class="x-ebookmaker-pageno" title="[Pg 21]"/>surrounded him. Within the limits of his settlement he had to face imminent starvation, and to cope with the innate lawlessness of a population for the most part idle, ignorant, and vicious. For it soon became plain that to look for the growth of a virtuous community, except at some remote period, from the strange elements gathered together in New South Wales, was but a visionary's dream.

England's social sewage was not to be shot down in Botany Bay, to be deodorised or made pure just because the authorities willed it. It was vain to count upon the reformation of these people in the present, or to build up hopes of it in the future. We have seen how their natural propensities displayed themselves on the voyage out. These, directly the convicts were landed, developed with rapid growth, so that crimes and offences of a serious nature soon became extremely rife. On the day the governor's commission was read, the governor addressed the convicts, exhorting them to behave with propriety, promising to reward the good while he punished heavily all evil-doers. Next morning nine of the people absconded. Within a week it was found necessary to try three others for thefts, all of whom were flogged. Before the month passed, four more were arraigned charged with a plot to rob the public stores, for which one suffered death, and the others were banished from the settlement. Yet at that time there was no possible excuse for such a crime. When goaded by hunger and privation in the coming years of scarcity, it was at least intelligible that desperate men should be found ready to dare all risks to win one plenteous meal, though even then each convict shared to the same extent as the governor himself. Each man's weekly allowance consisted of 7 lbs. biscuit, 3 lbs. peas, and 6 ozs. butter; 7 lbs. salt beef, or 4 lbs. salt pork. But in the first year the rations were ample, and inherent depravity could alone have tempted these convicts to rob the common store.

About this time another convict offender was pardoned on condition that he become the public executioner. Both "cat" and gallows were now kept busy, yet without effect. "Exemplary punishments," says Collins, "seemed about this period to be growing more necessary. Stock was often killed, huts and tents broken open, and provisions constantly stolen about the latter part of the week; for among the convicts there were many who knew not how to husband their provisions through the seven days they were intended to serve them, but were known to have consumed the whole at the end of the third or fourth day. One of this description made his week's allowance of flour (8 lbs.) into 18 cakes, which he devoured at one meal. He was soon after taken speechless and senseless, and died the following day at the hospital, a loathsome, putrid object." Here again was felt the want of overseers and superintendents of a class superior to that of the convicts, through whom discipline and interior economy might be maintained and regulated. Naturally those selected felt a tenderness for the shortcomings of their fellows, and it was more than difficult to detect or bring home offences to the guilty. A common crime was absence. Many, undeterred by fear of starvation, or savage natives, went off to the woods. One remained there nineteen days, returning to the settlement at night to lay his hands on food. In some cases the absentees were murdered by natives, and their bodies found sometimes with their heads pounded to jelly, but always mutilated, speared or cut in pieces. There were other crimes quite new, as were the punishments meted out to them. One impostor pretended to have discovered a gold mine; but it was proved that he had fabricated the gold dust he produced from a guinea and a brass buckle, and he was condemned to be flogged and to wear a canvas dress decorated with the letter R, "to distinguish him more particularly from others as a rogue." This same offender being afterwards caught housebreaking, suffered death, but not before he had betrayed his accomplices—two women who had received the stolen property. One of these was also executed, while of the other a public example was made. In the presence of the assembled convicts the executioner shaved her head, and clothed her in a canvas frock, on which were painted the capitals R. S. G.—receiver of stolen goods. "This was done," says Collins, "with the hope that shame might operate, at least with the female part of the prisoners, to the prevention of crime; but a great number of both sexes had been too long acquainted with each other in scenes of disgrace for this kind of punishment to work much reformation among them."

Thieving continued on all sides, and the hangman was always busy. Repeated depredations brought one man to the halter, while another, for stabbing a woman, received seven hundred lashes. Scarcely any of the convicts could be relied upon, yet many, in the scarcity of honest freemen, were appointed to posts of responsibility and trust. Generally they abused the confidence reposed in them. The case is mentioned of one Bryant, a seafaring west-country man, who was employed to fish for the settlement. Every encouragement was held out to this man to secure his honesty: a hut was built for him and his family, and he was allowed to retain for his own use a portion of every taking. Nevertheless he was detected in a long continued practice of purloining quantities of fish which he sold for his own gain. But he was too useful to be deprived of his employment, and he was still retained as official fisherman, only under a stricter supervision. Even this he eluded, managing a year or two later to make good his escape from the colony, together with his wife, two children, and seven other convicts. Having for some time laid by a store of provisions, and obtaining from a Dutch ship, in the port of Sydney, a compass, quadrant, and chart, together with information to help him in reaching Timor and Batavia, he stole one of the government boats and made off. Bryant and two of his convict companions being well trained in the management of a boat, and having luck upon their side, in due course reached the ports for which they steered. Others were less fortunate in their attempts to escape; like those who tried to walk to China northward through the Australian continent. Nor did much success wait upon the scheme laid by the convicts at Norfolk Island to overpower their guards, seize the person of the governor, and decamp. Although too wild and preposterous a plot to raise serious alarm, the very existence of this serves to prove the treacherous, untrustworthy character of these felon exiles. Some years later, indeed, in the reign of Governor King, an outbreak somewhat similar, but planned with secrecy and judgment, came actually to a head, and for the moment assumed rather serious proportions. In this, several hundred convicts combined "to strike for their liberty." They had pikes, pistols, and several stands of arms. The insurrection broke out suddenly. Two large bodies marched upon Paramatta, but were closely followed by an officer, Major Johnson, with forty men of the New South Wales Corps, who brought them to an action at Vinegar Hill, and in fifteen minutes dispersed them with great loss.

It is abundantly evident from these and other instances, that the convict population could only be ruled by an iron hand. But I think Governor Phillip would have forgiven them much if they had but been more industrious. Everything hung upon their labour. The colony must continue to be dependent on the mother country for the commonest necessaries of life, until by the work of these felon hands sufficient food was raised to supply subsistence, whenever the public store should grow empty or come altogether to an end. Yet