their intentions) that had they not been bought by the officers, in a very few weeks many of them would have been destroyed.  By this conduct, as far as their individual benefit was concerned, they had put it out of their own power to reap any advantage from the governor’s bounty to them; but the stock by this means was saved, and had fallen into hands that certainly would not wantonly destroy it.  There were a few among the settlers who exchanged their sheep for goats, deeming them a more profitable stock; but, in general, spirits were the price required by the more ignorant and imprudent part of them; and several of their farms, which had been, and ought to have always been, the peaceful retreats of industry, were for a time the seats of inebriety and consequent disorder.

About this time there anchored in the cove an American ship, the Hope, commanded by a Mr. Benjamin Page, from Rhode island, with a small cargo of provisions and spirits for sale.  The cause of his putting into this harbour, the master declared, was for the purpose of procuring wood and water, of which he stated his ship to be much in want; thus making the sale of his cargo appear to be but a secondary object with him.

As the colony had not yet seen the day when it could have independently said, ’We are not in want of provisions; procure your wood and your water, and go your way,’ the lieutenant-governor directed the commissary to purchase such part of his cargo as the colony stood in need of; and two hundred barrels of American cured beef, at four pounds per barrel; eighty barrels of pork, at four pounds ten shillings per barrel; forty-four barrels of flour, at two pounds per barrel; and seven thousand five hundred and ninety-seven gallons of (new American) spirits at four shillings and sixpence per gallon, were purchased; amounting in all to the sum of L2957 6s 6d.

This ship had touched at the Falkland Islands for the purpose of collecting skins from the different vessels employed in the seal trade from the United States of America, with which she was to proceed to the China market.  From the Cape of Good Hope her passage had been performed in two months and one day.  The master said, he found the prevailing winds were from the NW and described the weather as the most boisterous he had ever known for such a length of time.  By one sea, his caboose was washed over the side, and one of his people going with it was drowned.  He observed, when about the South-cape of this country, that the weather was clear; but after passing the latitude of the Maria Islands, he found it close, hazy, and heated, and had every appearance of thick smoke.  About that time we had the same sort of weather here; and the excessive heats which at other times have been experienced in the settlements have been also noticed at sea when at some distance from the land.

By this ship we were not fortunate enough to receive any European news.  The master saw only one English ship at the Cape, the Chesterfield whaler, commanded by a Mr. Alt, who had formerly been a midshipman in his Majesty’s ship Sirius, and who went home on board of the Neptune transport.”