We steamed out of the Ruined River-port, and left 'this old sandbank in Africa they call St. Mary's Isle,' at 11 A.M. on January 16, with a last glance at the Commissariat-buildings. Accompanied by a mosquito-fleet of canoes, each carrying two sails, we stood over the bar, sighting the heavy breakers which defend the island's northern face, and passed Cape St. Mary, gradually dimming in the distance. After Bald Cape, some sixty miles south, we ran along the long low shore, distinguished only by the mouths and islands of the Casamansa and the Cachéo rivers. Our course then led us by the huge and hideous archipelago off the delta of Jeba and the Bolola, the latter being the 'Rio Grande' of Camoens, which Portuguese editors will print with small initials, and which translators mistranslate accordingly. [Footnote: _The Lusiads_, v. 12. I have noticed this error in _Camoens: his Life and his Lusiads_ (vol. i. p. 896. London: Quaritch, 1881). It was probably called Grande because it was generally believed to be the southern outlet of the Niger.] These islands are the Bijougas, or Bissagos, the older 'Biziguiches,' inhabited by the most ferocious negroes on the coast, who massacred the Portuguese and who murder all castaways. They are said to shoot one another as Malays 'run amok,' and some of their tribal customs are peculiar to themselves. Here, about 350 miles north of Sierra Leone, was established the unfortunate Bulama colony. Its first and last governor, the redoubtable Captain Philip Beaver, R.N., has left the queerest description of the place and its people. [Footnote: _African Memoranda_. Baldwin, London, 1805.] Within eighteen months only six remained of 269 souls, including women and children. In 1792 the island was abandoned, despite its wealth of ground-nuts. After long 'palavering' it was again occupied by Mr. Budge, manager of Waterloo Station, Sierra Leone; but he was not a fixture there. It is now, I believe, once more deserted.