pose was the melody of
the evening hymn, which was chanted together by the whole family after
the lights were put out; and they were awakened at early dawn by the same
devotional ceremony. On Sabbath the utmost decorum was attended to, and
the day was passed in regular religious observances.

In consequence of a representation made by Captain Beechey, the British
government sent out Captain Waldegrave in 1830, in the _Seringapatam_,
with a supply of sailors' blue jackets and trousers, flannels, stockings
and shoes, women's dresses, spades, mattocks, shovels, pick-axes,
trowels, rakes, etc. He found their community increased to about
seventy-nine, all exhibiting the same unsophisticated and amiable
characteristics as we have before described. Other two Englishmen had
settled amongst them; one of them, called Nobbs, a low-bred, illiterate
man, a self-constituted missionary, who was endeavoring to supersede
Buffett in his office of religious instruction. The patriarch Adams, it
was found, had died in March, 1829, aged sixty-five. While on his
deathbed, he had called the heads of families together, and urged upon
them to elect a chief; which, however, they had not yet done; but the
greatest harmony still prevailed amongst them, notwithstanding Nobb's
exertions to form a party of his own. Captain Waldegrave thought that
the island, which is about four miles square, might be able to support a
thousand persons, upon reaching which number they would naturally
emigrate to other Islands.

Such is the account of this most singular colony, originating in crime
and bloodshed. Of all the repentant criminals on record, the most
interesting, perhaps, is John Adams; nor do we know where to find a more
beautiful example of the value of early instruction than in the history
of this man, who, having run the full career of nearly all kinds of vice,
was checked by an interval of leisurely reflection, and the sense of new
duties awakened by the power of natural affections.

[1] One person turns his back on the object that is to be divided;
another then points separately to the portions, at each of them asking
aloud, "Who shall have this?" to which the first answers by naming
somebody. This impartial method of division gives every man an equal
chance of the best share.

THE WRECK OF THE _ROYAL CAROLINE_

From "The Red Rover," BY JAMES FENNIMORE COOPER

Our watchful adventurer captain was not blind to these sinister om