crooked Island, Acklin, Mariguana, Inagua, Little Inagua. The Caicos (q.v.) and Turk's Island, which geographically belong to the Bahamas, have since 1848 been politically annexed to Jamaica.
The area is 5390 sq. m.; and in 1891 the popula- tion was 47,565, of whom about 6500 are Europeans. Of coralline formation, the islands generally are of reef-like shape, long, narrow, and low, the highest hill not exceeding 230 feet. With very little appearance of soil, they derive considerable fertility from the tendency of the porous rock to retain moisture. Besides excellent pasturage, they yield Guineacorn, maize, cotton, pine-apples, lemons, oranges, tamarinds, olives, pimento, cocoa-nuts, and a species of cinnamon. Sponges are largely found round the shores. Cotton cultivation received a great impulse during the American civil war. The sugar-cane, too, is grown more largely than formerly; but the salt manufacture has ceased to be remunerative. The temperature ranges from 57° to 113° F.; but in the winter the climate is so delightfully temperate as to be often prescribed in the United States for pulmonary complaints. The annual rainfall is from 43 to 45 inches, being heaviest from May to October, but pretty equally distributed over the other months. On 1st October 1866, and 8th September 1883, the Bahamas were visited by a furious and destructive cyclone.
The Bahamas were Columbus's earliest discovery (1492). But the precise spot of his first landing is still debated. Cat Island was generally believed to be the Guanahani or San Salvador of Columbus; but recent investigators transfer the honour to Watling's Island, situated a little farther to the east. The Bahamas, having been depopulated, but not again colonised by the Spaniards, were occupied by the English in 1629—to whom, after various vicissitudes of fortune in the wars with Spain and France, they were ultimately secured by the peace of Versailles (1783). Nassau, in New Providence, is the seat of government, and has recently been greatly improved both as town and port. During the American civil war, Nassau became the station for blockade-runners, and thence derived unexampled prosperity; the value of imports and exports rising from £234,029 and £157,350 in 1860, to £5,346,112 and £4,672,398 in 1864. They have greatly declined since; their present annual value, on a four years' average, being just over £200,000 and £180,000 respectively. But, so far as agriculture is concerned, the impulse then received has been maintained by the Bahamas. Both Baptists and Wesleyans are nearly twice as numerous as members of the Church of England, which was disestablished in 1869; there are but few Presbyterians, and still fewer Catholics. The constitution consists of a governor, aided by an executive council of nine members, a legislative assembly of nine, and a representative assembly of twenty-nine. See works by Bacot (2d ed. 1871) and Powles (1888).