could not be less than 50%.), which I took from my reserved store, and sent with a separate note to Captain James, begging his acceptance of it, and regretting that I could not here get it mounted; but adding, that I hoped he would have it done in England, and send in the account to my banker's, who had my directions to pay the cost. When the midshipman took these things, I said to him"My young friend, don't be offended if I offer you a doubloon, to lay in any thing you like for your mess;" but he objected to receive it, until my dear wife remarked "You cannot refuse it, because it is a present to your messmates as well as to yourself." He acknowledged the weight of this appeal, adding"You are very kind; and as we hear you are very rich, I will no longer say no. When you went on shore," continued he, "the captain said to our first lieutenant, "There goes a fellow worth more than his weight in gold!' Some took the speech one way, and some another. Now, sir, I would take it both ways a good heart, and a good purse! and they are two good things; that is, when they lay close aboard of each other." So, shaking me cordially by the hand, and my dear wife offering him hers, which was not her custom, he took his leave of us, apparently much delighted; perhaps more with what he had said, than from what he had received, either by my present, or our joint courtesy. But if his pleasure did not arise from what he had said, my dear wife's had; that having been the impulse to her cordiality on his leaving us.

The next day I received a note from Captain James, acknowledging the receipt of the letters, which he promised should be carefully delivered; also that he would pay every attention requisite to the safe delivery of the money boxes to my bankers; and then he returned me his warmest acknowledgment for my very superb and valuable present; which, however, he must insist on having mounted at his own expense.

Purdy and his nuptial friends were punctual on the appointed evening. The father and mother of the girl were both mulattoes. The man said he would give his daughter to Jemmy; but as he had heard from him that I had a good settlement, where I could employ him, and give him a house and grounds, he, and his wife, and his son, wished to go too. He told me he was a carpenter, and so was his son; that they had been turned out of a place they had built on some ground that did not belong to the man who sold it to them; and they were so impoverished and vexed by the business, they now wished to leave Jamaica altogether. I consented to take them; but it was on condition that the son should bring a wife with him, as my great object was to people the settlement with honest and industrious families. He answered, there would be no difficulty in that; so he would promise for his son. This matter being thus arranged in the presence of Purdy, I informed them I would lend them all some money, to buy such things as Purdy would advise as necessary to take with them, and that I would charge it to them; for which they must account to me at a future time.

The father and Purdy thanked me, and then departed with the welcome news to their friends. Little more was done this week; and on Sunday, the 30th, we went to church, accompanied by Diego, who now remained with us entirely at our lodgings; the schooner having the captain and his crew on board, besides Purdy, and the two New England negroes, whom we had shipped as part of her establishment.

Early in the week a fine new boat was fixed on with lugsails, measuring quite twelve tons. She was half-decked, and therefore safe in the open sea. I paid 300 dollars for her complete. Purdy agreed to have charge of her, with the two negro sailors; and to take all his family down in her, with their needfuls. I advanced to his father-in-law, the son, and himself, 20 dollars each; and told him he must ballast with coals, which I should want to burn lime; that they were now lying on Mr. Green's wharf, where he must take them in, and be in readiness to accompany the schooner, whose cargo was now ready, and would certainly sail on Monday or Tuesday next. I called this fine boat The Avon, after the beautiful river down which my Eliza and myself sailed on leaving England, and on whose admired banks we had walked delightfully together before we embarked on our eventful voyage. It had also been my place of recreation when with my uncle at Bristol; and I loved such recollections. I had wished to call our schooner The Severn, in honour of that noble river, near to which our native village stands; but she had been registered by name, and ugly as it was to our ears, it could not be

changed; she was called The Porghee, after a fish much esteemed at Bermuda.

By the middle of the week Mr. Finn was ready; but it seemed the spars could not be got below; so the schooner now began to take in her cargo, leaving the spars to be stowed upon deck. A few thousand bricks were already placed on the floor of the vessel; she then took in spare anchors for herself and the Avon, and also a long 12-pounder, fitted with a depressing carriage, to mount on the promontory, and nearly a ton of shot for the gun. Then, in barrels, came American flour, rice biscuit, Irish beef, pork, butter, sugar, salt, suet, coffee, raisins, gunpowder, pitch, tar, resin, kegs of paint, kegs of ball cartridges, and a keg of flints: in boxes, Russia duck, English stripes, checks, linens, coloured handkerchiefs for the head, &c. &c., soap, candles, refined sugar and tea in cases, ironmongery; as knives, locks, hinges, nails, &c.; ship carpenters' tools; house carpenters' tools; twenty stand of arms, with their appointments, and blank paper cartridges for the 12-pounder: in crates, kitchen utensils; as pots, pans, kettles, &c., with a large quantity of yabbahs, or earthen pots, used for cooking in Jamaica; also wooden trenchers, and coarse crockery, as jugs, brown dishes, delft plates, &c.: in packages, implements of husbandry; as pickaxes, spades, shovels, hoes, axes, hatchets, billhooks, &c.; sawyers' saws, leather, canvass, cordage, oakum; a quantity of slop clothing, including shoes; a large and small Union Jack, with spare buntin for other flags; two mahogany bedsteads, with mattrasses and moscheto nets: loose, spare

cables for the schooner and Avon, sails and rigging for the brig, a timber carriage wheelbarrows, handbarrows, squared timber for erecting habitations, boards, planks, staves, shingles; a great handmill, with a wheel for grinding maize; two mahogany tables, twelve mahogany chairs, wardrobe, and two chests of drawers. There were besides, a few hams, and a cheese; six dozen of Canary in hampers, and a quarter cask of the same; a large box of Spanish cigars, jars with oil, and spirits of turpentine, two looking-glasses, two spy-glasses, a speaking-trumpet, and bugle horn, a pair of glass shades for the candles, and some other things not herein enumerated: however, the whole did not make more than three fourths of a cargo; the planks and boards being stowed above all, so as to make a platform fore and aft in the hold, with room enough above it for the accommodation of such people as we might think fit to place there; as well as for the stock that Diego was to bring on board; viz. six sheep, four pigs, twelve turkeys, twelve geese, and twelve Guinea fowls; also a supply of plantain suckers, and a quantity of pine-apples, shaddocks, oranges, limes, and some other fruits. I may here remark, that the gunpowder, of which there were two barrels, as well as the kegs of ball cartridges, were cased in flour barrels, with a packing of Indian meal between, for security and safety.

While they were engaged in thus loading the schooner, I procured a letter of introduction to the Governor's secretary at Spanish Town; and hiring a calash with two horses, which I preferred to a