Our schooner was a low, sharp, fast sailing vessel, but in an irregular sea she was tossed about like a cork.  At daylight the weather cleared up, and the day turned out fine with a moderate breeze, which died away towards noon, when being in sight of the vessels at anchor in Maidstone Bay, Captain Smith and I left the schooner, to pull thither in a boat, and got on board the Eden about two in the afternoon:  we also went on board the Louisa, from Sierra Leone.

The accounts we received of our infant settlement were not so favourable as we could have desired, not with regard to the progress of operations, for that was greater than could be reasonably expected, but from the sickness that had prevailed, and the consequent loss of several valuable lives.  Mr. Glover, the master of the house-carpenters, died only the preceding evening, and it is much to be feared that the panic which took place on the first symptom of illness, (from a deficiency of that moral courage which every Christian ought to possess) proved more fatal than the disease itself.  This morning we had a most convincing illustration of this fact.  One of the stoutest and healthiest of our Plymouth artificers, who exhibited no previous symptoms of illness, on hearing of the death of Mr. Glover burst into a fit of crying, and exclaimed, “Oh my wife! my children!  I shall never see you again!” From that moment he drooped, and in a few days died from despondency.

Good Friday, April, 4.—­About 11 o’clock last night, the sentinel over the provision store at Newmarket, observed a man lying on the ground, tearing away the watling off one side of the store.  On being challenged, he rose up, either to make his escape, or to resist the sentinel, who was advancing with fixed bayonet.  In the scuffle that followed, the culprit was wounded in his left breast, notwithstanding which he succeeded in releasing himself from the grasp of his adversary.  The sentinel, however, returned to the charge, and following him up closely, felled him to the earth with a blow from the butt-end of his musket.  Still, however, the thief struggled violently, and prostrate as he was, endeavoured to bring down his opponent by seizing his legs:  the soldier was now compelled, in self-defence, to transfix his prisoner to the ground, by running his bayonet through his left arm, until the serjeant came up, who took him to the guard-house, whither he walked, notwithstanding his severe wounds, and great loss of blood.  His appearance was that of a native, his body being coated with red clay, and the fore part of his head shaved, while he wore the usual ornaments, a girdle, and armlets, of beads:  but he was soon discovered to be a soldier of the African Corps, named Gott, who had run away four months before, taking with him his arms, accoutrements, and clothes.

The African, schooner, sailed this afternoon, for the purpose of procuring yams and live stock from other parts of the island, our people having bought up the whole stock of the natives in the neighbourhood of the settlement.  We found here a few oysters on the Mangrove trees near the sea-shore, within reach of the tide.