On setting our traveller down in Poland, the soldiers who had guarded him, gave him to understand that he might then go where he pleased; but that, if he again returned to the dominions of the empress, he would certainly be hanged.  It did not appear for some time what the real cause was of this proceeding; but there is every reason to believe it arose out of the jealousy of the North-west Russian Fur Company, whose head-quarters were at Irkutsk, and that their influence at Petersburgh had procured from the empress the annulment of her previous order, together with the present inhuman mandate.  Ledyard, however, knew nothing of this; and, having neither relish nor motive for making the experiment a second time, he took the shortest route to Konigsberg, where he found himself destitute, without friends or means, his hopes blasted, and his health enfeebled.  In this forlorn condition, he bethought himself once more of the benevolence of Sir Joseph Banks, and had the good luck to raise five guineas, by a draft on his old benefactor, with which he reached London.  Here he was kindly received by Sir Joseph Banks, who gave him an introduction to Mr. Beaufoy, the secretary of a newly-formed association for promoting discoveries in Africa.

“Before,” says Mr. Beaufoy, “I had learnt from the note the name and business of my visitor, I was struck with the manliness of his person, the breadth of his chest, the openness of his countenance and the inquietude of his eye.  I spread the map of Africa before him, and tracing a line from Cairo to Sennaar, and from thence westward in the latitude and supposed direction of the Niger, I told him, that was the route, by which I was anxious that Africa might, if possible, be explored.  He said, he should think himself singularly fortunate to be trusted with the adventure.  I asked him when he would set out.  ‘To-morrow morning,’ was his answer.  I told him I was afraid that we should not be able, in so short a time, to prepare his instructions, and to procure for him the letters that were requisite; but that if the committee should approve of his proposal, all expedition should be used.”

In a few weeks all was ready for his departure.  The plan was, to proceed up the Nile as far as Sennaar or the Babr-el-Abiad, and from thence to strike across the African continent to the coast of the Atlantic.

His letters from Cairo are full of interest.  Of the Nile itself he speaks contemptuously, says it resembles the Connecticut in size, or may be compared with the Thames.

After some delay, the day is fixed on which the caravan is to leave Cairo.  He writes to his friends and to the African Association in great spirits; talks of cutting the continent across, and raises the expectations of his employers to a high pitch;—­the very next letters from Cairo brought the melancholy intelligence of his death.  It seems he was seized with a bilious complaint, for which he administered a strong solution of vitriolic acid, so powerful as to produce violent and burning pains, that threatened to be fatal unless immediate relief could be procured, which was attempted to be got by a powerful dose of tartar emetic.  His death happened about the end of December, 1788, in the thirty-eighth year of his age.