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 Hatorash on the 15th of August, and went to the place where the colony had been left in 1587. All was desolation. At length he found the word "Cruatoan" carved on a post. It was the name of the place whither the settlers had gone or had been taken. No effort was made to communicate with them, and the ships returned to England. Ralegh had now spent £40,000 on the work of colonising Virginia. In 1602 he again set a vessel to succour the lost colony, under Captain William Mace, but she returned without reaching Roanoak. The colonists intermixed with the natives, and were finally massacred by order of King Powhatan, instigated by his priests. Four men, two boys, and one young maid were spared, and from them the Hatteras Indians were descended.

Although the first colony was unfortunate, the patriotic efforts of Ralegh were, without doubt, the incentives to future colonisation. He aroused the spirit of colonial enterprise, and thus planted a sturdy tree, which bore fruit even in his own lifetime. The people of the United States must look to Sir Walter Ralegh as the original founder of their nation, and they could not have a nobler nor a purer origin. For Sir Walter's connection with Virginia is a monument of patriotic self-sacrifice; and that his great merits are not forgotten was shown when a window to his memory was placed by Americans in St. Margaret's Church, Westminster.

Sir Walter Ralegh turned his attention to the discovery of Guiana in 1594. In that year he sent Captain Jacob Whiddon on a preliminary voyage of discovery, but Whiddon was thwarted by the Spanish Governor of Trinidad, and returned. Meanwhile, Ralegh himself made an exhaustive study of the subject. He derived his knowledge of Peru and the Incas from Gomara; he had studied Andrew Thevet and Diego de Ordas, and he knew the particulars of the voyages down the Amazon by Orellana and Aguirre. He had heard of the discovery of gold in the Orinoco basin, of El Dorado, and of the fabulous city of Manoa. He obtained the services of such experienced seamen as Captains Whiddon, Keymis, Canfield, Gifford, and Dowglas: and he was accompanied by a number of gallant young gentlemen volunteers, some of them being his own relations. John Gilbert was his nephew, Greynvile and Gorges were cousins. Leaving England on the 9th of February, 1595, with five ships with the object of exploring the Orinoco, the expedition arrived at the island of Trinidad on the 22nd of March, anchoring at Parico within the Gulf of Paria.