The unfortunate results of these efforts dampened the ardor for American colonization and for twelve years there was a cessation of the attempts to people Virginia. Raleigh had exhausted his means and his later explorations were made with borrowed money and directed to the discovery of gold mines in Guiana. In 1602, Bartholomew Gosnold made a successful voyage to Virginia, returning with a cargo of sassafras. Several other expeditions followed which, although they made no settlements, revived public interest in the American possession and made the route a comparatively familiar one. When John Smith returned to his native land he found the colonization of Virginia occupying a prominent place in the minds of his countrymen. It was a project precisely fitted to satisfy the nobler ambition which now fired him to devote his talents and energies to his country’s service. It promised to combine with a useful career a sufficient element of novelty and adventure, and he lost no time in allying himself with the chief promoters of the movement. The territory of Virginia had been granted to Sir Walter Raleigh by Queen Elizabeth. The latter died in 1603, the year before Smith’s return to England, and her successor, James the First, imprisoned Raleigh on a charge of high treason and confiscated his possessions. In 1606, the King issued a charter for the colonization of Virginia to a company, which Smith joined with five hundred pounds of his own money. But previous to this he had been one of the most diligent workers in the promotion of the scheme, inducing merchants and noblemen to support the project with capital and persuading desirable men to volunteer as colonists. Neither object was easy of attainment and the latter was the more difficult. Numerous broken-down gentlemen of indifferent character were eager to embrace the chance of retrieving their fortunes in a new land, and hundreds of dissolute soldiers out of employment offered their services to the promoters. But the need was for farmers, mechanics, and laborers, and few of these could be induced to leave their homes in the prosperous state of the country at that time. Consequently the organizers of the expedition had to content themselves with a poor assortment of colonists who, but for the presence of Captain John Smith among them, would assuredly have added one more to the list of failures connected with North American colonization. It was due to him mainly, and almost solely, that the settlement at Jamestown survived and became the root from which branched the United States of America.