In the years between 1836 and 1840, when we lived at Enmore, we had, like all other householders of the day, assigned servants. The only exceptions at that time were our confidential nurse, and Copeland the coachman, an ex-50th man. Most fortunate was it for us young people that such a woman had attached herself to the family; of exceptional energy and intelligence, deeply religious, with an earnest and unswerving faith—'a slave of the ought,' like Miss Feely. As she abode with us from 1828 to 1858, it may be imagined what an influence for good she exerted upon us children when almost wholly under her control.

As for the poor convicts, they were really much the same as other people. Some were good, none of them particularly bad. Their master, though with a natural leaning to quarterdeck discipline, was not severe. When they got 'into trouble,' as they expressed it, it was through their own irregularities. A man would apply for a 'pass' (a permit in writing), granting leave to go to town and return by, say, eight o'clock P.M.; instead of which (like the ingrate who stole geese off a common) he would get drunk, be locked up by the police, and be brought up before Captain Wilson or other Police Magistrate of the day, charged with intoxication and being out after hours, whereupon he received twenty-five or fifty lashes, and was carefully returned to our service. The first intimation we received was the sight of Jack or Bill, as the case might be, coming up the carriage-drive in charge of a constable; his blood-stained shirt tied over his shoulders by the sleeves, instead of being worn as usual.

The flogging wasn't child's play, as may be believed. I have seen the weals and torn flesh; but the men did not seem to care so much about it, nor did it tend to brutalise them, as asserted. They admitted that it was their own fault, for running against that stone wall, the law. We had nothing to do with it, but indeed suffered loss of work thereby. In a day or two they were all right and cheerful again, well behaved of course, until that fatal 'next time.' Whether the men were of tougher fibre in those days, I can't say; but fancy a latter-day larrikin getting fifty or a hundred lashes, as these men did occasionally, without wincing, too! Compared to the modern product, the 'larrikin,' with his higher wages, better food, and more of the comforts of life than are good for him, they were angels of light.

The groom was a prisoner; so also the gardener, the butler, the housemaid, the laundress, the cook. The women were, no doubt, more difficult to manage. If they got to the sideboard when there was a bottle of wine open, trouble ensued. Hard working and well behaved generally, none of them could withstand the temptation of drink. This may have occurred more than once, but the ultimatum of which they stood in dread was, after repeated misbehaviour, to be sent to the Factory at Parramatta—the Bridewell of the colony. Their hair was cut short in that house of correction. They were supposed to work at hard and monotonous tasks. The work the unfortunates did not mind so much, but the short-cropped hair—all ignorant of the turn fashion was to take in after-years—they detested unutterably.

Two of these engagés (as French colonial officials called them) played us a pretty trick, for which, though it caused temporary inconvenience to the household, I have always felt inclined to pardon them.

The butler was a smartish young Dublin man, not more than a year out. He behaved well—was steady and willing. The laundress—Catherine Maloney, let us say—a quiet, hard-working young woman, was a valuable servant, worth about fifteen shillings a week, as wages go now. Fancy the privilege of keeping a capable servant, say, for four or five years certain! 'Please to suit yourself, ma'am,' and the later domestic tyrannies were then unknown. However, Patrick and Kate nourished deep designs—made it up to get married; wicked, ungrateful creatures! One fine morning they were missing, and, what was really exceptional in those man-hunting days, were never discovered—never indeed found from that day to this! 'These lovers fled away into the storm.' It would be in 1839, just about the 'breaking out' of Port Phillip. They probably got there undetected. Who knows? One wonders what became of them. Did Patrick grow rich, prosperous—even politically eminent? It was on the cards. They had my good wishes, in any case.

When we migrated to Port Phillip in 1840, a special permit was obtained from the Governor in Council to take down our servants—eight men and two women. The men went overland with the stock, and of course remained till their tickets-of-leave were due. But the women, our fellow-passengers by sea, married soon after they got to Melbourne. It was a 'rush,' in the latter-day goldfields' idiom, and women were at a premium. We might have refused our royal permission to this, but were not hard-hearted enough to do so. We were thus left desolate and servantless, a condition in life much less common in those days than it is now, I grieve to say, speaking as a householder. The men on the whole behaved well. George Stevenson, a clever mechanic and gardener from the north of Ireland, was drowned while crossing the Yarra at Heidelberg by night—a shanty being the fatal temptation. The groom died in the Benevolent Asylum at Melbourne, after many a year of faithful service to us and others. All our men but one got their tickets-of-leave, and drifted away out of ken. But while on the question, I may here record my opinion, that these men and their class generally did an immense deal of indispensable work in the earlier decades of the colony. They were, on the whole, when fairly treated, well behaved. They rarely shirked their work, were often touchingly attached to the families wherein they had done their enforced servitude, and after their virtual freedom was gained, mostly led industrious and reputable lives.

AFTER LONG YEARS

'This is the place; stand still, my steed, let me review the scene!' Quite correct, this is the place, though so changed that I hardly recognise the homestead which I built when I 'took up the Run' still known as 'Squattlesea Mere,' so many a year ago. Can it be possible that half a century should have passed—fleeted by like a dream—as a tale that is told—and that I should again stand here, looking at the work of my hands in that old time, whereof the memory is so fresh? The huts, the stock-yards, the cottage wherein we dwelt in peaceful contentment, nearly all are there, though much decayed and showing manifest signs of old Time—edax rerum—with his slow but sure attrition. The fruit trees in the garden, planted with my own hands, are of great age and size, and still bearing abundantly in a soil and climate so favourable to their growth. I find it almost impossible to realise that in June 1844, being then a stripling of eighteen, I should have established this 'lodge in the wilderness,' now developed into a fair-sized freehold, besides supporting a number of families in comfort and respectability on the selected portions.

Well do I remember the dark night when I reached this very spot, on a tired horse, having ridden from Grasmere on the Merrai that day, nearly fifty miles, without food for man or beast. The black marauders of the period held revel on a cape of the lava-bestrewn land which jutted out upon the marsh, near the Native Dog's Well. I had stumbled on to their camp, not seeing it until I was amid their dimly-burning fires. Relations were strained between us, and as they were then engaged in banqueting upon one of my milch cows (name Matilda), there is no saying what might have happened to the chronicler if my colt, a great-grandson of Skeleton (own brother to Drone), had not responded to the spur.