Chap. IV. ARRIVAL OF FRESH STORES. 61 



nometer was brought me by Captain Yardon on his 

 return xoyage from London in September. I had 

 then three sets and was prepared for accidents which 

 might occur in crossing rivers and so forth. I had 

 sent the damaged chronometers and sextants to Eng- 

 land through the Rev. ^Y. Walker of the Gaboon; 

 this being the only w^ay I could send them at that 

 time. They went to the Gaboon in a native boat, 

 and were sent by Mr. Walker to the English consul 

 at Fernando Po, who kindly shipped them in the 

 mail steamer for Liverpool. I must here record my 

 thanks to Mr. Graves, now M.P. for Liverpool, who 

 took the trouble to receive the instruments and trans- 

 mit them to London, where my friends had them 

 repaired or replaced by new ones. Not the least 

 welcome was a box of medicines sent to me by 

 my good friend, Robert Cooke. My kind friends, 

 the American missionaries at the Gaboon, also sent 

 me a supply of medicines and other things. But 

 their letters were not of a kind to bring me much 

 consolation : they w^ere not so hopeful as I was of 

 success in my undertaking, and although they did 

 not so express themselves, I could see they thought I 

 should never return. 



An interesting event occurred in July, which is 

 worth recording here. It was the arrival of a French 

 steamer, the first steam vessel ever seen in the waters 

 of the Fernand Vaz. Some of my negroes came 

 into my hut one morning in great consternation, and 

 breathless with running, to say that a great, smoking 

 ship of war had come down the Npoulounay river. 

 I asked how many guns it had. " Ten," they replied 



