FOOTNOTES:

FOOTNOTES:[179]Ikey Solomon.[180]Collins's New South Wales.[181]Ibid.[182]Clarke, executed at Hobart Town (1835), and who for five years wandered among the natives of New South Wales, asserted he had seen an isolated colony of Malays, or some other nation, the remnant of a shipwreck, which had existed for ages on the borders of a lake in the far interior to the north of Sydney. This he affirmed to the last moment of his life. If reliance can be placed upon his testimony, the village he described is doubtless the same, and is yet to be discovered. "Clarke addressed the people from the scaffold, acknowledging his crimes, and imploring all who heard him to avoid the dissipated course, which had led him to so wretched and ignominious an end." Upon this execution Dr. Ross adds—"It is a matter of consolation that we have a pastor, possessed of the very peculiar—we had almost said tact—but we should rather say endowments, with which Mr. Bedford is gifted, for leading to repentance, and affording all possible consolation to the miserable beings in their last extremity."—Courier, August, 1835.[183]Cunningham's New South Wales.[184]Gazette, 1824.[185]James Hawkins, a celebrated pugilist and pickpocket, was not less remarkable for his escapes. He was transported to Hobart Town, where he found several persons who invited him to become a bushranger: he refused, and devoted all his efforts to escape. In this he succeeded: soon re-transported for life, again he stowed himself on board a vessel, and returned to Weyhill, and was again transported. On his way to the hulks he once more got off his irons, but was secured (1820). In gaol he was orderly and quiet, and refused all enterprises which might have compromised his life.[186]Par. Papers.

[179]Ikey Solomon.

[180]Collins's New South Wales.

[181]Ibid.

[182]Clarke, executed at Hobart Town (1835), and who for five years wandered among the natives of New South Wales, asserted he had seen an isolated colony of Malays, or some other nation, the remnant of a shipwreck, which had existed for ages on the borders of a lake in the far interior to the north of Sydney. This he affirmed to the last moment of his life. If reliance can be placed upon his testimony, the village he described is doubtless the same, and is yet to be discovered. "Clarke addressed the people from the scaffold, acknowledging his crimes, and imploring all who heard him to avoid the dissipated course, which had led him to so wretched and ignominious an end." Upon this execution Dr. Ross adds—"It is a matter of consolation that we have a pastor, possessed of the very peculiar—we had almost said tact—but we should rather say endowments, with which Mr. Bedford is gifted, for leading to repentance, and affording all possible consolation to the miserable beings in their last extremity."—Courier, August, 1835.

[183]Cunningham's New South Wales.

[184]Gazette, 1824.

[185]James Hawkins, a celebrated pugilist and pickpocket, was not less remarkable for his escapes. He was transported to Hobart Town, where he found several persons who invited him to become a bushranger: he refused, and devoted all his efforts to escape. In this he succeeded: soon re-transported for life, again he stowed himself on board a vessel, and returned to Weyhill, and was again transported. On his way to the hulks he once more got off his irons, but was secured (1820). In gaol he was orderly and quiet, and refused all enterprises which might have compromised his life.

[186]Par. Papers.

The principles of penal government recognised in the times of Governor Arthur, may be best ascertained from his despatches and orders, and from the writings of Dr. Ross, who, if not directly assisted by Arthur, was inspired by his opinions. Whether those principles were practically applied, will be known by reference to other testimony. The deviations must not, however, be ascribed exclusively, either to the Governor's connivance, or to the intrinsic defect of his system. He could not act alone, and the agents he employed were sometimes incapable, and sometimes corrupt. In his own writings, he repeatedly alludes to the gradual approximation to what he deemed perfection of detail: it cost him the labor of years.

The estimate he formed, philanthropists are slow to entertain: one-third of those who arrived in these colonies, he rated incorrigible; the rest, chiefly affected by the prospect of reward or the dread of punishment, and indifferent to abstract good. In tracing crimes to their causes he largely ascribes them to poverty, and the pressure of classes on each other. He enunciated a novel view of the mental character of criminals—that they were subjects ofdelirium; that they saw every object through a false medium; and that no treatment could be successful which did not restrain them by an enlightened rigour. This view, given in a code of rules[187]for the management of road parties, was attributed to the reasonings of a medical member of his government: the notion it embodies, he himself ascribed to long experience in the management of prisoners. His observation supplied the facts; his councillor, perhaps, constructed the system.

He believed that to remove the opportunities of crime, was the only successful method of general prevention; that to keep the convicts quiet, to withdraw all external excitement was essential to successful treatment of their mental malady. He compared the ordinary offender to a steed untrained: very impatient of the curb and rein. The discipline of the government, either by its own officers or the master, he likened to abreaking in. Under the first application of the bridle, more facile tempers became at once submissive and docile; or if not—if the man threw the master—then came the government with heavier burdens and more painful restraint: he was caught, and resistance was borne down. The milder servitude being unsuccessful, then came magisterial admonition; then the lash; then sequestration on the roads; then irons; then the penal settlement—with its stern aspect, its ponderous labor, and prompt torture; in which mercy wrought through terror and pain, and hope itself was attired in lighter chains.

Arthur alleged that his system was inductive: reared upon a foundation of facts, its classification was self-constituted: every step in the several gradations of a prisoner's punishment was the result of his own will; the first, by his crime against English society, the residue by his misconduct in servitude. It was in his power, when delivered to his master, to work out his own liberty, without knowing again the frown of a magistrate, or the darkness of a dungeon: it was in his choice to delay deliverance until death. Thus the distribution and separation vainly attempted by a direct management of government, was better done by the prisoners themselves: they determined their own merit by their actual position, where they awaited pardon and liberty, or gradual descent to despair.

Arthur watched with great diligence the operation of his system. The character of most masters was known: they were bound to make annual returns of the number and conduct of their men. Their recommendation was required to procure the prisoner's indulgence: his police character was drawn out in form—the parliamentary papers shew into what minute particulars those documents entered; even an admonition of the magistrates was noted, and made part of the case.Blackandwhitebooks were kept, in which meritorious actions and the reverse were recorded. The term of preparatory servitude was four, six, or eight years—as the sentence was for seven, fourteen years, or life; then a ticket-of-leave allowed the prisoner to find his own employ, to enjoyhis own earnings; subject to the surveillance of the police, and to a forfeiture for breach of its regulations.

Arthur described the police as the pivot of his system: it comprehended surveillance and detection. The establishment of district courts, in which a paid magistrate resided, was an essential element of its success. The masters had a correctional authority at hand: a few miles, often a few minutes, brought them within the police court, and the punishment ordered followed the offence by a very short interval. The police constables, mostly prisoners of the crown, were selected from each ship to assist the recognition of their fellow prisoners, and they were rewarded for every runaway they arrested. They often shortened their own sentence by procuring the conviction of others; often, too, they obtained considerable sums, and even instant liberty, by the discovery of an outlaw. They were acute, expert, and, we are told by Arthur, vigilant beyond all men he ever knew. They were objects of fear and detestation.

The strong will of the prisoners thus encountered opposition on every hand. They were hedged round with restrictions; they were at the mercy of the magistrate, and subject to the lash, for offences which language is not sufficiently copious to distinguish with nicety.[188]Their unsupported accusations recoiled on themselves. They were entitled to complain, but the evidence they could generally command, was heard with natural suspicion. So well did they understand the hopelessness of contest, that they rarely replied, where a defence sometimes aggravated their punishment.

The convict was subject to the caprice of all his master's household: he was liable every moment to be accused, and punished.[189]Unknown, without money, he had no protector or advocate: one magistrate could authorise fifty lashes; one hundred could be inflicted by the concurrence of a second. It was asserted by Arthur, that the statement of their liabilities produced an expression of dismay in the countenances of convicts newly arrived. The indefinite character of these offences; the boundless discretion of the magistrate; the influence of the master; the presumption always against the accused; the dreadful nature of several of the punishments—doubtless created in many the recklessness of defiance and despair. A prisoner's sentence might beextended one or three years; he might be doomed to a penal settlement and chains. Nor could he liberate himself from his servitude: he came back from the triangles or road party, and stood at his master's door.

The determined resistance of change, except for punishment; the indissoluble tie of men to masters—was one part of Arthur's plan. The knowledge that submission was the only chance of happiness, caused many to yield to their destiny without a struggle; and where masters were humane, the connection lasted, without murmuring or oppression, until the close; but with many more, it was a period of misery, mental and bodily—the fierce passions breaking into open war, and seeking nothing but revenge or freedom. The rolls of the muster-master exhibit curious instances of this long struggle: there are several now before the writer, in which punishments succeed each other with a frequency so terrible, that the mind is only relieved by the belief that sensibility is destroyed by incurable misery.

Governor Arthur addressed a despatch, on "secondary punishments," to Viscount Goderich, intended to answer the report of the select committee of 1832. He thought the witnesses were not conversant with the state of the prisoners—a fact not surprising, since even the effect of English penitentiaries was debated under their very walls. The gentle system of Governor Macquarie was a tradition among the criminal population of Great Britain; but in this country, colonised at a later date, and by settlers of a higher class, the advantages of the convict were small, and his control more complete. Arthur thus delineated the condition of the assigned servant: deprived of indulgence, living in the interior, employed in clearing and cultivating forest land, allowed no wages; idleness, even looks betraying an insurgent spirit, exposing him to the chain gang or the triangle; deprived of liberty, subject to the caprice of a family, and to the most summary laws. He was a slave, except that his master was not trusted with the lash, and his claim for service terminable. True, he was well fed, while many in England labored hard, and yet were hungry and poor; but nothing reconciled the prisoner to bondage: he compared his condition not with the British pauper, but theirs who, though working in the same field, were masters of their own labor. He asserted that the bravado of persons, who affected indifference when ordered for Macquarie Harbour, was fully answered by the murderers who, to enjoy a momentary escape, ventured their lives; by the desperateefforts of many to conceal themselves in vessels, deprived of food for days, and tortured until their limbs mortified; by the despair of many rioters who arrived in theEliza, who, dejected and stupified by grief, soon drooped and died. He maintained that transportation, though not absolutely successful, was to be preferred, as frequently most dreaded, reformatory, and final.

He maintained, that the current reports respecting transportation deserved no credence, and were unsafe as foundations of public policy. Often, from the most selfish motives, the most delusive statements had been forwarded by prisoners. He instanced a woman from Liverpool, who arrived with her four children, allured by the representation of her husband, and sent out by the charity of his prosecutors; and who had informed her that, beside £60 per annum, he was lodged and fed for his labor. In this case, however, the man wrote falsely; but at that moment there were many who might have made the statement with truth.

In the despatches of Governor Arthur there is much acute observation and just inference. He had actually lessened abuses, until they became not very common or very flagrant: by collecting men in the employ of government under a more rigid system of superintendence, he had curtailed their indulgence, and made their condition more irksome. But it is well known to every colonist, that throughout his administration some prisoners were favored with greater liberty than others; that they accumulated property, and had at command whatever money could buy. He often, with a discretion both wise and humane, mitigated the severity of a sentence and alleviated the domestic desolation of a wife, by granting some indulgence to her husband. It is told to his credit as a man, although it does not add to the weight of his despatches.

The enunciation of principles was not common in the writings of Governor Arthur; he, however, states his view of the objects contemplated by punishment. He held that the severity of a penalty was to be measured by the operation of the crime on society,—or the views taken by legislators of its effect. Unhappily, this theory overlooks the fact, that penalties are usually for the protection of classes, rather than communities. The severe laws against poaching have never been vindicated on the principles of equity or national right: they are the laws of an aristocracy, for the protection of its pleasures. The unlimited power over life and liberty claimed by this doctrine, would excuse the Spartan method of anticipating crime. It is the old code of the opulent and powerful; but it is essentially unjust, fallacious, and therefore useless and wicked.[190]It is probable, however, that abstract opinions maintained but a slight influence on his actual policy, and that by his strong perception of the interest of society in the reform of the offender, he adopted many practical lessons of philanthropy.

Governor Arthur was directed by the Secretary of State to assign the prisoners employed on public works: such as were unfit for the service of settlers to form into gangs, and employ on stations distant from the towns. Lord Goderich had come to the conclusion that the service of government was rather courted than dreaded by the prisoners. This plan was skilfully resisted by Arthur: he admitted that constables and messengers were favorably situated. So great, however, were the hardships of those employed in public works, that his conscience was troubled, and only relieved by remembering that they were the worst of offenders; or, if better conducted, passed at length into the loan-gang—a condition as preferable to assignment, as was assignment to the service of the crown: thus balancing the advantages of their last against the severity of the first stage. He stated their assignment, so far from increasing the severity of punishment, their faults, and even crimes, would be covered by their masters, to preserve their labor; their earnings would place them beyond the condition of their class in Great Britain; and when their fortune should be known, they would never want for successors. But he appealed to a still more cogent argument. The expense of a convict mechanic to the crown, was one shilling per day; of a free artizan, seven to ten shillings: the difference would go to the workmen, to bribe their industry and gratify their vices. It was not, perhaps, known fully to Arthur, that at the moment he sealed his despatch, forty mechanics lodged in one ward, who earned not much less than £50 per week, by the leisure hours they enjoyed.[191]It was, however, true, that the inducement to pay large sums for occasional labor, arose from the difficulty of obtaining it: few mechanics were transported; so few, as to excite astonishment.[192]

But however exact and successful transportation, in Governor Arthur's opinion, a variety of causes contributed to excite in England a powerful prejudice against it, and to lead the ministers to interfere with some of its details of great practical consequence. The gradual amelioration of the criminal code—a restriction of capital punishments, demanded by the humanity of the British public—was allowed by the ruling classes with doubt and grudging. Some conspicuous cases confirmed their predilection in favor of the scaffold. What punishment, they asked, would transportation have proved to Fontleroy, who from the spoil of his extensive forgeries, might have reserved an ample fortune? It was reported, and not untruly, that many had carried to the penal colonies the profit of their crime; that the wife had been assigned to the nominal service of her husband; or, still more preposterous, the husband committed to the control of the wife—and were enabled at once to invest their capital in whatever form might promise success.

Several volumes issued in succession from the British press, full of highly colored sketches of colonial life; in which the advantages possessed by many emancipists, the splendour of their equipage, and the luxurious profligacy of their lives, were exhibited as the larger prizes of a fruitful lottery. Among these works, the most popular, that of Cunningham, professed to delineate the sentiments of the prisoners, from which it might be inferred that few conditions of human life offered so many chances of gaiety and prosperity.[193]

About the same period, Edward Gibbon Wakefield, of a talented family, and afterwards distinguished by his connection with colonisation, was imprisoned in Newgate for the abduction of Miss Turner. During three years' residence he professes to have devoted great attention to the subject of transportation. Few sessions passed but some prisoner, formerly transported, appeared under a second charge. In conversing upon their prospects, they described the country of their former exile in terms of high eulogy. It was the opinion of Wakefield that, as a punishment, it had no influence in preventing crime. The evidence of several settlers from New South Wales was of the same character; and M'Queen, a member of parliament, long resident in that country, stated that he had been often asked what offence would be sufficient to ensure transportation.[194]The letters received from the prisoners, recorded their good fortune, and were read by their former acquaintances. They were filled with exaggerations, dictated by vanity or affection; and seemed to convey an impression that, of their families, they only were fortunate.

A colonist is certainly not entitled to deny, that many strong cases of perversion occurred; but, except the superiority of diet, and the high value of labor common to new countries when they prosper at all, the descriptions given were mostly illusive and mistaken. The extreme misery anddegradation endured by many, and to which all were liable, rendered the ordinary condition of prisoners one which could not have been desired, except by the most wretched of the people.

New South Wales was regarded, by the laughing portion of the British public, as a perpetual beggar's opera. One eminent writer said, that the people of these colonies attracted attention only from the curiosity they excited: mankind were amused to know what form would be assumed by a community, composed of men who narrowly escaped the executioner. By another they were compared to an old fashioned infant, which had all the vices and deformity of a corrupt constitution and precocious passions. The exhibition of a panorama of Sydney in the metropolis of England, attracted large crowds. It was hardly possible to exaggerate the charms of its scenery, when clothed in the radiant verdure of the spring; but the dwellings were drawn, not only in their just proportions, but with all the grace of the pencil—cabins looked like bowers. The poet, Campbell, struck with the glowing harmony, exclaimed, how delightful to the London thief—beneath the clear sky and amidst the magnificent forests of Australia,

"Where Sydney Cove its lucid bosom swells"—

to shake the hand he once encountered in the same pocket at Covent Garden theatre! It is thus, too often, that substantial interests are sacrificed to humour. No one, acquainted with the minds of prisoners, can imagine that the purest atmosphere, or most exhilarating prospect, would be half so attractive to a veteran robber, as the murky cellars of the "London Shades."

The writings of Archbishop Whately tended to the same result. Against the principles of transportation he entered an earnest protest, not only as defeating the primary objects of a penalty, but as constituting a community charged with the elements of future mischief. He reasoned in his closet, and formed his conclusions from a process of investigation which was not complete: he overlooked some facts which tended largely to neutralise the evil, and that suppress or defeat propensities which thrive in Europe. He made many senatorial converts, and those he did not convince, in reference to his main proposition, were anxious to obviate his objections.

To meet, however, the views which prevailed, and which were strongly recommended by the parliamentary committeeof 1832, the government determined to increase the rigour of transportation. The effects of the French revolution, and the pressure of commercial distress, had produced a strong tendency to crime. In the agricultural districts of England riot and arson were prevalent: the utmost exertion of the laborer did not preserve his family from want. Depredations upon game, and other species of rural property, exasperated the legislative class. The hulks were crowded: it was proposed to establish a penitentiary at Dartmoor, long the site of a French prison, and employ the convicts in cutting granite for sale; but the discussions in parliament manifested the strong preference of the agricultural interests for a system of absolute banishment. It was observed by Peel, that the detention of prisoners exposed the government to endless annoyance, and before half their time was expired the solicitation of their friends often procured a remission.

Pending these enquiries, a rumour reached the colony that transportation was abolished. The papers broke out in the language of wailing and woe: theCourier, especially, gave utterance to the most passionate grief. The editor described the melancholy visage of the settlers, and the different expressions of vexation and disappointment which he heard around him. One declaiming against the perfidy of government, and another delineating the ruin involved in the fatal resolution. Some threatening to leave the country ruled by covenant breakers, who, in the spirit of reckless experiment, were not only demolishing the finest imaginable system of penal discipline, but sacrificing the fortunes of colonists, who had emigrated in the confidence that convicts would follow them in an uninterrupted stream.[195]These apprehensions were but temporary. The strong representations of Governor Arthur, and the extreme difficulty of change, secured a further trial under new conditions.

Lord Melbourne held a consultation with Mr. Stanley. He suggested that the increase of crime had arisen partly from ignorance of the actual consequences of transportation. He requested him to reflect upon this topic, and to determine whether it might not be proper to send transgressors through a more rigorous discipline on their landing, and to stop the comparative ease and comfort it was customary to enjoy.[196]Mr. Stanley undertook to contrive a scheme, which should terminate the indifference with which banishment was regarded. He had said that he would render the punishmentof transportation more dreaded than death itself. At his suggestion Lord Melbourne addressed a letter to the judges, and requested them, when on their circuits, to explain the extent of torment which banishment included; to select such as they might deem it proper to separate to a more terrific form of punishment; and to declare, in a public manner, the degree of severity which would follow a particular sentence.

It was determined that the more hardened should be confined at Norfolk Island or Macquarie Harbour; and that no prisoner for life should be withdrawn from a penal settlement, until seven years of his sentence was passed, or until one-third of a shorter period was completed. Then drafted to the roads: after wearing chains a further five years, he might be assigned to a master, and commence his probation. The less guilty were to join the road party at once, and in seven years be liberated from their chains. Mr. Stanley forwarded sixteen persons in theSouthwell, whom he directed should be kept in chains for the first seven years of their bondage. He thus established the system, distinguished as the "certain and severe" in the orders of government; and for several years described by the journals, as the "worse than death" system of Mr. Secretary Stanley.[197]

The object of Stanley was to invest transportation with novel terrors, and to give a more tragic aspect to the law. He did not, however, reflect, that he who has destroyed hope has also made the despairing worthless; that the victim will have recourse to violence or insensibility—that when he cannot rupture he will hug his bonds. He did not perceive that no Englishman would accept the service of a felon, who for twelve years had experienced the misery of chains—that it was not as prisoners, but as husbandmen, that the poachers and rioters of England were acceptable to the Australian farmer; who was reconciled to penal slavery, only when disguised under semi-patriarchal forms.

The change proposed by Stanley was greatly disliked by Arthur. It was the reverse of his system. Whatever influences were brought into action by agricultural service, would be lost in a gang. He foresaw the despondency, the oppression of the prisoners, and the gradual alienation of the colonists. Arthur referred Stanley's despatch to the executive council, with his own rejoinder. His system of twelve yearsbondage and chains was unanimously reprobated: the council concurred in the opinion of the Governor, that it would break up the gradations of punishment; and unless sustained by a large reinforcement of military, endanger the public safety and produce habits of outrage and revenge.[198]Whatever influence these representations possessed, the plan was abandoned of necessity. The chief justice of New South Wales advised the Governor that the law had not authorised the arbitrary addition of chains to a sentence of transportation—to increase the misery, not to add to the safe keeping of the prisoners. Such, on reference, was the opinion of the English legal authorities, and the men in irons were released.[199]

Whatever the motives of Lord Stanley, the transmission of such an order, without ascertaining the authority under which it was issued, was a serious official error. It is probable, that the persons injured had no means of appeal, and deserved no redress; but when it is remembered, that the law does not profess to determine the moral enormity of an offence by the extent of punishment, to aggravate a penalty which the legislators deemed equal to the crime—avowedly to make it more terrible than death itself—was a stretch of official power, which can scarcely be explained.

St. Paul denounced the judge who smote contrary to the law. Mr. Stanley's encroachment on the functions of legislation was only more defensible because less corrupt. To repress colonial disorders, the local government had, indeed, grafted the penalties he prescribed on the colonial statute book; but the despotic interference of a secretary of state was specially objectionable. Persons sentenced to transportation for political or agrarian crimes, were not unlikely to provoke the personal hatred of ministers, and therefore to suffer a vengeance beyond the intention of the judges, or the spirit of the laws.

To render corruption more difficult, the power of the governors was limited by statute. They had granted tickets-of-leave for the discovery of outlaws, the detection of serious crimes, and any service of great public utility. They had been often swayed by feelings of humanity in hastening the liberation of men, whose families required their care; but an Act "for abolishing the punishment of death in certain cases,"[200]not only fixed the time when prisoners should be capable of tickets-of-leave, but abstracted the chief advantages a ticket conferred. They were excluded from the protectionof civil laws, and thus thrown on the mercy of any who might employ them. These clauses were introduced by Lord Wynford (Sergeant Best), and were intended to equalise the punishment of offenders, and to prevent an early enjoyment of plunder. This restriction was, however, practically unjust. The grant of a ticket-of-leave was to enable a man to procure a livelihood: to deprive him of legal resource, was to invite the swindler and the cheat to make his earnings and acquisitions their prey. The local courts had hitherto resisted the injustice by evasion: a record of conviction being required to stay a civil action; although in the criminal courts it was sufficient to prove that the person accused had been dealt with as a transported offender.

Lord Wynford's Act made no such distinction. Its provision, probably the result of inadvertence, was so palpably a contradiction, that it was never acted upon in Van Diemen's Land, and was earnestly deprecated by all classes. To grant a prisoner liberty to seek subsistence, and yet suffer any fraudulent person to deprive him of his just wages, could arise only from that confusion of ideas, too common in legislation on the subject.

FOOTNOTES:[187]"It can scarcely be doubted, that the main body of convicts are under mental delirium—they see and appreciate every thing through a false medium; and as, from long experience and close observation, the Lieutenant-Governor is confident that a firm and determined, but mild and consistent supervision, is the very best to be followed, in order to remove the infirmity under which they labor, it is the treatment he enjoins shall be uniformly observed!"—Regulations issued to the Roads' Department.[188]"Absconding, insubordination, drunkenness, indecent conduct, neglect or wilful mismanagement of work, neglect of duty, indecent or abusive language, swearing, insolence, or other disorderly conduct."[189]Arthur.[190]Arthur's despatch to Lord Goderich.[191]It was not uncommon for four in their number to consume one gallon of rum at a sitting. Incredible as this may appear, it stands upon indubitable testimony; and one of the witnesses, had he been classical, might have said—Pars magna fui.[192]Arthur's despatch to Lord Howick, 1832.[193]"Several went out with me on these very terms: and among them one merry youth of two-and-twenty, whose father had been transported when he was a child. His elder brother followed the fortunes of his father by special invitation. On our arrival the elder brother came alongside, and introduced the younger brother and father (who, of course, were strangers to each other). 'When may we expect Jem?' was the question put shortly after the preliminary congratulations."—Two Years, &c., vol. ii. p. 259."I shall conclude this subject with a short anecdote, which fully illustrates how little a convict cares for transportation, or rather how much he prefers it. A gentleman, who came home passenger in the same vessel with myself, brought with him a convict as a domestic. I asked him what were his future plans? He replied, that he meant to go and see his mother, if she was alive; but if she was dead, he, to use his own words, would 'frisk a crib,' (Anglice—rob a shop) or do something to lag him for seven years again, as he was perfectly aware that he could not work hard enough to get his living in England."—Widowson's present state of V. D. Land, 1829. p. 65."In order to show the opinions entertained by some of the convicts, as regards the colony, I will give an extract from one of the sundry letters which I have read, written by them to their friends in England, using the writer's own language and punctuation, but altering the spelling. He requests that his wife will come out, and bring their children with her, and then proceeds as follows: 'I am perfectly well satisfied with my situation thanks be to God that has placed me under those that does not despise a prisoner. No, my love, I am (not?) treated as a prisoner but as a free man, there is no one to say a wrong word to me. I have good usage, plenty of good meat, and clothes with easy work. I have 362 sheep to mind, either of our lads could do it with ease. The best of men was shepherds. Jacob served for his wife, yea and for a wife did he keep sheep and so will I, and my love we shall be more happy here than ever we should be at home if happiness is to be found on the earth. Don't fail to come out I never thought this country what I have found it. I did expect to be in servile bondage and to be badly used but I am better off this day than half the people in England, and I would not go back to England if any one would pay my passage. England has the name of a free country and this is a bond country, but shame my friends and countrymen where is your boasted freedom. Look round you, on every side there is distress, rags, want, and all are in one sorrowful state of want. Happiness and prosperity has long taken their flight from Albion's once happy isle.' He then alludes to the low price of provisions, and adds—'Except you live in a town you have no rent to pay, for each builds his own house, no tithes, no poor-rates, and no taxes of any kind. And this is bondage is it?' There are some other amusing remarks in this original composition, but the above will suffice to show that convicts lead not always the unhappy life they are supposed to do, unless through their own bad conduct. The writer of the above letter bears such an excellent character that his master has sent to England for his wife and family, with the intention of trying to be of some use to them."—Breton's New South Wales, p. 281.[194]Potter M'Queen's evidence before the Commons, 1831.[195]Courier, 1831.[196]May 20th, 1833.[197]Stanley's despatch, August, 1833.[198]February 3rd, 1834.[199]Par. Pap.: Forbes's evidence.[200]2 & 3 9th Will. iv. cap. 42.

[187]"It can scarcely be doubted, that the main body of convicts are under mental delirium—they see and appreciate every thing through a false medium; and as, from long experience and close observation, the Lieutenant-Governor is confident that a firm and determined, but mild and consistent supervision, is the very best to be followed, in order to remove the infirmity under which they labor, it is the treatment he enjoins shall be uniformly observed!"—Regulations issued to the Roads' Department.

[188]"Absconding, insubordination, drunkenness, indecent conduct, neglect or wilful mismanagement of work, neglect of duty, indecent or abusive language, swearing, insolence, or other disorderly conduct."

[189]Arthur.

[190]Arthur's despatch to Lord Goderich.

[191]It was not uncommon for four in their number to consume one gallon of rum at a sitting. Incredible as this may appear, it stands upon indubitable testimony; and one of the witnesses, had he been classical, might have said—Pars magna fui.

[192]Arthur's despatch to Lord Howick, 1832.

[193]"Several went out with me on these very terms: and among them one merry youth of two-and-twenty, whose father had been transported when he was a child. His elder brother followed the fortunes of his father by special invitation. On our arrival the elder brother came alongside, and introduced the younger brother and father (who, of course, were strangers to each other). 'When may we expect Jem?' was the question put shortly after the preliminary congratulations."—Two Years, &c., vol. ii. p. 259."I shall conclude this subject with a short anecdote, which fully illustrates how little a convict cares for transportation, or rather how much he prefers it. A gentleman, who came home passenger in the same vessel with myself, brought with him a convict as a domestic. I asked him what were his future plans? He replied, that he meant to go and see his mother, if she was alive; but if she was dead, he, to use his own words, would 'frisk a crib,' (Anglice—rob a shop) or do something to lag him for seven years again, as he was perfectly aware that he could not work hard enough to get his living in England."—Widowson's present state of V. D. Land, 1829. p. 65."In order to show the opinions entertained by some of the convicts, as regards the colony, I will give an extract from one of the sundry letters which I have read, written by them to their friends in England, using the writer's own language and punctuation, but altering the spelling. He requests that his wife will come out, and bring their children with her, and then proceeds as follows: 'I am perfectly well satisfied with my situation thanks be to God that has placed me under those that does not despise a prisoner. No, my love, I am (not?) treated as a prisoner but as a free man, there is no one to say a wrong word to me. I have good usage, plenty of good meat, and clothes with easy work. I have 362 sheep to mind, either of our lads could do it with ease. The best of men was shepherds. Jacob served for his wife, yea and for a wife did he keep sheep and so will I, and my love we shall be more happy here than ever we should be at home if happiness is to be found on the earth. Don't fail to come out I never thought this country what I have found it. I did expect to be in servile bondage and to be badly used but I am better off this day than half the people in England, and I would not go back to England if any one would pay my passage. England has the name of a free country and this is a bond country, but shame my friends and countrymen where is your boasted freedom. Look round you, on every side there is distress, rags, want, and all are in one sorrowful state of want. Happiness and prosperity has long taken their flight from Albion's once happy isle.' He then alludes to the low price of provisions, and adds—'Except you live in a town you have no rent to pay, for each builds his own house, no tithes, no poor-rates, and no taxes of any kind. And this is bondage is it?' There are some other amusing remarks in this original composition, but the above will suffice to show that convicts lead not always the unhappy life they are supposed to do, unless through their own bad conduct. The writer of the above letter bears such an excellent character that his master has sent to England for his wife and family, with the intention of trying to be of some use to them."—Breton's New South Wales, p. 281.

"I shall conclude this subject with a short anecdote, which fully illustrates how little a convict cares for transportation, or rather how much he prefers it. A gentleman, who came home passenger in the same vessel with myself, brought with him a convict as a domestic. I asked him what were his future plans? He replied, that he meant to go and see his mother, if she was alive; but if she was dead, he, to use his own words, would 'frisk a crib,' (Anglice—rob a shop) or do something to lag him for seven years again, as he was perfectly aware that he could not work hard enough to get his living in England."—Widowson's present state of V. D. Land, 1829. p. 65.

"In order to show the opinions entertained by some of the convicts, as regards the colony, I will give an extract from one of the sundry letters which I have read, written by them to their friends in England, using the writer's own language and punctuation, but altering the spelling. He requests that his wife will come out, and bring their children with her, and then proceeds as follows: 'I am perfectly well satisfied with my situation thanks be to God that has placed me under those that does not despise a prisoner. No, my love, I am (not?) treated as a prisoner but as a free man, there is no one to say a wrong word to me. I have good usage, plenty of good meat, and clothes with easy work. I have 362 sheep to mind, either of our lads could do it with ease. The best of men was shepherds. Jacob served for his wife, yea and for a wife did he keep sheep and so will I, and my love we shall be more happy here than ever we should be at home if happiness is to be found on the earth. Don't fail to come out I never thought this country what I have found it. I did expect to be in servile bondage and to be badly used but I am better off this day than half the people in England, and I would not go back to England if any one would pay my passage. England has the name of a free country and this is a bond country, but shame my friends and countrymen where is your boasted freedom. Look round you, on every side there is distress, rags, want, and all are in one sorrowful state of want. Happiness and prosperity has long taken their flight from Albion's once happy isle.' He then alludes to the low price of provisions, and adds—'Except you live in a town you have no rent to pay, for each builds his own house, no tithes, no poor-rates, and no taxes of any kind. And this is bondage is it?' There are some other amusing remarks in this original composition, but the above will suffice to show that convicts lead not always the unhappy life they are supposed to do, unless through their own bad conduct. The writer of the above letter bears such an excellent character that his master has sent to England for his wife and family, with the intention of trying to be of some use to them."—Breton's New South Wales, p. 281.

[194]Potter M'Queen's evidence before the Commons, 1831.

[195]Courier, 1831.

[196]May 20th, 1833.

[197]Stanley's despatch, August, 1833.

[198]February 3rd, 1834.

[199]Par. Pap.: Forbes's evidence.

[200]2 & 3 9th Will. iv. cap. 42.

The treatment and disposal of mechanics, craftsmen, and the educated, or "specials," disturbed the equal operation of the laws.

The artizan, when not adapted for public works, was placed in the loan gang, and lent from time to time, chiefly to the officers of government, or to such settlers as were deemed worthy official patronage. They were not authorised to claim wages, but their employers prompted their industry by its usual recompense. Their value as workmen often secured them an appearance which surpassed the common means of English artificers, or they expended their earnings during paroxysms of intemperance. The power to grant the assistance of skilled workmen, and the custom of the officers to borrow them for their own service, excited unceasing murmurs. Master tradesmen complained, that their callings were followed by captains and lieutenants, whose journeymen were the prisoners of the crown, and who, beside the emoluments of office, engrossed the profits of smiths and carpenters—of tailors and shoemakers. Those settlers, excluded from participation in theloanlabor, denounced the venal partiality of its distribution. Long lists were published of workmen allotted to the relatives and confidants of the Governor, to display his unwearied nepotism.

The educated prisoners occasioned still greater complaint. At an early period, many of the higher functionaries were utterly ignorant of accounts, and were glad to employ the abilities which transportation placed at their disposal. Curious anecdotes are told of the profits derived by this class of scribes, by the distribution of royal clemency: thus the indents were altered by a clerk, who charged £10 for reducing considerably the duration of a sentence.[201]At a later date, a prisoner offered by letter £15 for his conditional pardon. The bearer gave information of its contents to another convict in office, who offered to obtain the "royal mercy" for £10, and he did so.[202]The reliance frequently placed in the fidelity of their penmanship, sometimes modified the details of punishment.

From the report of a board appointed by Arthur, it appeared that sixty-six were employed in the various departments. The evidence is valuable, from the statements it contains respecting the condition and influence of this class. They were represented to be quick, intelligent men, and were preferred because more easily commanded—if not controlled. Their office hours usually terminating at 4 o'clock, they obtained considerable sums as book-keepers. All correspondence, except despatches to the British government, and communications with the judges, passed under their eye. They were employed in taking depositions, and received bribes for expediting indulgences. Their acquaintance with the probable demands of the commissariat, was a source of emolument: they sold information to the shopkeepers, and thus enhanced the price. Arthur professed to deplore the necessity of their employment; a practice which long survived his government.

It was, indeed, a mournful sight, to behold men of better hopes sink into habits of intemperance; and for a long series of years pass through a succession of punishments, often for trifling infractions of the penal code—to see them display the utmost facility in penmanship, and to hear at everymovement the rattle of chains. Yet these prodigal sons of many a desolated house, were not so much objects of compassion, as those whose peace they had blighted with an incurable affliction. No one could imagine how many families, distinguished for rank, benevolence, and piety—known at home as the fortunate and happy—had in these regions unhappy relations, whose fate must have cast dark shadows on their own. Many, however, protected their kindred from public dishonor by the change of their names: they not unfrequently were overtaken by crime and punishment, having long left the dwellings of their fathers, whose reputation they spared by artifice and silence.

The wives of prisoners, who once moved in the higher circles, often exhibited an example of complicated virtue. What they took from the misery of their husbands they added to their own; and even by their participation rendered more intense the mental anguish they came to remove. Delicately reared, familiar with the comforts of affluence, they resolutely abandoned all. No entreaty, maternal tears, or offers of support, could change the purpose of conscience and affection. They gathered up the fragments of their shivered fortunes to venture on a lonely voyage, and encounter a rough courtesy—generous, when not brutal; to solicit commiseration from the harsh delegates of a nation's vengeance, or the hucksters of its mercy. Sad lot! fraught with anguish, with terror, and trembling: every moment passed in fear of some new fetter—of some fresh official caprice, or sudden separation! Such scenes of mental and physical martyrdom have been often known to professional men, who enter the interior of life, and watch the operations of secret sorrow. The mould of Tasmania covers many a true-hearted woman, whose constancy and self devotion are registered on high; and which, in another sphere, might command the admiration of the world!

The colonial government interdicted the connection of prisoners with the press, which, however, was not prevented or punished, when loyal to the authorities. Their writings were commonly laudatory of the officials, even when most offensive to the colonists. They were not always the most trucculent and unprincipled; although the censorship of public morals and political measures was unsuited to their civil condition.

Among those thus employed was Savary, once an opulent sugar baker at Bristol, who in 1824 was convicted of forgery, and his life spared by an exercise of mercy then novel.Happier far, had he died! He wrote for the press—on the right side. On the accusation of a colonist, his ticket-of-leave was withdrawn; but he was spared the usual penalty of banishment by the kindness of his patrons, who granted him another form of liberty. This man was followed by his wife; but on her arrival, her affection was seduced, or exhausted, and she returned to England. Savary attempted suicide, recovered, and again fell into crime: he was tried by Judge Montague, convicted of a colonial forgery, and afterwards died at Port Arthur—an awful instance of the effects of transgression; and of the proneness of men to repeat a crime they have once committed.[203]

It having been resolved to abandon Macquarie Harbour (1832), the government fixed on Port Arthur, on the east coast, as the site of a settlement where the rigour of discipline might be preserved. This district is situated on a peninsula within a peninsula, and contains about 100,000 acres of woodland—barren, but not repulsive. A neck of 450 yards broad, divides Tasman's and Forrestier's Peninsulas: there lamps are set on posts, to which fierce dogs are chained; and to close the passage by the shore, when opened by the recession of the tide, others are kennelled on a floating platform. Sentinels, guard-boats, and telegraphs, are the precautions employed to prevent escape; which few have attempted, and fewer still accomplished.

The first commandant was Surgeon John Russell; an office subsequently confided to Captain O'Hara Booth, a gentleman whose administration has been the subject of great eulogy. A minute code of government regulations defined the duties of all on the station. Hither all convicted of colonial crimes, or of more serious misconduct as assigned servants or in the road gangs, or who were separated to more than ordinary punishment by the secretary of state, or of the educated class, were sent. The degrees of punishment were, however, varied; and the more severe was exhausting and dangerous. The carrying gang, with a massive balk on the shoulders, resembled a huge centipede. The laborers, sometimes thirty together, groaning beneath a weight of many tons, obtained no respite from toil. The slippery and inclining ground exposed themto terrific perils: when they complained of inability to bear their burden, they were flogged, taken back, and compelled, by supernatural effort, to raise the load they had laid down. The numerous orders were enforced without momentary relaxation, and the scourge was the chief agent of control.

When the settlement was new, the men suffered from scurvy; they were not, subsequently, unhealthy: diseases of the heart formed a large proportion of their maladies. Many instances of great hardship have been authenticated; and several committed murder to be removed from misery by a public execution. The possession of a piece of tobacco was penal, and for this offence alone multitudes were flogged; but its use was only limited by the supply: many men would have risked the rack, rather than rejected this valued indulgence. A wesleyan missionary was accustomed to reward his servant with the luxury, until he found that being distributed, others were involved in punishment. Visitors usually carried tobacco, which they dropped on the tramway by which they were conveyed; and even when the prohibitions were most severely enforced, money would procure a supply.

The effect of Capt. Booth's administration was soon visible: the stoutest hearted gave way. Inexorably just, according to the system he represented, the accused might plead, but were never pardoned. The gentlemen convicts, clad in a prison dress, were employed in lighter labor and worked together; but were transferred to more penal gangs, for the least disorder. It is said that the terrors of Port Arthur were preventive of crime; that its rigour controlled and reformed, for the time, such as were sent there; but, both by those who vindicated, and those who condemned its severity, it is admitted that relapses were usual;[204]that it operated on the will by mechanical force, but debased the soul.

However heavy the hand of authority, it was not capricious. The overseers and constables were less brutal than at the road parties and previous penal stations. Compared with every other settlement of its class, Port Arthur, during Booth's management, was more humane because more equal and impartial. Constantly exhibited as a place of profound misery, it carried the vengeance of the law to the utmost limits of human endurance.

It would be improper to withhold the common testimony in favor of this officer, of whom the writer never heard a prisoner speak with reproach: he was detested only as the personification of unimpassioned severity. He gave all the weight of his example to promote the success of the missionary, and paid him respect in the sight of the prisoners. Time softens all things, and Captain Booth, on calm reflection, deserves to be remembered with respect, as an officer who took no pleasure in the sufferings he inflicted—who was as prompt to reward as to punish. A further detail is needless, and would add no new illustration of transportation.

The interest which Arthur took in the settlement which bears his name, may be inferred from his frequent visits, and the large promises which he offered in reference to its future prosperity. He thought seven thousand men might be sent there, to be detained six months on an average; and that the large consumption and expenditure would be repaid by the produce of their labor. From an early date, Port Arthur possessed the advantage of schools and ministerial attendance. A church, of handsome exterior, was erected.[205]

As the settlement improved, a tramway formed of hard wood, crossed a space of five miles, and thus connected the opposite bays. On this road, travellers were conveyed by human labor, a large proportion of the distance being, however, overcome by spontaneous locomotion.

The denizens of Port Arthur would furnish a curious collection of biography: the muster would be a living calendar. Among the more celebrated were, Ikey Solomon, the receiver, whom they made constable: the chartists—men, in whose fate millions have publicly expressed an interest. There was Collins, the mad sailor, who threw a stone at the last king; May, who murdered the Italian boy; and Cohen, a jew, who resigned himself to despair, and refusing sustenance, died: they now rest in the "Isle de Mort."

The establishment at Point Puer was intended to reclaim and control, rather than to punish, the unfortunate youth submitted to its discipline. Until a very late period, boys had been transmitted to the colonies in company with the men, and were treated without much discrimination: some at an age to understand crime only as a trick, or to deserveaught except pity and correction. Thus at Preston, a child, only seven years old, was transported for life. A boy, three years older, perhaps the same, called by his fellow prisoners, "King John," after three years imprisonment, arrived in this colony (1829) with sixty other lads; of whom, on their embarkation, not one in twenty could repeat the Lord's prayer.[206]It was stated by a Lord Mayor of London, that nothing could be kinder than to transport juvenile offenders to a country where their labor would be useful and their prosperity sure. It may be presumed, that in this spirit a girl and two boys were committed to take their trial for stealing some wood, valued at twopence, the property of the crown.[207]These acts of severity forcibly contrast with the happier fortunes of other classes. It is said of George III, that he arrested two Eton boys in the act of poaching: they took him for a keeper, and offered their pocket-money as a bribe. He threatened to inform their master; but next day sent them a present, requesting them to cease their depredations. They were peers when the monarch told the story, and he observed that they were most rigorous preservers of their game—"according to the old proverb, set a thief to catch a thief," said the king! A better authenticated anecdote was given by Lord Eldon, of his juvenile adventures; such as a rigorous magistrate might have turned to a very different account.[208]By what construction of equity the poor man's son, or the orphan, could deserve to be branded with an indelible stigma for no heavier crimes, it would be in vain to ask. Infractions of the law cannot be tolerated in any age, yet its administration has been often both partial and unmerciful.

Most of these young convicts had been first imprisoned a short period, and then turned on the world to obtain, by greater crimes, more lasting protection; or sometimes accused, but not convicted, they waited amidst moral pestilence the long delays of justice. A lad, fourteen years of age, was charged with stealing a hat: twelve months after, he was acquitted. What wonder that, dismissed a hardened criminal, he returned to be transported for life.[209]Such wasthe education of many, who might fairly adopt the language of Howard to the German emperor—"It is not in the power of your majesty to make reparation for the injury they have suffered." No subsequent care could atone for the long slumber of protective justice.

It is refreshing to find that kindness and coercion were united in the discipline of Point Puer: an oasis in the desert of penal government—unless viewed from the woolsack. Captain Booth was prompt in subduing rebellion and enforcing industry: the meals were regular, and habits of devotion and cleanliness were promoted. But when the boys were submissive and diligent, they were not forbidden to be happy: they were made tailors, shoemakers, carpenters, boat-builders, masons, and gardeners. Some became acceptable apprentices, were lost sight of as prisoners, and are now known only as respectable men. Such boys, however, were protected from contamination, from the moment of conviction. Those who mingled indiscriminately with the prisoners, surpassed them in mischief and wickedness. When landed they were placed in the barracks: some, not more than ten years old, blended the trickery of boyhood with the villainy of age, and had scarcely arrived a week, before they were tied up to the triangles and punished with the cat. Lord John Russell, yielding to humane suggestions, collected a cargo of juveniles from the various prisons, and appointed a surgeon-superintendent, who never lost sight of their moral welfare. The care was not unavailing: Captain Booth reported that a large proportion passed through his hands without incurring even magisterial correction, notwithstanding the most trivial disorders were punished. The reformation of adults may admit of scepticism, and be tolerated as a topic of ridicule: but children, taught to steal earlier than to speak; who received the first lessons of crime on the lap of a mother; who never heard of God, but from the lips of blasphemers—or of right, but as the fair distribution of spoil, were surely entitled to compassion. The sympathies of man cast penal science to the winds, and scorn to preserve the inexorable temper of legal vengeance, to save the rich from peculation, by the moral immolation of infant robbers. They are orphans cast upon a nation's mercy; for though nature gave them the claims of children, she did not secure them an interest in a parent's heart.

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