evil necessarily attendant on a system of transportation. The convict-women are allotted to private individuals as domestic servants and with them there is no difficulty, as, on account of the great disproportion between the sexes, caused by the unnatural manner in which the society has been formed, females are at a great premium in New South Wales. But the class of gentlemen convicts (as they are called), i. e. persons who in England belonged to the upper or middle ranks, being devoid of mechanical skill, and unfit for common agricultural labour, occasion a greater perplexity. At one time, a penal settlement named Wellington Valley was made in the interior at a distance of about 250 miles from the coast, where the gentlemen convicts were employed in light agricultural work, such as tending sheep, and were thus removed from the society and luxuries of the towns. This measure being the means of inflicting a much severer punishment than that usually endured by the upper class of convicts, had the effect of spreading great alarm among criminals of the same rank in London who were lying in prison under sentence of transportation, and we may reasonably suppose, among other persons, meditating crimes which would entail the same consequences. The establishment at Wellington Valley, however, having proved expensive, was discontinued, and gentlemen-convicts have now returned to their former state of comfort and enjoyment; that is to say, they are employed as clerks in the government offices, or given as tutors to private families :3 their whole time, except when occupied with business, being at their own disposal. Of those who are employed as tutors, Mr. Busby, who held an official situation at New South Wales, states that "as far as regards the necessaries and many of the comforts of life, they are exceedingly well off." (Ev. 1198.) Any annoyance

"Some returned convicts brought an account of their having been sent to Wellington Valley, and in speaking of it, they called it the 'Swells' settlement, the gentlemen-convicts:' and it created a great deal of apprehension in the minds of this class of persons, clerks, and others convicted of forgery and embezzlement."Wakefield, Ev. 1453.

2 On Wellington Valley, see Busby, 1181-97. 1203-8. Rep. 135.

3 Dr. O'Halloran, a convict, kept an academy at Sydney, (Walker, 996.) Thus these persons corrupt, not only the grown, but also the growing generation.

'res

to which those persons are exposed who have the command of money, is probably removed by means of an amicable arrangent either with the subordinate officers of government, or with the master to whom the convict is assigned, for Mr. Wakefield states that, "he knows that what are called pectable convicts' under sentence of transportation, and really expecting to be transported, make the greatest exertions to have money remitted, on their account, to merchants in the colony, and for the express purpose of paying for indulgence."1 Speaking of the same class of persons, Mr. Potter Macqueen says:

"In order to keep down the expenses of the colony to as low an ebb as possible, the different governors have preferred employing men of this description as clerks in government offices, to having regularly salaried persons of free character; of course they knew that persons so placed were amenable to any punishment they might have inflicted. But the evil it has produced in the system has been, that those persons being able to live much in the same kind of manner as formerly (for they all had tickets of leave the moment they were placed in this position), they assumed a formidable rank in society; they acted together; they found the freemen and officers in different regiments would not associate with them, looking on them as convicts, and they were in a different situation from agricultural labourers; those have been the disaffected persons who have been continually at variance with the government, and who have caused very considerable impediments to the general operations of that government." Q. 1760.o

In his report too, Mr. Busby states that, "as from an unwillingness to force the upper class of convicts into an associa

On the Punishment of Death, 192.

2 We recommend the following passage in Mr. Macqueen's Evidence to the study of all persons interested in the amendment of the law of real property, either in England or the colonies. Having mentioned the frequency of concubinage in New South Wales, he proceeds to declare that "he has no hesitation in saying that, in a very few years, this country will be compelled to pass some law of indemnity to enable a transfer of property from persons of this description, who, having natural children to leave it to, can make no form of conveyance," Q. 1361. A bill of indemnity to enable persons having illegitimate children to make a conveyance by will, must certainly be considered as a rare, if not altogether unheard-of phenomenon in the annals of legislation.

tion with the lowest class by confining them in the common barrack, it has been usual to allow them to provide themselves with lodgings, their situation has in most cases been so comfortable as to be divested of almost every appearance of punishment." Report, p. 125.

The knowledge and talents of these persons enable them to accumulate wealth, after the expiration of their term, and to form a political party opposed to the government and the free settlers. From all these circumstances Mr. Busby very justly infers that "The transportation of this class of offenders, while it inflicts a great evil upon the colony, affords no means of effectually punishing their crimes during the period of their bondage and so great are the means of bettering their circumstances by enterprize and industry after its expiring, or after a prescribed period of good conduct, that the dread of incurring the sentence certainly proves, in the majority of cases, no check upon the commission of crime." Report, p. 126.

The two other classes of convicts do not create any difficulty in a colony where manual is more valuable than intellectual labour. The mechanics are usually taken by the government to be employed in public works, and are distributed in Sydney and the other towns. Most convict mechanics are at first landing induced to conceal their skill, either by a belief that if they are taken into the service of government, they will not so soon get their ticket of leave, (i. e. a pardon conditional on their good conduct,) or by a hope that they may be assigned as common labourers to a person who will share with them the profits of their mechanical skill. So great is the demand for skilled labour in New South Wales, that mechanics in the employ of government frequently neglect their regular work that they may be able to labour on their own account after the government hours, by obtaining permission to sleep out of barracks as a reward for good conduct; and the wages which they thus procure enable them again to bribe the overseers for fresh indulgences. Mr. Busby states that " he had heard of a case, of the truth of which he had no doubt, of a mechanic in the service of the government at Sydney, who contrived to work for an individual as many hours during one week as entitled him to the wages of eight days labour," by which means

(as the same person adds) the convict mechanic is able to procure a reward for his labour and the means of indulgence, to a greater extent than the most industrious mechanic in England can procure. (Rep. p. 126.)1 The other convicts, not skilled in mechanical arts, are allotted to persons living in the country; by whom they are lodged, fed and clothed, and for whom they work as slaves: being (as has been already remarked) in precisely the same situation as the gangs of slaves on the estates of an ancient Roman landlord, or a modern West Indian sugar planter: except that their treatment is milder and their condition altogether more agreeable, partly from their former position as freemen, and partly from the difficulty of inflicting punishment, and the distance of magistrates, whose sanction is necessary for this purpose.2

Now with regard to this class of convicts who form the great mass of the criminal population of New South Wales, there is a very important regulation which is not, as we believe sufficiently known in this country, even to those who are familiar with the administration of criminal law; we mean the practice of granting tickets of leave, i. e. a conditional suspension of slavery, by which a convict is permitted to work for his own profit, provided he lives within a certain prescribed district, and commits no fresh crime.3

"A convict for seven years is allowed the privilege of a ticket of leave at the end of four years' service; a convict for fourteen years, after six years: and a convict for life after eight years' service; provided that they have continued during these respective periods in the service of one master. But it is in general taken for granted, that if a change of masters has occurred, the convict has not exerted himself to give satisfaction, and the period of probation, before he can obtain a ticket of leave, is lengthened accordingly.” Busby, Report, p. 126.4

1 Mr. Walker likewise states that he has known instances in which convicts in the service of government "have been able to bribe their overseers, and get away for hours together from their work; and in fact the general manner in which they work in the town of Sydney is quite proverbial; they do very little."-Ev. 962. 2 Walker, 803.

3 See Walker, Q. 870.

4 We conclude, that if the change of masters takes place from any other reason than the misbehaviour of the convict, for instance, if the master dies, changes his

Hence it appears that the sentence of a common prisoner to transportation for life in fact amounts to no more than this: if he conducts himself with sufficient propriety to avoid the commission of fresh crime, he becomes an agricultural labourer for eight years, during which time he is guaranteed against all contingencies, and is fed, lodged and clothed by his master: and after the expiration of this term he is allowed to work on his account within a certain district, where labour commands high wages, and common industry ensures to every one a tolerable livelihood. This is the worst lot that can befal a convict who is not guilty of fresh misconduct in his place of punishment, as it is called. And by such prospects as these it is hoped to terrify into an observance of the law a population who, if they are not maintained by an allowance from the poor rates scarcely sufficient to support life, can by the hardest and most unintermitted labour only earn a bare subsistence. It is a mere mockery to call such a system as this a system of punishment. As a matter of prudence, it would be advisable to many thousand persons in Ireland and the South of England to commit a crime which would ensure them seven years' transportation to New South Wales: the expences of their voyage would be paid; even the short probationary period of four years of servitude would be a vast improvement on their former state: and then would come the reward in the shape of a ticket of leave, and free labour for the rest of their lives; besides which, government would, after a certain period, send out their families to join them, at the public cost.1 If it were not for the danger of being sent to the hulks which a criminal would incur, this would be the most advisable course of defraying the expences of emigration, which a pauper could adopt.

On the insufficiency of transportation as an engine of punishment, there seems to be but one opinion: all the witnesses examined by the committee vie with one another in condemning it; not a solitary voice is raised in its defence. As, how

occupation, becomes insolvent, leaves the country, &c. the convict is not prejudiced. Substantially, therefore, the 'condition of the ticket of leave, in other words, of the remission of the rest of the sentence, is the good conduct of the convict. 1 See Evid. Q. 1261. 1317.