324 
ARRIVAL OF ORDERS. 
barque ‘ Golden Spring.’ It would therefore have 
been advisable, in order to relieve Captain Allen from 
the onerous responsibility of being the sole commis- 
sioner, to have appointed Acting-commander Ellis to 
assist him in that office, which he would have done 
after leaving Fernando Po, according to the provision 
in Lord John Russell’s instructions. 
Our preparations were very nearly completed, and 
it was the intention of Captain Allen to have sailed 
for the Niger on the evening of Saturday, the 25 th 
June; when in one moment all these plans were 
changed : all hands were awakened at one o’clock on 
the morning of the 24th, by the report that a steamer 
was in the offing. 
The order for a boat was hardly issued, when one 
shoved off from the ‘ Wilberforce’ with a mixed crew 
of officers and men, so great was the anxiety to obtain 
information as to our destiny. 
A very few minutes brought Lieutenant Gooch''^ the 
Commander of H.M.S. vessel ‘Kite,’ on board, who 
had been sent express from England, with despatches 
from the Colonial Office and the Admiralty, to the 
senior officer on the station, to stop the further pro- 
ceedings of the Expedition; the officers and men of 
which, he was directed to forward to England by the first 
opportunity. He was, moreover, instructed to send one 
of the steamers up the Niger, with a black crew, and 
* Now Captain. 
