Newport, though named of the council, had been ordered to return to England. As the time of his departure approached, the accusers of Smith, attempting to conceal their jealousy by the affectation of humanity, proposed that he also should return, instead of being prosecuted in Virginia; but, with the pride of conscious innocence, he demanded a trial; and, being honourably acquitted, took his seat in the council. About the 15th of June, Newport sailed for England, leaving behind him one of the barks, and about one hundred colonists. While he remained, they had partaken of the food allowed the sailors; but after his departure, they were reduced to the necessity of subsisting on the distributions from the public stores, which had sustained great damage during their long passage. These were both scanty, and unwholesome; the allowance to each man, for a day, being only a pint of worm-eaten wheat and barley. This wretched food increased the malignity of the diseases generated by the climate, among men exposed to all its rigours. Before the month of September, fifty of the company were buried; among whom was Bartholomew Gosnald, who had planned the expedition, and had contributed greatly towards its prosecution. Their distress was increased by internal dissension. The president was charged with embezzling the best stores of the colony, and with feasting at his private table, on beef, bread, and _aqua vitae_, while famine and death devoured his fellow adventurers. The odium against him was completed by the detection of an attempt to escape from them and their calamities, in the bark which had been left by Newport. In the burst of general indignation which followed the discovery of this meditated desertion, he was deposed, and Radcliffe chosen to succeed him.[14] [Footnote 14: Stith. Smith.] As misfortune is not unfrequently the parent of moderation and reflection, this state of misery produced a system of conduct towards the neighbouring Indians, which, for the moment, disarmed their resentments, and induced them to bring in such supplies as the country afforded at that season. It produced another effect of equal importance. A sense of imminent and common danger called forth those talents which were fitted to the exigency, and compelled submission to them. On captain Smith, who had preserved his health unimpaired, his spirits unbroken, and his judgment unclouded, amidst this general misery and dejection, all eyes were turned, and in him, all actual authority was placed by common consent. His example soon gave energy to others.