proportion to the excess of the ingredients which produce it, viz. decaying vegetation, stagnant moisture, a high temperature, and a confined circulation. The mountains in warm climates are most destructive, because they have the largest proportion of these united ingredients, always excepting, where they rise to the temperate region, that is five or six thousand feet above the level of the sea.
It is this fact, which causes such mournful waste of life in the new settlements in the United States and in south western Canada, and the settlers therefore cannot be too diligent, in removing all decaying vegetation, and all stagnant moisture as far as possible from their vicinities, before the heats of autumn.
But Sierra Leone is in fact a glorious spot—glorious in beauty, moderately fertile—with one of the finest harbors in the world; replete with the grandeur and beauty of the tropics; and ready to become salubrious, as soon as the causes of death can be removed. The labors and sufferings of a few more generations will probably effect this.
The long detention in the channel, to which the settlers were exposed, induced great sickness amongst them, and threw their landing at Sierra Leone into the rainy or sickly season. Intemperance amongst themselves, vastly aggravated the evil; and their numbers were reduced in consequence by death almost one half, in the course of the first year. A few deserted.
The remnant built a small town, and after the period above mentioned suffered no extraordinary mortality. They gradually improved in their circumstances, "and though far from being regularly industrious, were able to supply themselves with a sufficiency of food, and to secure a small, but constantly increasing property." Many, however, continued to migrate, and at one time, the community was in danger of extinction.
During this period, Granville Sharp, watchful over his orphan settlement with a father's care, had despatched on 7th May, 1798, a small vessel called the Myro, with some additional settlers and she arrived most opportunely to prevent utter despair and dispersion. On this occasion,
