sent out in the brig Strong under the care of the Rev. Jehudi Ashmun.  A quantity of stores and some thirty-seven emigrants sent by the Colonization Society completed the cargo.  Ashmun had received no commission as agent for the colony, and expected to return on the Strong; under this impression his wife had accompanied him.  But when he found the colonists in so desperate a situation he nobly determined to remain with them at any sacrifice.  He visited the native chiefs and found them, under cover of friendly promises, preparing for a deadly assault on the little colony.  There was no recourse but to prepare for a vigorous defense.  Twenty-seven men were capable of bearing arms; and one brass and five iron fieldpieces, all dismantled and rusty, formed his main hope.  Ashmun at once set to work, and with daily drills and unremitting labor in clearing away the forest and throwing up earthworks, succeeded at last in putting the settlement in a reasonable state of defense.  It was no easy task.  The fatiguing labor, incessant rains, and scanty food predisposed them to the dreaded fever.  Ashmun himself was prostrated; his wife sank and died before his eyes; and soon there was but one man in the colony who was not on the sick-list.  At length the long-expected assault was made.  Just before daybreak on the 11th of November the settlement was approached by a body of over eight hundred African warriors.  Stealthily following the pickets as they returned a little too early from their watch, the savages burst upon the colony and with a rush captured the outworks.  A desperate conflict ensued, the issue of which hung doubtful until the colonists succeeded in manning their brass field-piece, which was mounted upon a raised platform, and turning it upon the dense ranks of the assailants.  The effect at such short range was terrible.  “Every shot literally spent its force in a solid mass of living human flesh.  Their fire suddenly terminated.  A savage yell was raised, ... and the whole host disappeared."[8] The victory had been gained at a cost of four killed and as many seriously wounded.  Ammunition was exhausted; food had given out.  Another attack, for which the natives were known to be preparing, could scarcely fail to succeed.  Before it was made, however, an English captain touched at the cape and generously replenished their stores.  On the very next evening, November 30, the savages were seen gathering in large numbers on the cape, and toward morning a desperate attack was made on two sides at once.  The lines had been contracted, however, and all the guns manned, and the well-directed fire of the artillery again proved too much for native valor.  The savages were repulsed with great loss.  The unusual sound of a midnight cannonade attracted the Prince Regent, an English colonial schooner laden with military stores and having on board the celebrated traveller Captain Laing, through whose mediation the natives were brought to agree to a peace most advantageous