Statistical, Historical and Political Description of the Colony of New South Wales and its Dependent Settlements in Van Diemen's Land by William Charles Wentworth

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The progress made by these settlements in manufactures, is too
inconsiderable to deserve notice, further than as it affords a
striking proof in how much more flourishing and prosperous a
condition they are than the parent colony.

The commerce carried on by the colonists is of the same nature
as that which is maintained by their brethren at Port Jackson.
Like these, they have no staple export to offer in exchange for
the various commodities which they import from foreign countries,
and are obliged principally to rely on the expenditure of the
government for the means of procuring them. Their annual income
may be taken as follows:

Money expended by the government for the pay and subsistence
of the civil and military, and for the support of such of
the convicts as are victualled from the king's stores, L30,000
Money expended by foreign shipping, 3,000
Wheat, etc. exported to Port Jackson, 4,000
Exports collected by the merchants of the settlement, 5,000
Sundries, 2,000
------
Total, L44,000
------

The duties collected in these southern settlements, are
exactly on the same scale as at Port Jackson, and amount to about
L5,000 annually, inclusive of the per centage allowed the
collectors of them.

A general Statement of the Land in Cultivation, etc. the
Quantities of Stock, etc. as accounted for at the General
Muster in New South Wales, taken by His Excellency Governor
Macquarie, and Deputy Commissary General Allan, commencing the
6th October, and finally closing the 25th November, 1817,
inclusive; with an exact Account of the same at Van Diemen's
Land.

Acres in Wheat 18,462
Ground prepared for Maize 11,714
Barley 8561/2
Oats 1563/4
Pease and Beans 2041/4
Potatoes 559
Garden and Orchard 863
Cleared ground 47,5641/4
Total held 235,0031/4

Horses 3,072
Horned cattle 44,753
Sheep 170,920
Hogs 17,842
Bushels of Wheat 24,05 [sic]
Bushels of Maize 1,506

N. B. Total Number of Inhabitants in the Colony, including Van
Diemen's Land, 20,379.

PART II.

OPERATION OF THE EXISTING SYSTEM OF GOVERNMENT IN THE COLONY
FOR THE LAST FIFTEEN YEARS.

It is generally considered a matter of astonishment that the
colony of New South Wales, situated as it is, in a climate equal
to that of the finest parts of France, of Spain, and of Italy,
and possessing a soil of unbounded fertility, should have made so
little progress towards prosperity and independence. The causes,
however, which have contributed to its retardment, are the same,
as have been attended with similar effects in all ages. Not only
the records of the years that are no more, but the experience
also of the present day, concur in proving that the prosperity of
nations is not so much the result of the fertility of their soil,
and the benignity of their climate, as of the wisdom and policy
of their institutions. Decadence, poverty, wretchedness, and
vice, have been the invariable attendants of bad governments; as
prosperity, wealth, happiness, and virtue, have been of good
ones. Rome, once the glory of the world; now a bye-word among the
nations: once the seat of civilization, of affluence, and of
power; now the abode of superstition, poverty, and weakness, is a
lasting monument of the truth of this assertion. Her greatness
was founded on freedom, and rose with her consulate; her
decadence may be said to have commenced with her first emperor,
and was completed under his vicious and despotic dynasty: her
climate and soil still remain; but the freedom which raised her
to the empire of the world has passed away with her
institutions.

If we search still further back into antiquity, we shall find
that all the great nations which have at various times
preponderated over their neighbours, attained their utmost force
and vigour, during the period of their greatest freedom and
virtue; and that their decadence and ultimate annihilation were
the work of a succession of vicious and tyrannical rulers. The
empires of Persia and of Greece, were successively established by
the superior freedom and virtue of their citizens; and it was
only when the institutions, which were the source of this freedom
and virtue, were no longer reverenced and enforced, that each in
its turn became the prey of a freer and more virtuous people.

The experience of modern times is still more conclusive on
this subject; because no part of the chain of events which have
contributed to the aggrandisement or impair of existing nations,
lies hid in the mist of ages. If we regard the unprecedented
wealth and power of our own country, we shall be convinced that
her present pre-eminent position is not so much the effect of her
soil and climate, since in these respects she is confessedly
behind many of the nations of Europe, as of the superior freedom
of her laws, which have engendered her a freer, more virtuous,
and more warlike race of people. It is to her superior polity
alone that she is indebted for a dominion, unparalleled in the
history of the world; and it is to its rigid maintenance and
enforcement that she must look for its durability.

While England has been thus assiduously attentive to her own
immediate internal prosperity, she has not in general been
neglectful of those external possessions, which she has gradually
acquired by colonization, by conquest, or by cession. On the most
distant branches of her empire, she has engrafted, as far as
circumstances would in general admit, those institutions which
have been the main cause of her own internal happiness and
prosperity. In the West Indies, in Canada, and lately in the
Ionian Islands, she has introduced the elective franchise, and
established that mixed counterpoising form of government, whose
three component parts, though essentially different in their
natures, so admirably coalesce and form one combined harmonious
whole. It has, in fact, been one of the leading maxims of her
political conduct, and undoubtedly one of the chief causes of her
present greatness, to attach the people who have been embodied
into her empire, or who have emigrated from her shores only to
colonise new countries, and thus to extend her limits and
increase her resources, by an equality of rights and privileges
with her subjects at home. The navigation act, indeed, militates
in some degree, against the liberal view here taken of her
colonial policy; but the existence of this single act, which,
however its wisdom may be at present canvassed, there can be no
doubt has proved the basis of her commercial and maritime
ascendancy, will not invalidate the claim to liberality, of which
her colonial system is in other respects deserving. The conduct
of her government has undoubtedly been in most instances liberal
and enlightened; and if they have occasionally deviated from
their ordinary enlarged policy of establishing the representative
system, and leaving to the colonies, themselves, the liberty of
framing laws adapted to their several circumstances and wants, it
has been principally in those cases where the ancient inveterate
habits of the people, their difference of religion, and inferior
civilization, have rendered such deviations unavoidable. India
furnishes the principal example of such exception to her general
policy; yet, even in her remote possessions in that country, the
sixty millions who are subject to her sway, enjoy a security of
person and property unknown to them while under the government of
their native princes. It is on this amelioration in their
condition, and not on the strength and number of her armies, that
her dominion in that part of the world is founded; and after all,
what government is so stable as that which is bottomed on
opinion, and depends for its existence on general utility, and
the consent of the governed? Dominion may, indeed, be acquired,
and continued by force and terror; but if it have no other props
to support it, it is at best but precarious, and must, sooner or
later, fall, either by the resistance of those whom it would hold
in subjection, or by undermining their moral and physical
energies, and thus rendering them unfit even for the vile
purposes of despotism itself.

The colony of New South Wales, is, I believe, the only one of
our possessions exclusively inhabited by Englishmen, in which
there is not at least the shadow of a free government, as it
possesses neither a council, a house of assembly, nor even the
privilege of trial by jury. And although it must be confessed
that the strange ingredients of which this colony was formed, did
not, at the epoch of its foundation, warrant a participation of
these important privileges, it will be my endeavour in this essay
to prove that the withholding of them up to the present period,
has been the sole cause why it has not realized the expectations
which its founders were led to form of its capabilities.

It is not difficult to conceive that the same causes, which in
the lapse of centuries have sufficed to undermine and eventually
ingulph vast empires, should be able to impede the progress of
smaller communities, whether they be kingdoms, states, or
colonies. Arbitrary governments, indeed, are so generally
admitted to impair the moral and physical energies of a people,
that it would be superfluous to enter into an elaborate
disquisition, in order to demonstrate the truth of a position,
which has been confirmed by the experience of ages. Whoever is
convinced that he has no rights, no possessions that are sacred
and inviolable, is a slave, and devoid of that noble feeling of
independence which is essential to the dignity of his nature, and
the due discharge of his functions. This noble assurance that he
is in the path of duty and security, so long as he refrain from
the violation of those laws which may have been framed for the
good of the community of which he is a member, is the main spring
of all industry and improvement. But this dignified feeling
cannot exist in any society which is subject to the arbitrary
will of an individual; and although the governor of this colony
does not exactly possess the unlimited authority of an eastern
despot, since he may be ultimately made accountable to his
sovereign and the laws, for the abuse of the power delegated to
him, I may be allowed to ask, should he invade the property, and
violate the personal liberty of those whom he ought to govern
with justice and impartiality, where are the oppressed to seek
for retribution? Is it in this country, situated at sixteen
thousand miles from the seat of his injustice and oppression? To
tell a poor man that he may obtain redress in the court of King's
Bench, what is it but a cruel mockery, calculated to render the
pang more poignant, which it would pretend to alleviate?

I am not here amusing myself with the supposition of
contingencies that may never occur. I am alluding to outrages
that have been actually perpetrated, and of which the bare
recital would fill the minds of a British jury with the liveliest
sentiments of compassion and sympathy for the oppressed, and of
horror and indignation against the oppressor. Leaseholds
cancelled, houses demolished without the smallest compensation,
on the plea of public utility, but in reality from motives of
private hatred and revenge; freemen imprisoned on arbitrary
warrants issued without reference to the magistracy, and even
publicly flogged in the same illegal and oppressive manner: such
were the events that crowded the government of a wretch, whom it
would be as superfluous to name, as it is needless to hold him up
to the execration of posterity* If such an immortality were, as
it appears to have been, the object of his pursuit, he has
completely attained it. Almost at his very offset in life, he
acquired a notoriety which has increased through all the
subsequent sinuosities of his career. Not content with pushing
the discipline of the service to which he belonged, in itself
sufficiently severe, to its extreme verge, by an excess of
vexatious brutality, he goaded into mutiny a crew of noble-minded
fellows, the greater part of whom it has been since discovered,
pined away their existence on a desolate island, lost to their
country and themselves, the sad victims of an unavailing remorse.
Yet there is one of them still living, who has since fully
evinced his devotedness for his country's glory, and has been
deservedly raised to that elevated rank in her service, which but
for him many more might have lived to attain. Despised by his
equals in his profession, and detested by his inferiors, he was
contradistinguished from other worthy officers of the same name,
by prefixing to his _that_ of the vessel which was the scene
of this act of insubordination, in the event the grave of many a
noble spirit, that might otherwise have proved an honour to
themselves and a credit to their country. The brutal tyranny that
characterised his conduct on this occasion, would have alone
sufficed to brand him with the imputation of "coward," had it
been even unconnected with the many subsequent acts of oppression
which have stamped his career, and of which it is to be hoped for
the prevention of future monsters, that the infamy will long
survive the records. The 26th of January, 1808, the memorable day
when, by the spontaneous impulse of a united colony, he was
arrested; and fortunate for the cause of humanity is it that he
was then arrested, for ever** in the perpetration of the most
atrocious outrages that ever disgraced the representative of a
free government, has substantiated his claim to this character
beyond the possibility of doubt. Dreading the resentment of the
people whom he had so often and so wantonly oppressed, and having
on his back that uniform which was never so dishonoured before,
he skulked under a servant's bed in an obscure chamber of his
house, but was at length discovered in this disgraceful hole, and
conducted pale, trembling, and covered with flue,*** before the
officer who had commanded his arrest; nor could this gentleman's
repeated assurances that no violence should be offered his
person, convince him for a considerable time that his life was in
safety from the vengeance of the populace: so conscious was he of
the enormity of his conduct, and of the justice of an immediate
and exemplary retaliation.

[* The following anecdote, for the authenticity of
which I pledge myself, will afford a better illustration of this
monster's character, than whole pages of general declamation and
invective. At the period of his government cattle were very
scarce in the colony, and the stockholders were very tenacious of
allowing their cows to be milked, from the injury which it did
the calves. Milk was in consequence a great rarity; but as the
governor, naturally enough, did not choose to forego any of the
good things of this life, particularly whenever it was in his
option to obtain them without any expence, he had always a number
of cattle from the government herds, to furnish a supply of it
for his household. The surplus he generously distributed among
his favourites. One of these was a gentleman belonging to the
medical staff, who used in common with all those permitted the
same indulgence, to send his servant daily for his share of this
precious fluid. This unfortunate wight happened to go one morning
a little too late; and whether the person charged with the
distribution of this milk had been a little too liberal in his
donations to such of the gentlemen's servants as had attended in
due time, or whether the cows did not give their usual quantity
that morning, there was not a drop left for him on his arrival.
Not reflecting that this disappointment was occasioned by his own
negligence, he ventured to make some remarks, such as "he did not
know why his master should not have his share as well as another
gentleman, etc. etc." which proved so highly disagreeable to the
feelings of the great man who administered this highly important
office, that he immediately went and complained to the still
greater man who had invested him with it. This august personage
not only feelingly participated in the insult which had been
offered his faithful domestic, but also vowed that he should have
the most ample satisfaction. He accordingly ordered the
complainant to send the offending party into his presence on the
following morning; strictly enjoining him before hand, to take
especial care that he should remain ignorant of the chastisement
which was in petto for him. The next morning when the poor fellow
came as usual for his master's quota of milk, he was told by the
great man whom he had the day before unwittingly offended, that
the governor desired to speak to him. Wondering that so
distinguished a personage should even know that so humble a being
as himself was in existence, and at a loss to conjecture what
could be his gracious will and pleasure, he was ushered trembling
into his dread presence. In an instant his alarms were quieted.
The governor told him with a condescending smile, that as the
chief constable's house was in his way home, he had merely sent
for him to be the bearer of a letter to that person, from a
desire to spare his dragoon the trouble of carrying it. The poor
fellow, of course, delivered the letter with all haste, little
imagining what were its contents. When the chief constable
perused it, he ordered out the triangles; the poor wretch was
instantly tied up to them, and in a stupor of surprise and
consternation underwent the punishment, (whether twenty-five or
fifty lashes I am not sure) which was ordered to be given him,
without any explanation till after its infliction, of the reasons
why he received it. Was not this a refinement of cruelty worthy
the most atrocious monster of antiquity?]

[** When I wrote this part of the present work the
person to whom it has reference was living; and the only
alteration which I have made in it since his death, has been the
necessary changes in the tenses of the verbs. My assertions have
been scrupulously regulated by truth; but I am still aware that
they might have been pronounced libellous in a court of justice;
and I have been advised by some of my friends to cancel them, on
the ground that the recollection of injuries should not be
prolonged beyond the grave. The applicability, however, of this
principle to private resentments is not more evident, than its
inapplicability to public. The tomb which ought to be the goal of
the one, is the starting-post of the other. It is the legitimate
province, nay, more, one of the most sacred duties of the
annalist to speak of public characters after their deaths, with
that severity of reprobation or of praise, to which their conduct
in public life may have entitled them. Have not all impartial
biographers and historians acted on this principle? And shall I
be deterred from following so just and salutary an example? If
when death has set his seal upon a man's actions, and when the
evil which he has committed is irremediable, the voice of censure
is still to be silent, when, I may ask, ought it to be heard? Had
such an ill-judged forbearance been practised by historians,
would the world have known that any tyrants, except those who may
exist at the present epoch, or who may have existed within the
reach of memory or of tradition, ever infested the earth? Would
not the enormities of the Dionysii, of Caligula, and of Nero,
have been long since forgotten? And would not many of those
princes who have merited and obtained the appellations of
"great," of "good," and of "just," have become as atrocious
monsters as _these_ were, but from the dread of being held
up as objects of similar execration to posterity? The tyrant,
indeed, whose conduct I would stamp with merited detestation,
moved, fortunately for the interests of mankind, in a humbler
sphere, and therefore, his atrocities have a greater tendency to
sink into premature oblivion. But is it a less sacred duty to
take all such steps as may be calculated to deter his successors
from treading in his footsteps; because they will only have
_thousands_ to trample upon instead of _millions_?
Ought not oppression in every community, whether great or small,
to be discouraged by every possible means? And what means are so
likely to effect this end, and to prevent these secondary tyrants
from sneaking out of the pages of record and recollection, as to
project their memories red-hot from the sun of public
indignation, with a long fiery train of inextinguishable
ignominy, which may serve to point out their tracks; and to
render them for ever glaring objects of dread and execration, not
only to the planet of which they may have proved the bane, but to
the whole system encircled by their orbits? In persevering,
therefore, in the remarks which I made on this man's actions when
he was living, it is my conscientious belief that I have only
acquitted myself of an imperative duty; and that I should have
been guilty of a gross dereliction of it, had I done otherwise.
On this conviction, unalloyed by any baser impulse, I rest the
defence of my conduct; should there be any of my readers, who may
be inclined to view it in the same unjustifiable light as it is
regarded by some few of my friends.]

[*** See Lieutenant-Colonel Johnstone's
court-martial.]

The instance of this man's conduct, is, I am willing to allow,
an aggravated one, and such as it is to be hoped for the honour
of our species would be rarely repeated. That it has occurred is,
however, sufficient to demonstrate the impropriety of confiding
unlimited power to any individual in future. The mere possession,
indeed, of such vast authority, is calculated to vitiate the
heart, and to engender tyranny; nor are examples wanting in
history of persons, who though models of virtue and moderation in
private stations, yet became the most bloody and atrocious
tyrants on their elevation to supreme power. So great, indeed, is
the fallibility of human nature, that the very best of us are apt
to deviate from that just mean, in the adherence to which
consists virtue. All governments, therefore, should provide
against this capital defect; they should be so constituted as not
only to have in view what should happen, but also what might;
possibilities should be contemplated as well as probabilities.
The power to do good should if possible be unlimited: the ability
to do evil, followed with the highest responsibility, and
restrained by a moral certainty of punishment. An authority such
as the governor of this colony possesses, might be tolerated
under a despotic government; but it is a disgrace to one that
piques itself on its freedom. What plea can be urged for
encouraging excesses in our possessions abroad, that would be
visited with condign punishment in our courts at home? Are those
who quit the habitations of their fathers, to extend the limits
and resources of the empire, deserving of no better recompence
than a total suspension of the rights and liberties which their
ancestors have bequeathed them? Are they on their arrival in
these remote shores, to meet with no one of the institutions,
which they have been taught to cherish and to reverence? If the
want, indeed, of these institutions, of which so many centuries
have attested the wisdom, had as yet been productive of no evil,
there might be some excuse offered for the withholding of them;
but after such a scandalous abuse of authority, the colonists
expected, and had a right to expect, that no subsequent governor
would have been appointed without the intervention of some
controlling power, which, while it should tend to strengthen the
execntive in the due discharge of its functions, might at the
same time protect the subject in the legitimate exercise and
enjoyment of his private and personal rights. Never was there a
period since the foundation of the colony, when the impolicy of
its present form of government was so strikingly manifest; and
never, perhaps, will there be an occasion, when the establishment
of a house of assembly, and of trial by jury, would have been
hailed with such enthusiastic joy and gratitude: and accordingly
the disappointment of the colonists was extreme, when on the
arrival of Governor Macquarie, it was found that the same unwise
and unconstitutional power, which had been the cause of the late
confusion and anarchy was continued in all its pristine vigor;
and that he was uncontrolled even by the creation of a
council.

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