Speaking of Raleigh and his many and rare virtues, Bancroft adds—“The judgments of the tribunal of the Old World are often reversed at the bar of public opinion in the New. The family of the chief author of early colonisation in the United States was reduced to beggary by the government of England, and he himself finally beheaded. After a lapse of nearly two centuries the State of North Carolina, by a solemn act of legislation, revived in its capital the CITY OF RALEIGH; and thus expressed its confidence in the integrity, and a grateful respect for the memory, of the extraordinary man, who united in himself as many kinds of glory as were ever combined in one individual, and whose name is indissolubly connected with the early period of American history.” The fisheries of the north and the efforts of Sir Walter Raleigh at colonisation had trained a race of men for discovery. One of these, Bartholomew Gosnold, determined upon sailing direct from England to America, without touching at the Canaries and the West Indies, as had hitherto been the custom; and with the aid of Raleigh he “well nigh secured to New England the honour of the first permanent English colony.” He sailed in a small vessel directly across the ocean, and in seven weeks reached the shore of Massachusetts, but not finding a good harbour sailed southward, and discovered and landed on a promontory which he called Cape Cod, which name it retains to this day. Sailing thence, and still pursuing the coast, he discovered various islands, one of which he called Elizabeth, after the Queen, and another Martha’s Vineyard. The vegetation was rich; the land covered with magnificent forests; and wild fruits and flowers burst from the earth in unimagined luxuriance—the eglantine, the thorn, and the honeysuckle; the wild pea, tansy, and young sassafras; strawberries, raspberries, and vines. In the island was a little lake, and in the lake a rocky islet, and here the colonists resolved to build their storehouse and fort, the nucleus of the first New England colony. The natural features of the place, the historian tells us, remain unchanged—the island, the little lake, and the islet are all there; the forests are gone, while the flowers and fruit are as abundant as ever. But no trace remains of the fort. Friendly traffic with the natives of the mainland soon completed a freight, which consisted of furs and sassafras, and Gosnold was about to sail, when the hearts of the intending colonists failed them; they dreaded the attack of Indians and the want of necessary supplies from home. All, therefore, re-embarked, and in five weeks reached England.