Nor was this all. An engraving was published, in which a church attracted the religious sympathies of some, and a bank the mercenary thoughts of others; while a theatre gave an air of civilization and luxury the scene. Tempted by such descriptions, two hundred and fifty persons embarked for the land of promise; their lives, their fortunes, and their families engaged in a scheme which led to destruction. The mere adventurer was drawn by the beauty of the settlement, the fineness of the climate, and the hope of making a fortune. The son of the soil, who had amassed a capital which in Great Britain was unable to save him from a poor-house, but promised in Poyais a sufficiency for life, gathered his family together, sold his little furniture, reserving, with Scottish piety, the Bible which had often consoled his Scottish hearth, and sought an unknown clime, and a new home for his household deities. Notes, payable at the Bank of Poyais, were given in exchange for notes of the Bank of Scotland, under the plea that the latter would not circulate in the Mosquito country. At length, the barks which were to conduct the settlers were entered at Leith harbour; and under different auspices, but with similar results to those which marked the Darien expedition from the same port, they left the spot which many were destined to see no more. Their arrival at the Black River was ominous. As their vessel neared the new country, a gun was fired, and colors hoisted, to announce the coming of the emigrants. Every moment they looked anxiously out for some symptoms of the settlement. Every eye was strained to see the spire of the church which, in all their dreams, had decorated their home. Every heart beat with a strange, unwonted anxiety as they came near the place which had been pictured in such vivid colors. No great powers of imagination are necessary to conceive their watchful expectation, as hour after hour passed, and their signals remained disregarded; or with what a bounding joy they must have seen the first boat, conveying three white people, approach the ship. The delusion was brief; and a few words damped their hopes and destroyed their visions, by the information that it was a savage, sterile, and desolate spot. Greatly dispirited, they commenced a sad and sullen journey up the creek. With a burning sun and sky above, no traces of civilization around, exhausted by the climate, and galled by insects which the heat of the air nourished in great size, they proceeded with an almost funereal melancholy to their city of refuge. The young and ardent asked for gold and gems; the old and cautious looked at the situation, as, with an anxiety they could not conceal, they questioned of the soil, its capabilities, and its cultivation. “Lo!” wrote one who suffered greatly in this disastrous expedition. “Lo! they said it was all swampy.” By the shades of evening they landed, and eagerly looked for their future home. It was too dark to see where the old town of St.