"By his Excellency's command,
"J. Burnett."
[211] Backhouse and Walker's observations. This evil was corrected on their representation.
[212] Par. Papers.
[213] "The Rev. Dr. Bedford, in the course of his remarks, stated that his duty had imposed upon him the painful task of attending between three and four hundred executions, and that more than nineteen-twentieths of the unhappy men who had thus miserably perished, had been brought to this end by the effects of drunkenness."—Courier; Speech at a meeting of the first Temperance Society at Hobart Town, 1832.
"It has fallen to our lot to be present at the executions of a large proportion of the malefactors who have suffered the extremity of the law in Hobart Town, and the apparent apathy with which the unhappy men met their fate, was always to us the most humiliating part of the spectacle. Their lips would utter with apparent sincerity the invocations prompted by the clergyman, but the heart, that should have given them expression, was too plainly wanting. They were empty sounds—the soul was gone. The main part of the executioner's duty was performed to his hand; the kernel was already consumed.... They sung psalms, ate a hearty meal: they heard the summons of the sheriff; their arms were pinioned; the halter was put about their neck; the cap was brought over their eyes, and they dropped into eternity with more indifference than the ox goes to the slaughter."—V. D. Land Annual; edited by Dr. Ross, 1833.
[214] 28th June, 1832.
[215] Despatch to Spring Rice.
SECTION XVIII
Governor Arthur held the reins of authority while considerable changes transpired in the elder colony. Sir Thomas Brisbane, who succeeded Macquarie, had chiefly attempted to diminish the expenditure, and in the management of convicts had sought in the results of their labor, rather than its detail, the success of transportation. Formed into gangs, they were employed in clearing farms under the inspection of government superintendents, for which the settlers paid a moderate price; but on the arrival of General Darling, the government assumed an aspect of increasing rigour, and the reins of authority were tightened until they were in danger of breaking. It does not belong to this work to examine minutely the general policy of that ruler; it was, however, held in earnest detestation by those who were, or had been prisoners. The magistrates were empowered to inflict corporal punishment to a very questionable extent, and it was customary for one settler to judge and sentence the servant of another, who in his turn performed a similar office. It is surely not necessary to prove, that the moderate exercise of such extensive powers depended rather on the equitable temper of British gentlemen than the practical limitation of their power.