He reported, May 22, 1817: "I have just received information from a source on which I can implicitly rely, that it has already become the practice to introduce into the state of Georgia, across the St. Mary's River, from Amelia Island, East Florida, Africans, who have been carried into the Port of Fernandina, subsequent to the capture of it by the Patriot army now in possession of it ...; were the legislature to pass an act giving compensation in some manner to informers, it would have a tendency in a great degree to prevent the practice; as the thing now is, no citizen will take the trouble of searching for and detecting the slaves. I further understand, that the evil will not be confined altogether to Africans, but will be extended to the worst class of West India slaves."[85] Undoubtedly, the injury done by these pirates to the regular slave-trading interests was largely instrumental in exterminating them. Late in 1817 United States troops seized Amelia Island, and President Monroe felicitated Congress and the country upon escaping the "annoyance and injury" of this illicit trade.[86] The trade, however, seems to have continued, as is shown by such letters as the following, written three and a half months later:-- PORT OF DARIEN, March 14, 1818. ... It is a painful duty, sir, to express to you, that I am in possession of undoubted information, that African and West India negroes are almost daily illicitly introduced into Georgia, for sale or settlement, or passing through it to the territories of the United States for similar purposes; these facts are notorious; and it is not unusual to see such negroes in the streets of St. Mary's, and such too, recently captured by our vessels of war, and ordered to Savannah, were illegally bartered by hundreds in that city, _for_ this bartering or bonding (as _it is called_, but in reality _selling_,) actually took place before any decision had [been] passed by the court respecting them. I cannot but again express to you, sir, that these irregularities and mocking of the laws, by men who understand them, and who, it was presumed, would have respected them, are such, that it requires the immediate interposition of Congress to effect a suppression of this traffic; for, as things are, should a faithful officer of the government apprehend such negroes, to avoid the penalties imposed by the laws, the proprietors disclaim them, and some agent of the executive demands a delivery of the same to him, who may employ them as he pleases, or effect a sale by way of a bond, for the restoration of the negroes when legally called on so to do; which bond, it is _understood_, is to be _forfeited_, as the amount of the bond is so much less than the value of the property.... There are many negroes ... recently introduced into this state and the Alabama territory, and which can be apprehended. The undertaking