all of the colonists together at Fourah Bay, and Bacon went farther down the coast to seek a more favorable site.  A few persons who did not wish to go to Fourah Bay remained in Sierra Leone and became British subjects.  Bacon found a promising tract about two hundred and fifty miles down the coast at Cape Montserado; but the natives were not especially eager to sell, as they did not wish to break up the slave traffic.  Meanwhile Winn and several more of the colonists died; and Bacon now returned to the United States.  The second expedition had thus proved to be little more successful than the first; but the future site of Monrovia had at least been suggested.

In November came Dr. Eli Ayres as agent of the Society, and in December Captain Robert F. Stockton of the Alligator with instructions to cooeperate.  These two men explored the coast and on December 11 arrived at Mesurado Bay.  Through the jungle they made their way to a village and engaged in a palaver with King Peter and five of his associates.  The negotiations were conducted in the presence of an excited crowd and with imminent danger; but Stockton had great tact and at length, for the equivalent of $300, he and Ayres purchased the mouth of the Mesurado River, Cape Montserado, and the land for some distance in the interior.  There was also an understanding (for half a dozen gallons of rum and some trade-cloth and tobacco) with King George, who “resided on the Cape and claimed a sort of jurisdiction over the northern district of the peninsula of Montserado, by virtue of which the settlers were permitted to pass across the river and commence the laborious task of clearing away the heavy forest which covered the site of their intended town."[1] Then the agent returned to effect the removal of the colonists from Fourah Bay, leaving a very small company as a sort of guard on Perseverance (or Providence) Island at the mouth of the river.  Some of the colonists refused to leave, remained, and thus became British subjects.  For those who had remained on the island there was trouble at once.  A small vessel, the prize of an English cruiser, bound to Sierra Leone with thirty liberated Africans, put into the roads for water, and had the misfortune to part her cable and come ashore.  “The natives claim to a prescriptive right, which interest never fails to enforce to its fullest extent, to seize and appropriate the wrecks and cargoes of vessels stranded, under whatever circumstances, on their coast."[2] The vessel in question drifted to the mainland one mile from the cape, a small distance below George’s town, and the natives proceeded to act in accordance with tradition.  They were fired on by the prize master and forced to desist, and the captain appealed to the few colonists on the island for assistance.  They brought into play a brass field piece, and two of the natives were killed and several more wounded.  The English officer, his crew, and the captured Africans escaped, though