[79] Such are the words of Lieutenant Collins, from whose account of New South Wales the narrative is taken. When will Christians learn, in their intercourse with heathens and savages, to abstain from such falsehood and deceitful dealing?
[80] This generally appears to be rather a suspicious act;—to dance a corrobory is “a proposal these savage tribes often make, and which the traveller who knows them well will think it better to discourage.”—Mitchell’s Three Expeditions, vol. ii. p. 269.
[81] Grey’s Western Australia, vol. ii. p. 370.
[82] It happened that the two French ships of discovery under the unfortunate La Perouse came into the harbour of Botany Bay just as the English were finally quitting it. The French stayed there nearly two months, and after they left that harbour they were never again seen by any Europeans, both vessels having been lost.
[83] See Lang’s New South Wales, vol. i. p. 23.
[84] See Barrington’s History of New South Wales, p. 171. See, too, another instance at p. 385.
[85] This conduct was so common, that, when provisions became scarce, the supply was issued twice in the week, on Wednesdays and Saturdays.
[86] The blame of these lax and unworthy notions must not fall on the laity alone; many of the clergy in those days deserve to have a full share of it; but while we see and lament the faults of that generation, we must not forget to look after those of our own, and to correct them.
[87] See Judge Burton on Religion and Education in New South Wales, p. 1.
[88] Certainly some of the means employed for the moral improvement of the convicts were very strange ones. For example, we are told, on one occasion, that some of them were “ordered to work every Sunday on the highway as a punishment!” See Barrington’s History of New South Wales, p. 184. See likewise, p. 246.