AN HISTORICAL AND STATISTICAL ACCOUNT OF NEW SOUTH WALES, BOTH AS A PENAL SETTLEMENT AND AS A BRITISH COLONY. BY JOHN DUNMORE LANG, D.D., SENIOR MINISTER OF THE SCOTS CHURCH, AND PRINCIPAL OF THE "We have seen the land, and, behold, it is very good."-JUDGES Xviii. 9. SECOND EDITION, WITH NUMEROUS ADDITIONS, BRINGING DOWN THE HISTORY OF THE IN TWO VOLUMES. VOL. I. LONDON: A. J. VALPY, RED LION COURT, FLEET STREET: 1837. HAVING found it necessary to undertake a voyage from New South Wales to England in the month of July, 1833, on business connected with the Australian College, and with the Presbyterian Church in communion with the Church of Scotland, in that colony, and having accordingly obtained leave of absence for twelve months from His Excellency Major-General Sir Richard Bourke, the present Governor of New South Wales, it appeared to me that I could not employ the leisure of a long and dreary voyage more usefully for my adopted country, than in drawing up a series of sketches, for publication in England, illustrative of its past history and of its present condition. The following work was accordingly commenced immediately after we had lost sight of the Australian land; and the first seven chapters were written chiefly in the high latitudes of the Southern Pacific, before doubling Cape Horn the remaining chapters were written during the run from Cape Horn to the British Channel. A work written in such circumstances must necessarily have many imperfections. In running to the eastward in the high southern latitudes, in which the first part of the work was written, no fewer than thirteen icebergs were seen from the deck of our vessel; and the process of writing was frequently interrupted-sometimes by intense cold in my own private cabin, at others by the smoke from the ship's stove in the main cabin; and at others, again, by a sea occasionally breaking over the vessel's side, and dashing a shower of spray over the manuscript through a broken pane in the window of my apartment. In such circumstances repetitions of the same idea, if not also of the same words, are apt to occur; dull expletives are apt to intrude themselves, and the balancing of periods is scarcely to be thought of. My object in the work has been threefold :—1st, To afford the reader a correct idea of the history, the tendency, and the working of the transportation system, as it regards the Australian colonies;-2ndly, To exhibit a faithful representation of the present state of the colony of New South Wales in particular; and 3rdly, To promote the best interests of that colony, by promoting the emigration of reputable families and individuals to its territory, and by pointing out to the authorities at home the line of policy which it is expedient to pursue for the future, to secure its general welfare and its rapid advancement. As a penal settlement, the history of New South Wales is unquestionably much more interesting to the general reader than that of any of the other colonies of the empire. That colony has been the scene of an experiment on the capabilities of man, the progress and the result of which are interesting not merely to Britain, but to Europe-to the world. The general impression in the mother country relative to that experiment decidedly is that it has failed-that the whole system of transportation is bad—that its management is worse, and that it ought forthwith to be discontinued. If this impression should be correct, it will nevertheless be of importance to ascertain whether the failure has been owing to the system or to the management, and what are the causes that have operated in producing so unlooked-for and so unfortunate a result. If, on the contrary, the impression should be unfounded, it is high time that the public should be undeceived. It is allowed on all hands that there is much in the present state of the Australian colonies to counteract the general tendency and efficiency of the Transportation system. In order, therefore, to show how such a state of things has been arrived at, I found it absolutely necessary, in projecting the present work, to take a retrospective view of the state and progress of the colony from its original settlement to the present time. This retrospect, which I am confident has been taken with candour and impartiality, I have reason to believe will sufficiently explain whatever might otherwise have appeared anomalous in the present aspect and condition of the Australian colonies. It is scarcely possible to relate facts and events of comparatively recent occurrence, in the progress of |