; others that he is
put in there for punishment. Some grudge him every gleam of comfort or
alleviation of misery, to which his situation is susceptible; to others
every little privation, every little unpleasant feeling, every
unaccustomed circumstance, every necessary point of coercive discipline,
presents matter for a charge of inhumanity."[57]

To American transportation, the following is a summary of his
objections. 1. It was unequal: a man who had money might buy off the
servitude. Again, with regard to banishment, it was unequal: some would
have been glad to go by choice, others would rather die. 2. It was
unexemplary: what the convict suffered, be it much or little, was
unknown. 3. It was unfrugal: it occasioned great waste of life in the
mode, and of money in the expenses of conveyance. 4. It did answer in
some degree, in disabling the offender from doing further mischief: yet
it has always been easier for a man to return from transportation than
to escape from prison. 5. It answered, every now and then, the purposes
of reformation pretty well; but not so well upon the whole, under the
variable and uncertain direction of a private master, whose object was
his own profit, as it might be expected to answer under regulations
concerted by the united wisdom of the nation.[58] In these objections to
American transportation the colonists will recognise familiar
sounds--the chief elements of the arguments, in times both remote and
recent, against the practice of transportation.

The worst class of criminals were often found in London, before their
first sentence had expired. Many suffered capitally for this offence.
Before the practice of contracting with shippers, political offenders
preferred the continent of Europe to the hardships of America. It was
made felony, without benefit of clergy (20 Geo. ii.), for rebels under
sentence of transportation to reside either in France or Spain; and the
inhuman penalty was denounced against their friends who might correspond
with them in any form. When the crown carried out the sentence, the
offender's return was still capital, and though unpopular, the guilty
rarely escaped the penalty on conviction.

When this colony was established, the chief towns of Great Britain were
haunted by innumerable thieves, who were organised for the purposes of
robbery. In London armed men assailed passengers by night, and even by
day. The arrest of robbers was accompanied with considerable danger