A person who came out to this country in the capacity of a carpenter's mate on board the _Sirius_, and who had been discharged from that ship's books into the _Supply_, having been left behind when that vessel sailed for England, offered his services to put together the vessel that arrived in frame in the _Pitt_; and being deemed sufficiently qualified as a shipwright, he was engaged at two shillings _per diem_ and his provisions to set her up. Her keel was accordingly laid down on blocks placed for the purpose near the landing-place on the east side. As this person was the only shipwright in the colony, the vessel would much sooner have rendered the services which were required of her, had she been put together, coppered, and sent out manned and officered from England; by these means too the colony would have received many articles which were of necessity shut out of the _Pitt_ to make room for her stowage. About this time a malady of an alarming nature was perceived in the colony. Four or five of the convicts were seized with insanity; and, as the major part of those who were visited by this calamity were females, who on account of their sex were not harassed with hard labour, and who in general shared largely of such little comforts as were to be procured in the settlement, it was difficult to assign a cause for this disorder. April.] With a dreadful sick list, and with death making rapid strides among us, the month of April commenced: a lamentable circumstance to those who had to provide by their labour for the support of a colony, in which, from its great distance, not only from the parent country, but from every port where supplies could be procured, it became an object of the first magnitude and importance to endeavour speedily, and by every possible exertion, to place its inhabitants in a situation that accident or delay might not affect. His Majesty's ship _Guardian_ afforded a melancholy recollection how much this colony had already felt from misadventure, and the delay which occurred in the voyage of the _Lady Juliana_ transport had proved equally calamitous. The recent circumstance of a ship arriving without a supply of flour, and other contingencies, spoke with a warning voice, and loudly demanded that every arm which could be raised should be exerted to make provision against the hour of want. Few, however, in comparison with the measure of our necessities, were the numbers daily brought into the field for the purpose of cultivation; and of those who could handle the hoe or the spade by far the greater part carried hunger in their countenances; but it was earnestly hoped and anxiously expected, that by the speedy arrival of supplies from England the full ration of every species of provisions would be again issued, when labour would be renewed with additional vigour and effect; health and strength be seen residing among us; and the approaches of independence on Great Britain be something more than a sanguine hope or