CHAP. III.] BAHIA TO THE CAPE. 137 



males, but as time wore on and a new generation sprung up, the 

 young men, scions of an adventurous stock and reared in tem- 

 perance and hardihood, found tlieir isolated life too tame for 

 them, and sought more stirring occupation elsewhei-e. The 

 proportion between the sexes rapidly altered, and at the time 

 of Captain Denham's visit women were considerably in the 

 majority. The greater number of those who left Tristan in 

 the Geyser were young women, and many of them went into 

 service at the Cape, where there still remained some of the 

 relations of the earlier settlers. 



All this time the settlement maintained an excellent char- 

 acter. Glass, its founder, a Scotchman born at Kelso, seems to 

 have been a man of principle, and of great energy and industry, 

 and to have acquired to a remarkable degree the confidence of 

 the community. lie maintained his position as its leader, and 

 represented it in all transactions with outsiders for thirty-seven 

 years. The colony had always been English-speaking, and had 

 strong British sympathies; and "Governor Glass," as he was 

 called, had received permission from one of the naval ofhcers 

 visiting the island to hoist the red ensign as a signal to ships. 

 This was the only quasi-official recognition which the colony 

 received from Britain after the withdrawal of the troops in 

 1818. Glass died in 1853, at the age of sixty-seven years. He 

 had suffered severely during his later years from cancer in the 

 lower lip and chin, but he retained his faculties and his prestige 

 to the last, and his death was a great loss to the little commu- 

 nity. A general account of Tristan d'Acunha is given by the 

 Kev. W. F. Taylor, in a pamphlet published in 1850 by the 

 Christian Knowledge Society. Mr. Taylor speaks most highly 

 of the moral character of the flock to whom he ministered for 

 five years ; indeed, he goes so far as to say that he could find 

 no vice to contend with, which is certainly extraordinary in so 

 mixed an assemblage. It may be accounted for, however, to a 

 certain degree by the compulsory sobriety of the islanders, who 



