"I suppose that for these last thirty years, communibus
annis, there have been at least 600 convicts per year
imported into this province: and these have probably gone
into 400 families."

After answering some objections to their importation because of the
contagious diseases likely to be communicated by them, he further
remarks,--

"This makes at least 400 to one, that they do no injury to
the country in the way complained of: and the people's
continuing to buy and receive them so constantly, shows
plainly the general sense of the country about the matter;
notwithstanding a few gentlemen seem so angry that convicts
are imported here at all, and would, if they could, by
spreading this terror, prevent the people's buying them. I
confess I am one, says he, who think a young country cannot
be settled, cultivated, and improved, without people of some
sort: and that it is much better for the country to receive
convicts than slaves. The wicked and bad amongst them, that
come into this province, mostly run away to the northward;
mix with their people, and pass for honest men: whilst those
more innocent, and who came for very small offences, serve
their times out here, behave well, and become useful
people."

This attempt to justify the _convict trade_ elicited two able and
spirited replies over the signatures of "Philanthropos" and "C.D."
appearing in "Green's Gazette" of 20th of August, 1767, in which the
writer of the first article is handled "with the gloves off."

"His remarks [says Philanthropos] remind me of the
observation of a great philosopher, who alleges that there
is a certain race of men of so selfish a cast, that they
would even set a neighbour's house on fire, for the
convenience of roasting an egg at the blaze. That these are
not the reveries of fanciful speculatists, the author now
under consideration is in a great measure a proof; for who,
but a man swayed with the most sordid selfishness, would
endeavor to disarm the people of all caution against such
imminent danger, lest their just apprehensions should
interfere with his little schemes of profit? And who but
such a man would appear publicly as an advocate for the
importation of felons, the scourings of jails, and the
abandoned outcasts of the British nation, as a mode in any
sor