And now a new disaster awaited our unhappy colonists. I like the temperate, homely words of the old writers,--Anas Todkill, William Phetiplace, and others--and I shall again borrow them. "Wee returned to the Fort where this new supply being lodged with the rest, accidentally fired the quarters; and so the Towne, which being but thatched with Reeds, the fire was so fierce as it burnt our Pallizadoes, though ten or twelve yards distant, with all our Arms, Bedding, Apparell, and much private provision. Good Master Hunt, our Preacher, lost all his Librarie, and all that hee had (but the clothes on his backe), yet none ever saw him repine at his losse. Upon any alarme he would be as readie for defence as any; and till he could speake he never ceased to his utmost to animate us constantly to persist: whose soule questionlesse is with God." Newport remained fourteen weeks at Jamestown. He should have left in fourteen days. Thus his crew again consumed supplies which had been provided for the colony. But a "small stream of water issuing from a bank near Jamestown was found to deposit in its channel a glittering sediment which resembled golden ore. The depositation of this yellow stuff was supposed to indicate the presence of a gold mine," and presto! all the little world except Captain Smith "went crazy!" The axe was left in the tree, the spade in the corn-hill. There was no more thought of tilling or planting or building. "There was no talke, no hope, no worke, but digge Gold, wash Gold, refine Gold, load Gold; such a bruit of Gold as one mad fellow desired to bee buried in the sand least they should by their Art make Gold of his bones. Little neede there was and lesse reason the shippe should staye, their wages run on, our victuall consumed,"[41] &c. Purchas, whose quaint marginal notes bring back our "Pilgrim's Progress" days (he antedated Bunyan, however), says in the note opposite this page, "Certaine shining yellow sand (I saw it!) with great promises of gold, like the promises yeelding sandy performances." Captain Smith set his face like a flint against this gold-fever, which seemed likely to rival Frobisher's experiments and failures in 1577, and declared he was not enamoured of the golden promise, nor could he bear to "see necessary business neglected to fraught such a drunken ship with so much gilded dirt." "Till then," continue our historians (Anas Todkill _et al_.), "we never accounted Captaine Newport a refiner, who being fit to set saile for England, and we not having any use for Parliaments, Playes, Petitions, Admirals, Recorders, Interpreters, Chronologers, Courts of Plea, nor Justices of Peace, sent Master Wingfield and Captaine Archer with him for England, to seeke some place of better imployment."