The British Press; or, Morning Literary Advertiser.
London, England, 1822-08-22 00:00:00

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filth in which l found it, both on an early visit
'after my *eked], end on one preceding my depar-
ture ; the diseedreit, uod licentious v.
'premier of the antlers', maiiifested the little degree
at control itiwkicls the female convicts were kept,
'and the little sttosirjort that was paid to any thing
'beyond the mere Ktfortoanre of certaiJ porno.,
of I labour. Mr. ()ate., the se i e deo bins
justified himself by the al;osidoned habit of the
women. and the want ,of mesons to make their
punishment eiTeetwil. It must be arktiooleclgeit',
that in such a building es the factory, hs tack was
a hopeless Ciae.; it might bare he n made more tf-
Getout by hot more constant and contiguous resi-
denc'e, but he was chirged with the duttes of chief
constable in the town of Paranutte. mud carried on
the Isiittnent of a hater. No inetance qa retire-
sented to me of his improper connivance in the mis-
conduct of the women; mod the magistrates of pa_
raiment, to niie of whom he had given serious cone
of offence, bore teenumay to the activity end per-
stverence thst he displayed in the !terrorism:lce of
hit duty, as supirinteudent of the factory.
The evil consequences arising to the' Colony
from the indiscriniiimte association, sod the now-
strained piostitition of so Many litenisous women.
have been seriourly Wit by the inhabitonts at large.
With the temptations that their- residence in Parla-
ment ufforded. and the slight degree of punish-
meld that confinement in the factory ineicted, no
female convici, when assigned to a respectable fa-
mily, could be taught the value of Poch s sitnetioe,
or could be made to feel the n.cesaisy of obedience.
These consequences are strongly sad justly describ-
ed in a letter addreseed by the Rev. Mr. Marsden
to Governor Macquerrie in the year 1813. and that
makes part of the evidence anbmitted to the Cvm-
mince of Parliament on the State of Gaols. The
effects stated by Mr. Mersden are partially con-
firmed by the answer of Governor Macquarrie, and
recite further confirmation from the evideoce of
Mr. (Nike., the chief constable of Plemmons ; from
that of Mr. Hannibal M'Arthur, Mr. West, Mr.
Rouse, and Mr. Come.

M►. Marsden. as Acting Magistrate at Para.
matte, took 'leading part in the police of that place.
and became more fully acquainted,und more deeply
impressed, with the nature and extent of the mis-
chief that it created. The gaol and factory, more-
over,had originally been constructed under hie di-
rection!. mid he must at an early period have been
convinced of the inadequacy of such buildings, for
the purposes either of penal discipline or of moral
restraint : in both of these points of view, the plan
was as objectionable as the execution was de-
fective.
The report of Mr. Greenwsy. the colonial archi--
tect, upon the ►tate of these buildings that was
made in the month of October, 1816, alludes in
very general terms to them; but it indicates the de-
fects iiiherent in the plan, and the consequenres to
which they naturally led. Without making Mr.
Marsden reponsible for these defects of the building
that he ouperiutelided, and which was originally in-
tended for • place of employment only, it is some-
what surprising. that from the period of his
appointment to the magistracy, in the year 1811, to
the year 1815, he had not addressed some represen-
tation to Governor Macquarie, of the same evils
that he then deplored, the existence of which, long
antecedently, must hove been as curb within his
observation, and must have as forcibly attracted it.
Deference to the feelings of Governor Macquarne,
whose attention he observed to be then employed in
other building., and want of success that he had
experienced in procuring some attention to his re-
presentations respecting the hospital at Panienatts,
might have been the motives fur this silence : what-
ever they really were, the facts that are stated by
Mr. Marsden, in his letter to Governor Macquarric.
could not have altogether escaped his knowledge
and observation. The complaints in the colony re-
spectieg the misconduct of the female convicts, of
their disobedience, and of their immoral connexion•.
must have been known to him, and they must
have pointed at the want of accommodation 111
the colony, and punishment of the female convicts,
as the natural sources of these evils.

'laving observed, in Governor Macquerries an-
swer to Mr. Marsden, that he justified the delay that
occurred, and was still to take place, in the con-
struction of a proper place of reception for the female
convicts, by the want of any specific instruction,
from your Lordship to undertake such a building,
and winch he states that he solicited at an early
period of his government, and considered indispen-
sible, I felt it to be my duty to call to the recol-
lection of Governor firlacquarrte, that he had under-
taken several buildings of much less urgent
necessity than the factory at Parunsatte, without
waiting for any such indispensable authority ; and I
now find, that the construction of it was announced
by him to your Lordship iu the year 1817, as then
in his contemplation, without making any specific
allusion to the evils which the want of it had so
long occasioned ; that the contract for building it
was announced to the public on the 41st of Marcl►
1818, and that your Lordship's approval of it was
nut signified until the 24th of August 1818, and
could not have reached Governor Macquarrie's
hands until nearly a year after the work bad been
undertaken. It types's, therefore, that if want of
authority had been the sole cause of the delay i•s
building the factory at Parematta, that cause would
not only have operated in that month of Mitch
1818, but it would have constituted to operate until
the want of authority had been formally supplied.
Governor Macquarrie, however, •u.t be cei.sciosa,
that after he had stated to Mr. Marsden' its the
year ISIS, and with an appeerance.of regret, that
the want of authority prevented him from under-
taking the curistructiou of a building of such un-
deniable oecessity and importance as the fastory at
Paramatta, he had undertaken several building-,
which, though useful in themselves, were of ter.
comparative importance; arid had commenced i.l
the month of August 1817, the laborious and
pensive constructmu of his own stables at 574-