Then the council were to elect their president and assume command of the settlers; while Captain Newport was to spend two months in discovery and loading his ships "with all such principal commodities and merchandise there to be had."[13] With these orders went a paper, perhaps drawn by Hakluyt, giving valuable advice concerning the selection of the place of settlement, dealings with the natives, and explorations for mines and the South Sea.[14] In respect to the place of settlement, they were especially advised to choose a high and dry situation, divested of trees and up some river, a considerable distance from the mouth.

The emigrants numbered one hundred and twenty men--no women.

Besides Captain Newport, the admiral, in the _Sarah Constant_, of a hundred tons, the leading persons in the exploration were Bartholomew Gosnold, who commanded the _Goodspeed_, of forty tons; Captain John Ratcliffe, who commanded the _Discovery_, of twenty tons; Edward Maria Wingfield; George Percy, brother of the earl of Northumberland; John Smith; George Kendall, a cousin of Sir Edwin Sandys; Gabriel Archer; and Rev.
Robert Hunt.
Among these men John Smith was distinguished for a career combining adventure and romance.

Though he was only thirty years of age he had already seen much service and had many hairbreadth escapes, his most remarkable exploit having been his killing before the town of Regal, in Transylvania, three Turks, one after another, in single combat.[15] The ships sailed from London December 20, 1606, and Michael Drayton wrote some quaint verses of farewell, of which perhaps one will suffice: "And cheerfully at sea Success you still entice, To get the pearl and gold, And ours to hold Virginia, Earth's only paradise!" The destination of the colony was Chesapeake Bay, a large gulf opening by a strait fifteen miles wide upon the Atlantic at thirty-seven degrees, and reaching northward parallel to the sea-coast one hundred and eighty-five miles.

Into its basin a great many smooth and placid rivers discharge their contents.