# An account of a voyage to establish a colony at Port Philip in Bass's Strait on the south coast of New South Wales, in His Majesty's Ship Calcutta, in the years 1802-3-4/Addendum 5

N$^o$ V.
UPON the proper selection of convicts to be transported to a new colony, its improvement must almost totally depend. The advice of Lord Bacon upon this subject is worthy of attention. "The people wherewith you plant," says his Lordship, in his essay "on Plantations," ought to be gardeners, ploughmen, labourers, smiths, carpenters, joiners, fishermen, fowlers, with some few apothecaries, surgeons, cooks, and bakers." How little such a selection is attended to in the transportation of convicts to New South Wales, was sufficiently ​exemplified on board the Calcutta, where, out of three hundred and seven convicts, there were but eight carpenters and joiners, three smiths,one gardener, twenty labouring farmers, two fishermen, nine taylors, and four stone-masons. The remainder may be classed under the heads of gentlemen's servants, hair-dressers, hackney-coachmen, chairmen, silk- weavers, calico-printers, watch-makers, lapidaries, merchant's clerks, and gentlemen. It requires no argument to demonstrate the little use such trades are in an infant colony, where agriculture is the chief pursuit, and where manual labour is infinitely more necessary than ingenuity. It is true a watch-maker deals in metals as well as the smith, but we doubt whether, with all his exertions, he could make a hundred nails in a day. With respect to gentlemen convicts, they are worse than useless, for they are invariably troublesome, as the present government of New South Wales can sufficiently attest. The education and the manners of such people ​will, in most instances, prevent their being employed in manual labour; they will always find advocates in the feelings of those who hold the rank which they once held, and this will prevent their being confounded with the common herd of convicted felons: but, although by their crimes they have lost the reality of their original rank, the shadow of it remains, together with a portion of the feelings which constituted their former character; hence they contemplate their degradation with impatience bordering on phrenzy; they are guilty of indiscretions (particularly in language) which must create continual disturbance to an administration, where coercion is the only engine of government, and where consequently jealousy is continually on the. watch to anticipate insurrection.
The method of selecting the convicts sent out in the Calcutta might certainly be improved, A ​list of four hundred convicts was sent to the surgeon of that ship, from which he was to choose three hundred. In this selection, he, of course, regarded merely health and age, for he was to receive 10l. for every convict landed in health in New South Wales. Of their characters he could have no knowledge, and he had no instructions respecting peculiar trades, in preference to others.
The dreadful mortality which has, in several instances, taken place among the convicts on board transports going to New South Wales, must proceed chiefly from a want of attention to cleanliness, both in the persons of the convicts and the ship herself; for, in every instance where proper precautions were taken, no such mortality has taken place. The convicts, in general, being equally indolent and careless, as well as unused to a ship, will in many instances be found so ​negligent of themselves, that severity is some. times necessary to prevent their becoming the most disgusting objects from vermin and dirt In passing through the warm latitudes in particular, the most rigid attention to cleanliness can alone prevent disease; the following precautions, if strictly followed, will, as far as it is in the power of man, prevent the admission of sickness, or effectually check its progress, in the most crowded ship. When the prison is on the orlop deck, where the air has but a scanty admission, it should never be wetted, the dirt should be scraped off every morning, and the deck afterwards scrubbed with bibles and dry sand. Every part of the prison should be clean, so that no receptacle for bones or other filth could be found; and should it be necessary to stow any ​articles whatever in the prison, the space they occupy ought to be bulkheaded round. Particular care is requisite that no wet cloaths are hung up or left about the prison.
Every convict should be supplied with a hammock, a very thin mattress, and one blanket; care must be taken that every man hangs his hammock up in his proper birth, else laziness will induce the greater number to spread it on the deck even in the wet; in dry weather the beds should be aired as often as possible, (if every day the better,) and the hammock scrubbed once a month.
If the ship touches at Teneriffe or Madeira, or if not, after she has passed those islands, the ​beds, blankets, jackets, stockings, shoes, and every kind of woollen clothing, should be taken from the convicts, else, from the total want of fore-thought, the greater part of them will be lost, before they again feel the want of them in the high southern latitudes. The flocks in the beds should be taken out, and, after being exposed to the sun, remade; all the woollen-clothing well-washed (if the ship touches at the islands, in fresh water, if not, in salt), and afterwards dipped in lime-water, and dried without wringing. The fumigations, by means of devils composed of wetted gun-powder, are perhaps often carried to too great an excess, and, in fact, this kind of fumigation is liable to many and great objections, particularly in cold or wet weather, when it is most commonly practised; the cold air, rushing into the fumigated apartments when opened, immediately condenses the vapour that remains, and leaves a degree of dampness that must be unwholesome. ​In wet weather it, is impossible to let a sufficient quantity of air into the apartment after fumigation, without, at the same time, admitting a proportionate quantity of moisture, hence the people often return to it before the vapour is evaporated, and inhale a considerable quantity, which must affect the lungs. In all weathers, fires of sea-coal (for charcoal is liable to the same objections as fumigations with gun-powder) will be found infinitely more effectual in clearing the prisons of foul air, than any kind of fumigation. As to fumigation by acids, it is usually performed on so small a scale, that I cannot conceive it productive of any advantages, if any such are inherent in it.
In passing through the warm latitudes, I would strongly recommend, that the convicts be obliged to bathe, at least, twice a week. This might be so regulated as to give but little trouble, a certain proportion bathing every day, and if ​performed under the superintendence of a medical man, no danger could arise from it. In short, it will be found, that wholesome diet, sufficient exercise, and proper attention to cleanliness, are the most effectual preventives of disease on long voyages. The first, the Government of England supplies with a liberality peculiar to itself; but the two latter must be left to the care of the person to whom the charge of so many of his fellow-creatures is entrusted.
THE END.
* ↑ These are blocks of wood a foot long, and six inches deep and wide.
* ↑ This was done on board the Glatton and Calcutta, but on board hired transports fixed bed-places are usually erected for the convicts, from which it is probable their bed-things are never removed while they are on board.