on the imperturbable Commissioner and his
secretary. He was charged with eaves-dropping, back parlour scandal,
partisanship, and wilful lying. The particular delineation of individual
conduct, and which he thought requisite to illustrate systems, excited
the utmost vexation: it was painful to officers, to find their
character, their habits, and the profits of their places, laid open to
national observation. Perhaps, those details were sometimes beyond an
obvious political necessity; but the plain exhibition of principles in
old English phrases--giving vice its true name--measuring the results of
transportation by a standard recognised outside both the mess-room and
the gaol--was of vast advantage to the colonists themselves. The
reference made to Bigge's Reports in this work, however, is always
limited to facts, which could not be distorted or colored. His
connections, and the spirit of his mission, prejudiced his judgment,
respecting a system which had been the growth of circumstances; but his
integrity is transparent, not less than his prepossessions. Time will
extract the sting of his disclosures; but their moral results will
remain. They tended to destroy those evils which can only live in a
congenial atmosphere--and wither, except in the shade.

The Reports of the Commissioner were published by order of the House of
Commons in 1822: Macquarie closed his official career on the 1st
December, 1821, having held the government for twelve years. Thus their
labors and opinions came before the parliament and the world together.
Macquarie, when he considered himself entitled to reward, for a period
of service of unusual length, found it was necessary to defend his
reputation. Betrayed by the warmth of his temper into some irregular
acts, which ill expressed the ordinary spirit of his government, he was
vulnerable to his assailants. The flogging of freed men, notwithstanding
the precedents left by his predecessors; the scandalous neglect of moral
precautions, in the disposal of the women; and prominent instances of
unjustifiable lenity; constituted serious deductions from his merit. He
was, however, exempted from pointed censure, and the crown assigned
L1,000 per annum, as his retiring pension. This favor was scarcely
conferred, when he was called before that Tribunal, where conduct and
motives are seen together: he died at St. James's, London, on the 1st
January, 1824, and his remains were carried to the Isle of Mull, North