The leader of the expedition—William Walker, or, as he was then called, Col. Walker—after returning to Upper California, resumed the occupation of editor of a daily paper. One of the proprietors of the paper he edited was Byron Cole, whose attention had been for several years directed to Central America, and more particularly to Nicaragua. Cole, in frequent conversations with Walker, urged him to give up the idea of settling in Sonora, and to devote his labors to Nicaragua; and soon after he heard of the revolution undertaken by Jerez and Castellon, Cole sold his interest in the paper at San Francisco, and sailed for San Juan del Sur. He left for Nicaragua on the steamer of the 15th of August, 1854, being accompanied by Mr. Wm. V. Wells, whose attention was fixed on Honduras. From San Juan del Sur, Mr. Cole, after numerous delays and vexations, succeeded in getting to Leon, and there obtained from Castellon a contract, by which the Provisional Director authorized him to engage the services of three hundred men for military duty in Nicaragua, the officers and soldiers to receive a stated monthly pay, and a certain number of acres of land at the close of the campaign. With this contract Cole returned to California early in the month of November, and forthwith sought Walker for the purpose of getting him to take an interest in the enterprise. As soon as Walker read the contract he refused to act under it, seeing that it was contrary to the act of Congress of 1818, commonly known as the neutrality law. He, however, told Cole that if he would return to Nicaragua, and get from Castellon a contract of colonization, something might be done with it. Cole accordingly sailed a second time for San Juan; and on the 29th of December, 1854, Castellon gave him a colonization grant, under which three hundred Americans were to be introduced into Nicaragua, and were to be guaranteed forever the privilege of bearing arms. This grant Cole sent to Walker, and it reached the latter at Sacramento early in the month of February, 1855.