passed from the messenger to the
hands of a merchant, who disregarded its fate. It obtained no reply.

The colony had just reason to complain at the time. The supreme court
had been closed for many months: the business of the legislative council
detained the judge and attorney-general from their proper functions, and
for nearly two years no gaol delivery had occurred at Launceston. Two
persons, father and son, charged with cattle-stealing, had been two
years awaiting trial, when they were both acquitted. The evidence
against them was of the slightest description; yet during their
detention domestic calamities of all kinds had overtaken them.

The delay was still further extended by the issue of a new charter, and
with the usual incaution of the secretary of state. This charter arrived
1831: it nominated Mr. Pedder chief justice, and Alexander Macduff
Baxter, puisne judge. It made no provision for continuing process begun
in the late court, and required colonial legislation to cure the defects
of its details.

Mr. Baxter, the puisne judge elect, had been attorney-general of New
South Wales. His relations with Darling had not been cordial, and he was
disgraced in the eyes of the public by domestic differences: his wife
was insane, and he himself was intemperate. Just before he left Sydney
for Van Diemen's Land, he was bound over to keep the peace, and was
declared insolvent. On his arrival, the royal warrant for his induction
had not reached the colony, and after some delay he returned to New
South Wales, and thence to Great Britain, where he died. Mr. Baxter
ascribed his ruin to his grant from the crown: he employed persons to
look after his estate, and they conducted him to beggary.[185]

The lieutenant-governor resolved, if possible, to exclude Baxter from an
office which he could only dishonor, and passed an act, pronounced by
the lawyers a piece of "doubtful and dangerous" legislation, by which
the clause of the charter requiring two judges was expunged, thus
constituting the court of one. The act of parliament, however,
authorised the measure: the council had power to repeal or annul a
patent, until the pleasure of the crown were known. The act was
approved, and remains among the laws. Occasions might occur, when the
course of justice would be arrested in a small community by requiring
many officers to constitute a court.[186]

The reformers were not disheartened by their failure: they assembled
again the follo