friends at home, and among themselves in the colony, each depended on
his own energy and resources for his success; and the foregoing
description of many of the original settlers will account for the
disappointments that ensued in various instances.

Few who abandoned the settlement under such circumstances, were willing
to admit their failure was the result of their own want of exertion, or
their unfitness for the enterprise in which they had embarked;
accordingly, wherever they went, and in their letters home, the blame
was laid on the country. Thus many of the evil reports respecting it,
which were current at home and in the neighbouring colonies, may be
traced to this source.

A prevalent cause of distress among the early settlers arose from their
having generally brought out with them little ready money, compared with
their other property. This was chiefly owing to the Government
regulations admitting of land being assigned to those only who
introduced labourers, and various kinds of property required by farmers.
Many of the settlers, therefore, to the extent of their means, were in
this way amply provided; but having understood in England that money
would be of little use in a new country, numbers, without questioning
what they wished to be true, incautiously expended most of their means
in the property that would entitle them to obtain land in the colony.
However, when they had been some time in the settlement, they discovered
that there, as in other places, money was needful; and on wishing to
procure some by the sale of part of their property, they found it
difficult to do so without loss, in consequence of most other settlers
having brought out similar investments.

Another cause of depression, which has borne seriously on the settlers,
has been the occasional high price of the necessaries of life. With a
view of remedying this evil, cargoes of provisions have been repeatedly
imported by the Local Government--the actual cost alone being charged to
the settler. Even a shipload of bullocks and pigs was introduced from
Java. But, numbers of the bullocks and pigs getting loose, soon became
as wild and difficult to recapture as if they had been natives of the
woods, whither they had betaken themselves.

Experience has shown that the system of free grants, which was the first
adopted in Western Australia, is decidedly injurious to the prosperity
of a settlement, from the facility it affords to persons possessed