Star.
London, England, 1829-09-24 00:00:00

NEW SOUTH WALES.

TREATMENT OF TRANSPORTED FELONS.
The following letter, addressed to Mr. 'Wontner, the
Governor of Newgate, and received within the last week,
has been read by most of the high official and judicial
authorities now in London, who have expressed an una-
nimous opinion that the publication of the contents would
be calculated to serve the cause of virtue, by deterring
rsem the perpetration of crime those who erroneously
'suppose that transportation is a bed of roses.

" RENNIN= Sta—l have heard with great grief that Messrs.
--. (Ms old employers) have been again plundered, and my name
has again been 'nought before the public, as having relapsed into
bad courses in this distant laud. This information is totally incor-
rect. Immediately upon my landing, in Oct. 1827, my shipmates

and I were assigned to settlers up the country. The muter I was
then assigned to I am still living with, and I can have his teatimo-
nials as to the blamelessness of my conduct. I have also the
strongest testimonials of good conduct under the surgeon-superin-
teudant's own hand, during my passage out, when I acted as his as-
sistant. Mr•. L. was very anxious to gain me some situation suitable
to me, but the letters he wrote to the secretary were neglected by the
chief mate, who was to send them on those ; and I was in conse-
quence assigned to my present employer, as his Excellency had
signed his name, and it could not be reversed, like the laws of the
Medes and Persians. Thus, by the negligence of one man, I have
become a settler's man. Ido not diguise the truth from you; I
have been moat miserable in this most unhappy land ; I have suf-
fered every degradation in life ; insults upon insults have been
heaped upon sue; I have been obliged to associate with the most
depraved of human beings, my master's men. Separated from all
hopes of comfort and enjoyment, debarred from all religious wor.
ship, I have been ready to murmur at the decrees of the Aamtarry
What can I say to you? I have been living 150 miles from Syd-
ney, up the mountains, 40 miles from any church or settlement. I
see no one from month to month but a black native. The voice of
prayer is never heard ; all is blasphemy and wickedness ; and al-
though my master has
,latterly made me his house servant, and
places much confidence in me, my situation is but little if anything
improved. I receive no wages, no inducement, unless I plunder
him, and that I hope, by GOD'S help, I shall never do. He is a
man whom it is very difficult to please; but I weary you, and I
shall take my leave of the subject with observing, that I have la-
boured in the field at all kinds of toil under a meridian sun ; that

lam become alike indifferent to comforts of all kinds. When I
am hungry I eat, when I am thirsty I drink ; I receive my meu
u another. Hunger is our sauce. We grind in a hand mill, we
bake in the ashes, and live in miserable huts, which admit both
wind and rain. A sheet of cork and a bundle of straw is our bed,
and a blanket our covering; but fatigue is our's, and we sleep as

well as if on beds of down. A shirt and duck trowsers form our
dress. I have learned to reap, to shear sheep, to fell timber, to
burn it off; in short, I can do almost all laborious work.
a Thus, my kind and much respected Sir, I have given you a
slight sketch of my life. lam most miserable and disappointed.
I know my sentence, although severe, is just; yet I was in hopes
that my occupation would have been more close to my abilities.
Is it, I ask, no punishment to be thus sent seventeen thousand
miles from my native country? Gracious Gou! could rising
youth but have a single glance of the prisoner in New South Wales,
he would surely shun the temptation to crime. The slightest of.
fence provokes flogging; insolence is the grand bugbear in the Co-
lony : for this I have seen our men sent to an iron-gang, to work in
chains, and be half-famished, or tied up to receive the ignominious
punishment of 50 or 75 lashes. Shame on the name of English-
men! A man, who calls himself a settler, first imposes upon his
slaves, and goads them on to speak, and then drags them before a
'Magistrate to be lashed and tortured for insolence! It is useless
to murmur, for complaint is crime in this dreadful spot. A master
up the country is a petty king, and the spirit in which be exercises
his power is truly diabolical. If his slave speaks, the wretch's
stomach is taxed. We all feel a tenfold degradation here ; we
feel that we are slaves to paltry tyrants, who seem as if they
were born to add to the stings and tortures of a wretched al-
minal. It is this feeling which leads to that apathy complained of
amongst servants. If a Government servant sees his master's pro.
perty going to ruin, it is ten to one that he passes on and takes no
notice ; he argues that it is no interest of his, and thus the settler,
by not studying his mens' interest, forgets his own. The men receive
no wages, and not sufficient clothing. True, the authorities will say,
Why do you not complain to us? and it shall be remedied ;"
but de you think that many will or dare complain, when they
know the authorities will support the settler, and that the mas.
ter is sure to take his revenge. Tea, sugar, and tobacco, are
called indulgencies, and rest with the discretion of the master,
who seldom forgets to use his power like a giant. With
respect to liberty, it is a thing that few now get possession of :
a Lifer must serve eight years with one master, ten years with
two, and one year additional for every additional master. The
smile of bitterness comes over my face whilst I write this : may
Goa enable me to overcome this dreadful sensation ! Why is a man
debarred all chance of liberty whose conduct may be irreproach-
able? Much of the misery and crime committed by convicts may
be attributed to the almost total extinction of his hopes of liberty.
As to myself, I once thought of a mitigation, but all hopes are
gone : I am like a piece of mechanism ; my spirit is so much bro-
ken by disappointments and hardships, that I feel a dreadful spirit
of indifference creep upon me—my lite appears a blank, and futurity
is my only source of expectation. One step alone appears before
me; I shall consider of it 12 months, and then make my election."
The unhappy writer of this letter is, as our readers must
perceive, a man of education. He is young, and hap-
pened to fall into the snares of another Milwood, who
first prevailed upon hint to commit petty robberies upon
his employers, and then threatend to inform them, if he
did not continue to administer to her necessities and pro-
digality by more extensive depredations. He was detected,
and the moment his good fortune deserted him, his de-
stroyer sneered at and abandoned him.
The system, as described by him, is known to those
who are in the habit of receiving communications front
the most impartial and dispassionate correspondents, to
be not in the slightest degree overdrawn. The slave-
system in our West India Colonies, cruel as it has been
described to be, does not surpass the ingenious power of
torturing and galling possessed and practised in the great
country district, of New South Wales.