"Having gone with a friend in a gig from Sydney to the races at Paramatta, they were passed on the road by many genteel equipages, including close carriages, curricles, and landaus.
"In answer to the stranger's questions, his companion informed him that one brilliant 'set out' belonged to Sam Such-a-one, who had been a convict, but was now a free man and a man of fortune; that another was the property of a convict who kept a draper's shop in Sydney, but was assigned to his wife, who had brought out with her a large sum of money; that a third belonged to a ticket-of-leave man, who had obtained that indulgence almost immediately after his arrival in the colony—and so on.
"At the racecourse, where all the 'beauty and fashion' of felonry was assembled, the stranger's astonishment was complete at the number of instances in which he obtained similar answers.
"After some graver reflections on so singular an exhibition, he ironically remarked that he thought he had better return as soon as possible to India for the purpose of there committing some crime that should subject him to a short sentence of transportation; for it really seemed to him that that was the best way of getting on in the world!"
His description of the "fine lady convicts" is particularly amusing—
"Things are differently managed now, and when a transport ship arrives at Sydney, all the madams on board occupy the few days which elapse before their landing in preparing to produce the most dazzling effect at their descent upon the Australian shores.
"With rich silk dresses, bonnets a la mode, ear pendants three inches long, gorgeous shawls and splendid veils, silk stockings, kid gloves, and parasols in hand, dispensing sweet odours from their profusely perfumed forms, they disembark, and are assigned as servants and distributed to the expectant settlers.
"On the very road to their respective places of assignment the women are told of the easy retirement of the factory, and advised to get themselves sent there, without having to obtain the consent of an assignee master.
"Offers of marriage are made to some of them from the waysides; and at their new habitations they are besieged by suitors.
"The hapless settler who expected a servant, able, or, at least, willing to act perhaps as house and dairymaid, finds he has received quite a princess.