nds of flour, which had been offered as a reward for bringing
to justice a garden-thief, were paid to the watchman who fired at him.]

So great was either the villainy of the people, or the necessities of the
times, that a prisoner lying at the hospital under sentence of corporal
punishment having received a part of it, five hundred lashes, contrived
to get his irons off from one leg, and in that situation was caught
robbing a farm. On being brought in, he received another portion of his
punishment.

Among other thefts committed in this season of general distress, was one
by a convict employed in the fishing boats, who found means to secrete
several pounds of fish in a bag, which he meant to secure in addition to
the allowance which was to be made him for having been out on that duty.
To deter others from committing the like offence, which might, by
repetition, amount to a serious evil, he was ordered to receive one
hundred lashes.

At Rose Hill the convicts conducted themselves with much greater
propriety; not a theft nor any act of ill behaviour having been for some
time past heard of among them*.

[* They had vegetables in great abundance.]

At that settlement a kangaroo had been killed of one hundred and eighty
pounds weight; and the people reported that they were much molested by
the native dogs, which had been seen together in great numbers, and,
coming by night about the settlement, had killed some hogs which were not
housed.

The colony had hitherto been supplied with salt from the public stores, a
quantity being always shaken off from the salt provisions, and reserved
for use by the store-keepers; but the daily consumption of salt
provisions was now become so inconsiderable, and they had been so long in
store, that little or none of that article was to be procured. Two large
iron boilers were therefore erected at the east point of the cove; some
people were employed to boil the salt water, and the salt which was
produced by this very simple process was issued to the convicts.

Our fishing tackle began now, with our other necessaries, to decrease. To
remedy this inconvenience, we were driven by necessity to avail ourselves
of some knowledge which we had gained from the natives; and one of the
convicts (a rope-maker) was employed to spin lines from the bark of a
tree which they used for the same purpose.

The native who had been taken in November last convinced us how far
before every other consideration