The Express.
London, England, 1863-05-29 00:00:00

MISS anrs EMIGRANTS.

Miss Rye has addressed a very intersecting letter
to the Times, dated "Dunedin, Otago, March 16," giving
some ides of the country in which her young charges have
settled, the condition in which they found the immigration
barracks on landinmgg and the difficult:imp surrounding female
emigration generally. With the exception of about three
or four serves* who were expected to be placed in a few
days, all the girls and governesses have found suitable
employment, the latter at salukis of front 601. to 401.,
the former at wages of from 401. to 201. per annum.
Miss Rye complains bitterly of the total want of order
which accompanies the embarkation of WOUND at the dock;
and of the facilities for intoxication on baud the ship.
She believes that the tales told of immoralities on board
emigrant ships are too true. In their cue it seemed the
matron proved unsuited for her situation, and we are led to
infer, though this is not explicitly stated, that the
voyage of the emigrants was not without regrettable
incident& Some arrangement, she says, ought to
be made to prevent a mixed emigration of single
young men and women in vessels carrying brandies and
wine*. " Happily, we were favoured with • particularly
sober captain, who did all in his power to rectify the wile
about which I have been complaining ; but no one man,
however vigilant, can keep constant guard over 60 or 70
men, and we suffered sorrow of heart enough to warrant
my speaking on this subject even more strongly than I have I
done." Dunedin has quadrupled itself within the Let
eighteen months. The advent of the emigrants was almost
simultaneous with that of some thowand miners from
Melbourne. "Since then 2,000 more have arrived. Undoubt-
edly, goldfields attract all the worst characters for many
miles round, and some of the greatest villains under the sun
are at this moment now in Otago. But I am still of thalami)
(minim as at first, that the miners themselves are a particu-
larly fine, athletic body—men and brethren and not brutes."
The miners have since nearly all started for the diggings.
House-rent is fearfully high ; 18e. a week is asked for two
small rooms, and 30a. is frequently given for the same accom-
modation it the situation is particularly good. The cease-
quence of this is that the town is half tents, whole colonies
of them being inhabited by women and children whose
husbands and fathers are up at the diggings. The Dunedin
immigrants' barracks is an abomination. Hell of it is occu-
pied that:Mama constabulary and a body of mounted police.
" Lath be imagioed Maya Miss Rye) that& sine pane;
were run acrosa the way of Parliament-street, in front
of the Horse Guards,path just sufficiently high to screen per-
son behind from observation, that the left half of that
edifice is occupied by men, and tire right wing by women,
hones being stabled at the rear, the majority of beast;
lying to the right, St. James's Park representing the wet's%
of Dunedin Bay, that the door of the coest•bulary-office
opens into the immigration barracks, a space of about 200
feet only dividing the sleeping apartments of men and wo-
men from one another. The girls are frequently left to
themselves for hours together, the matron continually deep.
ins from home • there la not the slightest accommodation
for the girls to ' tidy.up' (i.e., to wash clothes after a
four months' voyage), nor can they get water to drink with-
out going to some public-house &ion street, and, to nom.
plate the picture, there is neither bench at which the
poor girls can sit, nor table, however rode, upon which they
can place their food ; there is perfect liberty of ingress and
egress at all hours, and everyone is allowed to do exactly
what sums best in her own eyes; a more demoralisingschool
for undecided characters could not possibly be imagined, and
a more discreditable place does not exist under the sun.
Two or three illegitimate children and their mothers are at
present residing there, sad two or three similar additions
are expected within the next month, while the upper attics
are occupied by • body of women who are known only to
night and evil deeds—women who never have been and never
intend to go out into service."

In coecrusioe, Miss Ryere peas that emigration to that
place ought never to oases. If another shipload of servants
and governance of her owe selection were corning out next
weak, she would naderrake to place them all within a month
of their leading. " I repeat that there is plenty of work
here for women who know how to dolt; that for women who
caa take rare of themselves, and intend to walk sprightly,
it is • place where they most get on in the lose run. That
the greatest of all delusions with which I am acquainted is
the mania exhibited at home for Inducing wild girls' sad
' girls who Dever did like work ' to come out to the colonies ;
I always said it wee folly to send sorb. I csa only reiterate
my belief, which has been most painfully contented by
observation siooe coming here, and beg the clergy and all
who ate interested in social questions at home to prevent,
instead of aiding, by every means in their power, the emi-
gration of such characters, unless they wish to send them
to immediate and carbide destruction."

FATAL ACCIDENT AT GREENWICH PlER.—Yester-
day afternoon a fatal amidest occurred to a young man,
named William Forrest, at the Gresswith steam-boat pier.
It appnn that as eve o'clock the Dryad passeager steam-
iewl arrived at the pier, front Woolwich, sod having
landed amoral pane= was again in moil's to proceed op
e river, when the deceased incsittioaely shook hands with
the mate of ERE MEd, which caused hen to fall from the
edge of the pier into the river, and as be did not again
appear on the surface it is supposed that ha was carried
wrier the &snag dummy. The deceased was a watchman
in the employ at the Greenwich damn-bait Company.