At Daybreak The Explorers Landed Upon Roanoke Island, Which Is Twelve Miles Long By Two And A Half Wide, And Found The Spot Where Admiral White Had Left The Colony In 1587.

Eagerly searching for any tokens of the lost ones, they soon traced in the light soil of the island the imprint of the moccasin of the savage, but looked in vain for any footprint of civilized man.

What had become of their countrymen?

At last some one spied a conspicuous tree, far up on a sandy bank, blazed and carved. There were but three letters cut upon it, C.R.O., but these simple symbols possessed a world of meaning. Three years before, when the sad farewells were being spoken, and the ships were ready to set sail for England, this feeble band, left to struggle in the wilds of the new land with sad forebodings of their possible fate, had agreed upon a signal, and had promised Admiral White that if driven to starvation upon the island, they would plant their colony fifty miles inland, near a tribe of friendly Indians. Indeed, before the ships sailed for England, they were making preparations for this move. Admiral White requested them to carve upon a tree the name of the locality to which they should remove, and if distress had overtaken them they were to add a cross over the lettering. Anxiously gathering round this interesting relic of the lost Englishmen, the rude chirography was eagerly scanned, but no vestige of a cross was found.

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