g and disgusting aspect: and the excesses,
sufferings, and debasement connected with the public works, the
peculation of the officers and the indolence of the men, brought again
in view the evils of associated labor; and reinforced the arguments for
dispersion. The men, when together, became dealers, and indulged in all
the vices of cities; scattered, they became savage, and filled the
colonies with crimes.

The secondary settlements have been often the theatres of great iniquity
and oppression, and the commandants have dared injustice, which no
supreme authority would venture: to these meaner, and sometimes
contemptible agents, the prisoners must be subjected, on the principle
of dispersion. Such practical difficulties start up at every instant,
and thus expose the policy of the government to perpetual oscillation.
An instance, of later date, will demonstrate the danger of minute
sub-divisions, which exclude a public press and a public opinion. A
commandant resolved the seduction of the daughter of a prisoner: he
crept into her father's house, and offered violence. The father wrote to
the Governor (Brisbane); his letter passing, of course, through the
office of the commandant; who read the complaint, and ordered the aged
parent to the triangles. The doctor, knowing the nature of the offence,
refused his sanction, on a plea of health. The tyrant still insisted;
but the obstinate humanity of the surgeon prevailed. What then? The
father was sent from the station, and, after a while, the daughter was
thrown on Sydney, a prostitute. This officer had an accomplished wife:
she detected improper company in her room, and her exasperated husband
broke her arm to repress her outcries! It is to such hands that the
prisoner has been too often entrusted: to men, only known for their
vices--broken down by debt and dissipation--who have taken refuge, with
the wrecks of their fortune and reputation, in a military command.

The obligation of this history to the Reports of Mr. Bigge, renders it
proper to explain the origin, nature, and operation of his commission.
The representations of several colonists, that the administration of
Macquarie was subversive of public justice and favorable to crime; that
his expenditure was lavish, and his projects ridiculous, had reached the
house of parliament. To these charges the Rev. Samuel Marsden, chaplain
and magistrate, added the full weight of his authority. This person,
from his long residence,