ands, to Sierra
Leone to summon assistance; but his ambition was not to be so easily
satisfied. We had done splendid service in capturing two factories and
destroying one of them--the second would also, of course, be destroyed
when we abandoned it--but the loss of the _Psyche_ was a very serious
matter, which must be atoned for in some shape or another; and he soon
allowed it to be understood that he was in no particular hurry to quit
our present quarters, where the wounded were making admirable progress,
and the sound were comfortably housed, while provisions of all kinds
were plentiful and the water was good. But this, excellent as it was in
itself, was by no means all; with two such perfectly equipped factories
as we had found upon the river it was certain that the slave traffic on
the Fernan Vaz must have assumed quite formidable proportions; and it
was the skipper's idea that before our wounded should be lit to be
moved, one or more slavers would certainly enter the river, when it
would be our own fault if we did not capture them.

The most careful dispositions were accordingly made, with this object in
view; the gig, in charge of an officer, was daily dispatched to the
entrance of the lagoon in order that, herself concealed, her crew might
maintain a watch upon the river and report the passage of any vessels
upward-bound for the Camma Lagoon, while, so far as our own quarters
were concerned, everything was allowed to remain as nearly as possible
as it was before it fell into our hands, in order that, should a slaver
arrive at the factory, there should be nothing about the place to give
the alarm until it should be too late for her to effect her escape. As
a final precaution, a sort of crow's-nest arrangement was rigged up in a
lofty silk-cotton tree which had been left standing in the screening
belt of timber along the southern shore of the island, in order that a
look-out might be maintained upon the approach channel during the hours
of daylight, and timely notice given to us of the approach of slavers to
the factory of which we were in occupation.

A full week elapsed from the date of our desperate fight on the sand
spit, with no occurrence of any moment save that, thanks to the skill
and indefatigable exertions of Hutchinson and Murdoch, all our wounded
were doing remarkably well, two or three of them, indeed, having so far
recovered that they were actually able to perform such light duty as
that of hospita