The Press.
London, England, 1853-05-21 00:00:00

MAY 21, 1853.

Wales disproportionate to its numerical and
territorial greatness. In 1828 her exports
were 90,000/.: in Isl4B they were 1,800,0001.;
indicating an increase of twenty to one in as
many years. Her territory extends over
eleven degrees of latitude, and nearly eight of
longitude. Her chief city, Sydney. already
rivals in importance the much older settle-
ments of Montreal or Toronto, and may fairly
vie with any American town of only equal
antiquity. In a word, it is impossible to look
at the statistics of Australian prosperity with-
out seeing that they furnish the most com-
plete vindication of that very system which
they are sometimes cited to disparage. When
colonists declaim, in a tone of indignant
virtue, against the sending of convicts to a
country so populous, wealthy, and flourishing,
it is not unreasonable to answer, " Yes—but
" who created this wealth? Who gave you
" this prosperity of which you boast—this
" strength which you threaten to use against
" us ? The very class whose presence you treat
"as pollution, but of the aid of whose services
"your fathers were glad."
But still, it is said, material advantages are
not alone to be considered ; nor are they
worth having at the price of month degra a-
tion. Certainly not : but how stands the
case ? The police of Australia is excellent ;
by the peculiar circumstances of the country
it has been stimulated to unusual vigilance ;
crime does not lurk undetected ; the number
of convictions is a fair measure of the number
of offences committed ; yet it is as certain as
any generalisation from statistical details can
be, that the number of convictions, compared
with the population, is less in Australia than
in the British islands. With regard to the
security of life and property in that island
which has so often been spoken of as a
pandemonium of vice, Lord Grey cites the
following testimony. It is in itself conclu-
sive, and is borne out by a multitude of other
witnesses :
In the dearth of aecommodation within the rounds of the
police, I was glad, after living three weeks in the ship, to
take a lone house three miles from Launceston, on a road
not patrolled, with a navigable river in its front, and dense
bush behind it. My neighbours, at the distance of a long
half mile, are a farmer who was a convict, a smith, a shoe.
maker, awl a joiner, all of whom had been in the same
predicament; and thus with my seven dogs, null my
pistols distributed amongst my English and German
servants, I awaited my fate. My German governess, whose
father is a captain in the Franktert service, loaded a double-
barrelled gnu ; and my German butler contrived to have a
complete armament in his bedroom : he put strings to a
miserable dinner•bell, and on the least alas we went our
nightly rounds. We have a nasty ugly hill between us and
the town, where the horses must walk, and where there
is cover for highwaymen; so it was long a piestion whether
I, the master of the house, ought to be out after dark, and
whether we could safely accept dinner and dance invita-
tions in the town.
To.morrow I shall have been six months in my lone
house. I went into my pantry yesterday. and my butler's
pistols were not loaded. My German governess sent her
donble-barrel to be cleaned, and has not asked for it again.
The plate is no longer brought regularly into my bedroom.
1 leave my forty-gninea " Mortimer" doitioletifle in my study
at the other end of the house. I have a convict coachman,
a convict gardener, awl some farm labourers who were
sent nut here. My coachman and gardener live nit the
premises : we seem to have altogether ceased to feel
alarm. We are out at all hours of day or night, without.
preraution and without apprehension. I have begun this
letter in this somewhat trivial manner, because I think
that one personal ease is better than a quantity of generali-
sation. BM I may g.) on to say, that we have spent days
wed nights in other settlers' images, far more lonely and
unprotected than our ovrn,—lumse,4 built at different times,
like our old English manor-housea. fun of corners and
crevices, steps up and steps down, with fastenings to doom
and windows of most untrustw, 'Pity detieription. I have
walked through usz dense bush, and driven miles and miles
over roads where escape by means of speed loul been impos.
sible. Cheap living, a healthy climate, abundauce of pleasant
employment. a firm Government, an active police. and, I
may add, contort even in the prisons,—these. and es-
pecially the three first, guarantee safety to our lives and
property.
•

• • -
Lord Grey goes on to contend that the anti-
convict agitation is artificial—the work of a
few journalists, mob-orators, and anti-impel-id
partisans. We do not set too much value on
these excuses, the invariable resource of a
beaten party; but we readily believe that the
sincere haters of transportation are and were
a very small minority of all that motley host
whose outcry against the Colonial-office stunned
the ears of Parliament. The movement
in reality had two characters : it claimed to
defend the cause of colonial independence ;
and under that popular banner were ranged

THE PRESS.

not a few who little thought that they were in
reality fighting for the monopoly of labour in
the hands of tree emigrants. These lust. the
working hands. many of them long settled iu
the colony, and well knowing its ways, were
little disposed to accede to any measures.
however calculated to benefit the employer,
which would have the effect of reducing their
own exorbitant wages ; although the very fail
of these wages being higher than capitalists
could afford generally to pay tended to dimi-
nish the quantity of employment, and thus
ultimately to injure the very persons who
believed themselves to be benethiug thereby.
It is only for a time that one class can profit
at the expense of another. In the long run,
the interest of society in general becomes the
interest of every member of it. But not so
argued the Australian labourers. All they,
knew of the matter was, that every new influx
of emigrants, whether bond or free, tended to
lessen their gains, and destroy the virtual
supremacy over the employer which they had
hitherto possessed. Free emigration they
could not of course oppose. They or thvir
fathers hed actually been emigrants ; and the
benefit to the colony from an increase of popu-
lation was too obvious to be disputed. But in
denouncing the introduction of convicts they
were safe. The selfish purpose was effeetually
concealed under the mask of pure patriotism
and exalted morality. And it would be unjust.
to suppose that many did not really feel what,
the majority professed to believe. There is
doubtless a certain degradation attached in
public estimation to the idea of a penal settle-
ment, though experience has shown that,
reclaimed convicts do not, as a class, when
removed from temptation, and engaged in
industrial pursuits, relapse into their tOrmer
habits. Perhaps the right of England to
employ the Australian settlements for the
purpose for which they were originally founded
has been, both by Lord Grey and other colo-
nial ministers. too barely and nakedly put
forward. That there exists among our coun-
trymen at the antipodes no real unanimity of
opposition to the introduction of criminal
exiles, in moderate numbers and with due
precautions, is sufficiently shown by the vote
of the Legislative Council of New South Wales
in IR4B. But to that vote, and its subsequent
reversal by the same body, we cannot here do
more than allude in passing.
In considering the transportation question
as dealt with by Lord Grey, it is important
not to lose sight of the fact that under this
general and somewhat inaccurate designation
have been comprised punishments differing
very widely, at different periods, both in their
nature and in the severity with which they
were inflicted. When the system originated,
in 17R7, it is probable that. by a majority of
the prisoners sentenced, the actual exile—the
bamishmeut—the enforced separation from
home and friends—was felt as the most pain-
ful part of the infliction. Australia was then
a country absolutely unknown to the mass Of
Englishmen, and of which little except a rude
outline of coast was laid down in the best.
maps. Voluntary emigration beyond seas was
an experiment still untried. In the West, a.
few hardy pioneers, penetrating beyond the
French settlements of Canada, and establish-
ing themselves on the shores of Lakes Erie
and Ontario, disputed the possession of their
scattered bush-farms with those Indian tribes
which then roamed freely over the magnificent
province of Canada West. The reports which
at rare intervals reached England from these
early settlers were not such as to invite any
save professed lovers of adventure to follow in
their track. But even these reports were, to
the great body of the people, matters 14 no
interest. The example of emigration had not.
been set—the national exodus had not com-
menced. The few who quitted their homes to
reside in a colony became to those whom they
left behind as if they had ceased to be. For
them there was no communication with former
friends—scarcely even the hope of return.
And thus it came about that the mere change
of place—in our day an inducement rather
than a deterring penalty—was regarded by
the eonviets of fifty years ago as a real
and terrible punishment ; whence also it fol
lowed that, though hard work and privation
were very frequently the lot of thu toussported

68

felon, Government troubled itself little about
the amount of penance thus performed by
him, satisfied that the primary sentence WfiA
in itself sufficient both as atonement and
example, without reference to any further
suffering which he might have to endure. By
degrees, in the lapse of years, eircumstances
altered, but the law remained the same.
Though the tide of free emigration had begun to
set towards Australia—though not unfrequent
instances ()scarred in whit+ transportation
was actually sought as a Weans of hettering
the condition of the criminal—though able
writers used their pens, and orators lifted up
their voices in Parliament, to protest against
the continuance of a system of punishment
which had manifestly ceased to be effective—
still no material change took ',lave in the
system until after 18:18, when the subjeet was
for the first time investigated before a pat
liamentary eommittee. The result. of that
committee was that. in 1812. Lord Stanley
being Colonial Secretary, considerable mo-
difications ensued in the condition and
discipline of the convict. A period of penal
servitude, extending in most eases over several
years, and sureeeded by gradual and cantioua
relaxation of surveillance, gave reality to the
sentence and terror to the punishment. A
new principle was hereby recognised. It was
treknowledged that exile alone, without the
aceompaniments of severe restraint and eOni-
imisory labour, formed no fitting or adequate
retribution for erime, and the simple penalty
hitherto imposed became a complex one, in
which the new element—that of penal hervi-
tude—so far preponderated as to throw the
others into the shade. For this change, long
demanded, and rendered imperatively new's-
sar,y by circumstances, Lord Grey seems to
claim exelusive credit. But the credit or
originating it, or rather of recognising the
necessity of its adoption, belongs to the
Ministry of 18.12 anti not to that of 180. Lord
Orey herein merely followed the steps, and
carried out, though with some alterations, the
designs of his two predeeessors. The princi-
pal change for which he is really responsible
is that by which felons undergoing their bell-
tence of penal labour are retained at home
until the expiration of that part. of their ben-
tenee. The innovation was objected to—which
in England is a matter of course with all
innovations—but it hits worked well, and is
among the best of Lord Grey's reforms. It. is
only just to let him narrate it in his own
words :
But we thought that experience had shown ample
reasons for altering both the mode and pluee of linguini's
that part of the p 111 l ishment which omelets in subjecting
the ofiCsider to forced tallow.. Thu eon 111 l Ate. of the
House of Cu on transportation had, in the year
Ifs:o4, for very good merlons, illiVirled the discontinuance of
the system of assignment. Since that time, the attempt
to enforce penal labour en offenders( kept under the charge
of edieers of the tioveniment in the colonies hail failed
still more el/11104(4. Them was r.,0111 indeed to hope
that, guided by the experience gained from that failure, there
would he no dittleulty in taking preenutimis that should
prevent the reisirrenee of the et ils which had arisen in
Van Ifiemen's Lansl, at least in sis 'enameled a bolsi, but
still there were inherent diflieultice in carrying into en en-
tigin a system of penal i tsmrin a remote videny. In such
a situation the liovernntant could neither exercise a
sufficiently close superintendenee over the working of the
system, nor yet eommand with the same faeilny as at home
the services of trustwoirthy and energetic sulmardinate
officers, on whom the discipline and moves% of a penal
establishment ntsiuly depends. There copula be little doubt
that, if the large number of convicts in the venal gangs
in \'an Diemen 's Land bad been in penal establishments
at home, the abuses which grew up would have been far
sooner diseovereil and assrreeted, and that the difficulties
which anew in getting An efficient staff of officers would
not have been experieneed. Hence we considered that
much au
of the punishment of transportati as ronsists of
penal labour +de odd Ile inflicted at lease., or in compara-
tively neighbouring colonies.
It was Win, that for a bug
sentenced to transportation had been punished at home, by
confinement in the hulks with work in the deekyards, and
that the result been the reverse of satisfactory. Ifut,
on the other hand, the ever •nt (of the separate syatem at
Pentonville had been eminently successful, and there was
EVILWIIi to hope that, by inlptv,vemeuts which might Ist in.
troduced, convicts, atter going through a perillti of aepanste
impriso lit, might he employed on public works, within
reach of the constant inspection of the Government, s sil-
ent the evils which generally attend the congregation fie
wither of large lualieiv of men in such circumstances.
With these views, it was stated in Sir tit:urge tirey's
letter a,. which I have referred, that the punishment of
trllllltri it WRPi intendell Of " a
'Milted period of separate :reprisomortit, sureeeded by
employment on pothe voila, either ;direful, AS at ridindtar
ur at dint aids, or i this country; uud ulfUnstei). It'll4l"vd

In ordinary eases by exile or banishment for the remain-
ing term of the original sentence." In a subsequent part
of the letter, the advamtages offered by the Australian
voluities for the ultituate reception of couvicta, after they
had undergoue the wure strictly le•nal part of their sen-
tence, were insisted upon ; and in conclusion it was stated
that " the pinit itself must for the present be considered
as experimet►tal, and p►wer will 1w reserved to the (imm-
inent to modify it according to the results of experience.
But, if perrta►rently adopted, it will be ueces►s.try to embody
it in a bill to be submitted to Parliament."
The general conception of this plan, how-
ever, WIN I►ettrr than the detail. The colo-
nists complained, and not without reason, that
too large a measure of freedom had been
granted to felons just turned loose from gaol,
when all restrictions on their conduct were
virtually done away, save only that which con-
fined them within the limits of the colony.
Some relapsed into crime : as a general rule,
they congregated in the towns where their
labour was not required, and where association
with one another retarded, if it did not pre-
vent, their return to habits of industry ; few,
comparatively speaking, would accept situa-
tions in the bush. Much official corre-
spondence followed, not all we believe of the
most amicable kind ; and in the end a com-
promise was agreed to, by which the future
convicts, instead of going out as " exiles," or,
in other words, freemen within the limits of the
colony, received tickets of leave, whereby they
were and are retained under the supervision
of the magistrate, until exempted tlwrefrom
by lapse of time and a continued course of
good conduct. Lord ti rey proceeds to sum
up, in the following extract, the rides ac-
tually in force when he quitted the Colonial-
office :

Thaler these regulations all convicts, except those whose
bodily or mental health renders them unfit for it, are in
the first instance anbjected to a period of separate int-
risomuent, varying from six to eighteen months, accord.
nig to their sentences, to the circumstances of their
sevenil cases, and to the manner iii which they bear their
ronfinetnent ; eighteen months being apparently the
longest period for which this severe punishment Call be
safely inflicted.
After they leave the separate prisons, they are ordinarily
removed to one of the penal establishments at homy or
at I ;ihraluir or I tertntula , where they are detained and
subjected to herd labour for a time, which varies Record-
ing, to their sentence, and to the greater or less degree of
good conduit and industry they manifest. A system of
laskwork, with a daily record of the work they do and of
the manner in which they behave. has been established, by
which convicts are enabled to 'dosage considerably the
period. of their detention, by industry 141141 good cotablet,
and to piss to the next stegs'. that of ticket.of.lesive ladders
in the eolonies. They are found to look forward with in.
tense anxiety to obtaining this lston and the lave of
doing so is thus It powerful instrument for the niaint4.llllllCe
of discipline. towing those still muter coercion, whether nt
home or abroad. A few, who prove altogether untnanage.
able at home, are sent to Nortblk Island, instead of with
tickets ',cleave to mother cultmy. and some are also milli
to Van lliemeWm teapot or Western Australia without
tn•krts of leave : but these Iwo Classes fortii only a small
proportion of the. witote. settaing anv convicts to liii•
Colonies without tickets of leave Will 4 it d,pu 1tt0'(110111 0111'
original OW it was 1;01111t1 ner,•s•,ll to Wild 1111.1. W
in
this 111111111er, til order to keep up the estalolislunents re.
twirls! in the colonies flit the weevil tttt and punishment of
men wltosr tiekets of leave might Ity witlelnts it hit. 110,-
84,10 ml ; and it also appeared that a valuable tublitiim
might thins br male to the means of matt• • g discipline
among the large ladies of eonvicts at }suite.
It, the colottit,s, those to whom t Whet sof Inv
granted ore not allowed to leave the eitstod •11 the Goi et H-
ewitt until they have made an agreement with some settler
to !wive him tot not less than a year ; the employets being
relamsible our pating to the thivernment a certain stun
annually from their wages. The ticket-of-leave holders
we not considered eligible for eotalitiottial pardons mail
they have paid a certain sum in this manner, and have be-
tuned well for a f varying aceording to the length of
their sentence. Thins a nuns transtawted tin• seven yearn
most Iwhave well, as tiekt.t-of-lo.me lathier, forgot less than
a year and a half, in which his uagps, at
the vote of 51 a 1111% or i 1.10,. in all. mot be paid to the
I iorcrlllat.lll. 1111111 tea llspOlielt for twenty ears. or for
lit.', i utiLtil4o turn ronditiun.,l pnudonuntil Ili. hull
10411:Weil well !Or tiVe and hits paid •251. to the t loverti-
went. this regulatitat. together with those by which a
primmer eon abridge the iwrital passed by him in the pre-
limittat y stages of his punishment. by industry and guts!
eotaltiel• he may 'dean' a conditional pardon when Ile has
Completed about halt' the term of his sentence. a sentence
for life !wing reck.atell for this pitilsise equivalent to one
for twenty )ears. The holders of tickets of leave are re-
quired to resident vertaiit districts, mid.ol4 a gruel,d rule, at
U distance from the towns and more settled portions of the
colonies.

Space is Ivonting to allow us to follow Lord
Grey through his interesting detail Of the
practical difficulties encountered in establish-
ing the system here described. These were
necessarily considerable : first., on account of
the crowded state of 'Van Diemen's Land,

THE PRESS..

where alone, between 1E441 and 1E4444, felons
could be received ; next, from the fluctuations
of public opinion in the various colonies
affected ; and, lastly, in consequence of some
errors of judgment," us Lord. Grey frankly
admits them to have been, which led to
plausible, but, in our judgment, utterly
groundless, imputations of intentional bad
fiiith. The very faults of Lord Grey's charac-
ter are such as ought to exempt him from the
suspicion of duplicity. It is the pliant, easy-
going, popular politician—the man anxious to
stand well with all sides, not the austere,
imperious, and inflexible statesman, almost
morbidly jealous of his honour, and cherishing
consistency with a pride rare in these days—
who pledges his word without the intention Of
redeeming it. But on these personal topics
we will not dwell. It is worth notice, as
being creditable to the Conservative Opposi
tion, no less than to the Whig minister, that
although the reforms proposed by the latter
naturally led to much parliamentiny discus-
sion, and required a good deal of explanation
to make them generally understood, they were
not, on any occasion, selected as a battlefield
of party, nor was an attempt made in any
quarter (save once or twice by members of the
present Government) to represent them, as
might easily have been done, in the light of
hazardous experiments, by which more would
be risked than gained. All Lord Grey's diffi-
culties, as he himself acknowledges, arose in
Australia and not in England. But even in
Australia a part, and not All unimportant pant,
of the population are at this hour fitvouruble
to a continuance of the thinsportatien system.
While the Anti-convict Longue carried all before
it in Van Diemen 's Land and the southern
districts of New South Wales, meetings were
being held, and petitions numerously signed,
among the colonists of Moreton Bay, praying
for the introduction of fresh convicts to supply
the pressing deficiency of free labour. That
the jealousy of the New South Wales la-
bourers will even so fitr relax as to allow of
their petition being granted we do not antici-
pate ; but Lord Grey points out an easy
remedy in the separation of Moreton Bay
front the colony within whose territorial limits
it is at present included, but with which, in
respect of material interests, it has nothing in
eommon. This course would appear to have
been neither definitively approved nor rejected
by the Colonial-office at the time of the Whig
!resignation
lie :
SO matters rested when we left °thee, and I neither
know wlua mar have lwen knee alone by our successors,
nor what further would hare been deadest upon lay your
Cabinet, had it. Mill remained in existence, when the
11104Wers to the despatchesWidish hail been Written Were
received. Itnt 1 inlay he relliiittisi tea express my own
opinion, that if it had then appeared that the admission of
eonviets tr the district of Moreton Bay wits as decidedly
called for by the wishes of the inhabitants as there was
reason to believe, while owing to the olgoositiun of Sydney
it remit! only Ire aceomplisheal by a division of the motility. it
would have lawn right to adopt that measure. At the, same
time, I think it was tea Ile desired that this divishoi should
be deferred, and that the Legislature of New Sleuth Wales
should he induced to consent to the opening of the squat-
ting districts for the reception of conriets. Could the
Ley.,fislative C ttttt have fawn induced to do so. it would
have been easy, without dividing New South Wales for
other purposes, tea have framed an order in council pro-
riding for the introdueti tttt convicts into the colony. but
only into a part of it strictly defined. and limited so as to
exclude the towns and more settled distticts.
It. is, I know, considered that the discovery of gold is an
obstacle tea such a measure. 9 and that it is allSOrd ter
nom ley sending him tea a country where gold is to lw ob-
tained. Those who make this objection seem to forget
that at man sentenced to transportation cannot. hope tea lw
relieved from constraint, so as tel be able to join in the
exciting seareh for gold. until he lass completed at least
half the tent, of his sentence. It is surely an nlasurdity
to suppose that any 1111111 will, from the desire of ultimately
making his way to the diggings. deliberately expose himself
tea several mouths of the stern discipline of Pentonville,
fe allowed lay a year or two. and perhaps much more, of severe
labour at Pentland, in order to be sent to Australia, where
on his arrival he will la' resmired to work hard far from the
gold legions, without. receiving all his earnings fora far-
ther period, which may extend to tire years or even fluor'.
Those who wish to reach the mines may do a.) far more
easily than by the road of transportation, nor do 1 believe
that the dread lit ihr lthiSllllleld will lw iu the slightest
degree diminished by its being known that. atter a la riot
of severe endurance. at the end or a tilaa, in taut cease less
OHO *IMP years and a hulf, and which in general will be
far more. (salvias wise II;Ive passed through this adOettl
will
tied themselves within SilMe‘"ll4.o easier WWII tat' the gold-
fields than they were. before they committed the crimes for
which they hare suffered. Criminals. of all aim are those
who lewd ienk forward to advantages sea distant, and to be
purchased by so mach previous privation and aintoiug;

SATURDAY,

the immediate gratification of their passions is the ruling
motive of their lives. But, while the diseovery of gold
affbrds no valid objection to the removal of criminals to
Australia. it. has greatly increased the want which is felt
there. of the only class of labourers whose services can be
calculated on, in order to carry on other and not less im-
portant occupations than the search for gold, which draws
away by its seductions so many of those who are free to
join in the pursuit.
This is a clear and concise vindication of the
transportation system ; and as such we insert
it, only qualifying our assent to its reasonings
with two remarks. First—that Lord Grey, in
his argument against the probability of any
one getting himself transported on purpose,
assumes, on behalf of the criminal classes, a
more accurate acquaintance with the real
nature of the penalty than such classes are
likely to possess; and, secondly—it is probable
that as wages rise, and employers tind greater
trouble in suiting themselves with servants,
the liberated criminal may succeed in over-
coming the prejudice which at present renders
it impossible for him to live honestly in Eng-
land. But, as things now are, we cannot
forget that, but for the system of penal exile
now so loudly condemned, we should have
had in this country, residing among us, not
less than 48,000 ex-convicts, the great majority
of whom must have subsisted at the expense
of society. Nor would Australasia have been
a gainer ; for it is notoriously owing to the
abundance of compulsory labour that Van
Diemen's Land continued to gather in its crops,
and carry on its ordinary pursuits, while the
rush to the diggings left lands elsewhere
uncultivated and harvests unreaped. In a
postscript dated Feb. 22, 1853, Lord Grey
deprecates strongly (as he has since done in
the House of Lords) a total discontinuance of
penal exile. The intention of Sir John Poking-
ton to send no more convicts to Van Diemen's
Land did not, he states, surprise him. If the
interests of the colony were thereby injured,
the colonists, who demanded the change, were
abate to Maine. Means might have been found
to dispose of the convicts elsewhere ; and if,
as intended by Sir John, due time were taken
to complete the new arrangements before those
formerly in force were discontinued, little or
no 11111.111 would have resulted :
nut we are now told that the removal of convicts to Van
Inemen's Land is to mow et once, and that it is not to be
continued for more than a short time to any of the Anstre-
Ilan colonies. This involves an entire change in the
present system of secondary punishment and lam al-
together at a loss to understand how the new arrangements
which will in coestsmence he necessary can be matured
with due care and deliberation, and how they can be sub-
mitted to the judgement of Parliament in the very short
time that will be allowed for the purpose. What is 10 be-
come of the large number of convicts now undergoing
their preliminary punishment, and to whom an express
promise has been made that by good conduct they would
Ottani tickets of leave in the colonies at sit early period ?
There cannot lii less, 1 apprehend, than front two to three
hundred men monthly becoming entitled to this boon for
the next two or three years. and it will lie a difficult owes.
tion to determine what is to be done with them. Faith
cannot. of course, be broken with these men by dent' • g
them at Portland, or any other of our penal establishments,
Iwyend the time at which they have tt right, under the
regulations printed for their information, to look for
their release from the forced labour there Untamed upon
them. lint, if the Australian colonies are to be chased
against them, I am not aware of any other place to which
they elm he sent : and I am quite certain there is no part
of the British dominions in which it is possible to make
arrangements for receiving them with tickets of leave in
the time within which some mode of disposing of them
must be discovered. To send them abroad as exiles would
prebably be equally diMirnit, and would be merely rerun
ring to our original phut, which was given up became it
WAN folllld mot to answer.
Ate they then, as a substitute for the tickets of lea; e
they have been pramiaed in the colonies, to lie allowed
their discharge in this country ? and is the ultimate re-
moval from their native country of criminals assitenced
to
tnutsportation to cease in future to be an essential part of
their punishment" If this is what is intended, I ant cont.
pelted to express my opinion, that so momentotts a change
in what has been our policy for near two hnndred yeant
ought not to have been decided upon without the previous
concurrence of Parliament. So fur AS has yet been ex-
pressed, the judgment of Parliament has been decidedly
adverse to doing away with the punishment of transporta-
tion. I have mentioned in my eighth letter the opinion
expressed in 1547 by the committee of the House of
Lords, atter examining the judges and many }tenants of
gnat experience in the adiniuistration of our criminal
I have also mentioned that. in 1/.411.mi address to the Crown
was voted by the House el Continues against the Omens
meat of that day. ob,iceting to the detention in this coun-
try of convicts senteneed to transportation. None of the
motions made dining your own athuinistration, fur obtain-
ing a contrary- opinion from the same house, obtained any
considerable support. Looking flusher back, even the
committee which. in 1838, condemned the former system
of transportation, did not fail to recognise the advantage,