Volume I Part 19 (2/2)

By this s.h.i.+p we received a public seal to be affixed to all instruments drawn in his Majesty's name, and a commission under the great seal empowering the governor for the time being to remit, either absolutely or conditionally, the whole or any part of the term for which felons, or other offenders, should have been or might hereafter be transported to this country. Duplicates of each pardon were to be sent to England, for the purpose of inserting the names of the persons so emanc.i.p.ated in the first general pardon which should afterward issue under the great seal of the kingdom.

To deserving characters, of which description there were many convicts in the colony, a prospect of having the period of their banishment shortened, and of being restored to the privilege which by misconduct they had forfeited, had something in it very cheering, and was more likely to preserve well intentioned men in honest and fair pursuits, than the fear of punishment, which would seldom operate with good effect on a mind that entertained no hope of reward for propriety of conduct. The people with whom we had to deal were not in general actuated by that nice sense of feeling which draws its truest satisfaction from self approbation; they looked for something more substantial, something more obvious to the external senses.

In determining the device for the seal of the colony, attention had been paid to its local and peculiar circ.u.mstances. On the obverse were the king's arms, with the royal t.i.tles in the margin; on the reverse, a representation of convicts landing at Botany Bay, received by Industry, who, surrounded by her attributes, a bale of merchandise, a beehive, a pickaxe, and a shovel, is releasing them from their fetters, and pointing to oxen ploughing and a town rising on the summit of a hill, with a fort for its protection. The masts of a s.h.i.+p are seen in the bay. In the margin are the words _Sigillum. Nov. Camb. Aust._; and for a motto _'Sic fortis Etruria crevit.'_ The seal was of silver; its weight forty-six ounces and the devices were very well executed.

The cattle were immediately landed, and turned into the inclosures which had been prepared for them. One cow died in the boat going up.

The remaining transports of the fleet were now dropping in. On the 26th the _Active_ from England, and the _Queen_ from Ireland, with convicts of that country arrived and anch.o.r.ed in the cove. On board of the _Active_, beside the sergeant's guard, were one hundred and fifty-four male convicts. An officer's party was on board the _Queen_, with one hundred and twenty-six male and twenty-three female convicts and three children.

These s.h.i.+ps had been unhealthy, and had buried several convicts in their pa.s.sage. The sick which they brought in were landed immediately; and many of those who remained, and were not so ill as to require medical a.s.sistance, were brought on sh.o.r.e in an emaciated and feeble condition, particularly the convicts from the _Active_. They in general complained of not having received the allowance intended for them; but their emaciated appearance was to be ascribed as much to confinement as to any other cause. The convicts from the _Queen_, however, accusing the master of having withheld their provisions, an inquiry took place before the magistrates, and it appeared beyond a doubt, that great abuses had been practised in the issuing of the provisions; but as to the quant.i.ty withheld, it was not possible to ascertain it so clearly, as to admit of directing the deficiency to be made good, or of punis.h.i.+ng the parties with that retributive justice for which the heinousness of their offence so loudly called; the proceedings of the magistrates were therefore submitted to the governor, who determined to transmit them to the secretary of state.

Nothing could have excited more general indignation than the treatment which these people appeared to have met with; for, what crime could be more offensive to every sentiment of humanity, than the endeavour, by curtailing a ration already not too ample, to derive a temporary advantage from the miseries of our fellow-creatures!

By the arrival of these s.h.i.+ps several articles of comfort were introduced among us, there being scarcely a vessel that had not brought out something for sale. It could not, however, be said that they were procurable on easier terms than what had been sold here in the last year.

The Spanish dollar was the current coin of the colony, which some of the masters taking at five s.h.i.+llings and others at four s.h.i.+llings and six-pence, the governor, in consideration of the officers having been obliged to receive the dollars at five s.h.i.+llings sterling when given for bills drawn in the settlement, issued a proclamation fixing the currency of the Spanish dollar at that sum.

The _Supply_ was now carefully surveyed, when it appeared, that her defects were such as to render it by no means difficult to put her into a state that would enable her to reach England; but that if she remained six months longer in this country, she would become wholly unserviceable.

It was therefore determined to dispatch her immediately to England.

Timber had with infinite labour been procured for her main-mast, and her other repairs were put in train for her sailing hence in the course of the next month.

October.] The remainder of the transports expected did not arrive until the middle of October. The _Albermarle_ was off the coast some days, being prevented by a southerly current from getting in. She arrived on Thursday the 13th, with two hundred and fifty male and six female convicts, her proportion of stores and provisions, and one sergeant, one corporal, one drummer, and twenty privates of the new corps.

The convicts of this s.h.i.+p had made an attempt, in conjunction with some of the seamen, to seize her on the 9th of April, soon after she had sailed from England; and they would in all probability have succeeded, but for the activity and resolution shown by the master Mr. George Bowen, who, hearing the alarm, had just time to arm himself with a loaded blunderbuss, which he discharged at one of the mutineers, William Syney (then in the act of aiming a blow with a cutla.s.s at the man at the wheel), and lodged its contents in his shoulder. His companions, seeing what had befallen him, instantly ran down below; but the master, his officers, and some of the seamen of the s.h.i.+p, following them, soon secured the ringleaders, Owen Lyons and William Syney. A consultation was held with the naval agent, Lieutenant Robert Parry Young, the s.h.i.+p's company, and the military persons on board, the result of which was, the immediate execution of those two at the fore-yard arm. They had at this time parted company with the other transports, and no other means seemed so likely to deter the convicts from any future attempt of the like nature. It afterwards appearing that two of the seamen had supplied them with instruments for sawing off their irons, these were left at the island of Madeira, where the _Albermarle_ touched, to be sent prisoners to England.

On the day following the _Britannia_ arrived, with one hundred and twenty-nine male convicts, stores, and provisions on board; and on the 16th the _Admiral Barrington_, the last of the ten sail of transports, anch.o.r.ed in the cove. This s.h.i.+p had been blown off the coast, and fears were entertained of her safety, as she left the cape with a crippled main-mast and other material defects. She had on board a captain and a party of the New South Wales corps, with two hundred and sixty-four male convicts, four free women, and one child. She had been unhealthy too, having lost thirty-six convicts in the pa.s.sage, and brought in eighty-four persons sick, who were immediately landed. Her stores and proportion of provisions were the same as on board of the other s.h.i.+ps.

The whole number of convicts now received into the colony, including thirty on board the _Gorgon_, were, male convicts one thousand six hundred and ninety-five; female convicts one hundred and sixty-eight; and children nine. There were also eight free women (wives of convicts) and one child; making a total number of one thousand eight hundred and eighty-one persons, exclusive of the military. Upwards of two hundred convicts, male and female, did not reach the country.

Of the ten sail of transports lately arrived, five, after delivering their cargoes, were to proceed on the southern whale fishery, viz the _Mary Ann_, _Matilda_, _William and Ann_, _Salamander_, and _Britannia_.

Melville, the master of the _Britannia_, conceiving great hopes of success on this coast from the numbers of spermaceti whales which he saw between the south cape and this port, requested to be cleared directly on his coming in, that he might give it a trial; and, the governor consenting, his s.h.i.+p was ready by the 22nd (a week after her arrival), and sailed on the 24th with the other whalers.

The _Queen_, _Atlantic_, _Active_, _Albemarle_, and _Admiral Barrington_, after being discharged from government employ, were to proceed to Bombay, by consent of the East India Company, and load home with cotton upon private account under the inspection of the company's servants at that settlement, provided the cotton should be afterwards sold at the company's sales, subject to the usual expenses (their duty only excepted), and provided the s.h.i.+ps did not interfere with any other part of the company's exclusive commerce*.

[* Notwithstanding this provision, which was expressed more at large in the licence given by the company, and which extended to the prohibition of every article except the stores and provisions put on board by government, there was on board of these s.h.i.+ps a very large quant.i.ty of iron, steel, and copper, intended for sale at a foreign settlement in India, with the produce of which they were to purchase the homeward-bound investment of cotton.]

The quant.i.ty of provisions received by these s.h.i.+ps being calculated for the numbers on board of each for nine months only after their arrival, and as, so large a body of convicts having been sent out, it was not probable that we should soon receive another supply, the governor judged it expedient to send one of the transports to Bengal, to procure provisions for the colony; for which purpose he hired the _Atlantic_ at fifteen s.h.i.+llings and sixpence per ton per month. In the way thither she was to touch at Norfolk Island, where lieutenant-governor King, with some settlers, was to be landed; and the _Queen_ transport was hired for the purpose of bringing back lieutenant-governor Ross, and the marine detachment serving there, relieved by a company of the New South Wales corps.

On the 25th, the anniversary of his Majesty's accession to the throne, a salute of twenty-one guns was fired by the _Gorgon_, and the public dinner given on the occasion at the government-house was served to upwards of fifty officers, a greater number than the colony had ever before seen a.s.sembled together.

The following morning the _Atlantic_ sailed for Norfolk Island and Calcutta. For the first of these places, she had on board Lieutenant-Governor King and his family; Captain Paterson of the New South Wales corps (lately arrived in the _Admiral Barrington_); Mr.

Balmain, the a.s.sistant-surgeon, sent to relieve Mr. Considen; the Rev.

Mr. Johnson, who voluntarily visited Norfolk Island for the purpose of performing those duties of his office which had hitherto been omitted through the want of a minister to perform them; twenty-nine settlers discharged from the marines; several male and female convicts, and some few settlers from that cla.s.s of people.

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