, and patching, which ingenuity devised, to eke out
wretchedness, and preserve the remains of decency. The superior dexterity
of the women was particularly conspicuous. Many a guard have I seen mount,
in which the number of soldiers without shoes exceeded that which had yet
preserved remnants of leather.

Nor was another part of our domestic economy less whimsical. If a lucky
man, who had knocked down a dinner with his gun, or caught a fish
by angling from the rocks, invited a neighbour to dine with him, the
invitation always ran, "bring your own bread." Even at the governor's
table, this custom was constantly observed. Every man when he sat down
pulled his bread out of his pocket, and laid it by his plate.

The insufficiency of our ration soon diminished our execution of labour.
Both soldiers and convicts pleaded such loss of strength, as to find
themselves unable to perform their accustomed tasks. The hours of public
work were accordingly shortened or, rather, every man was ordered to do as
much as his strength would permit, and every other possible indulgence was
granted.

May, 1790. In proportion, however, as lenity and mitigation were extended
to inability and helplessness, inasmuch was the most rigorous justice
executed on disturbers of the public tranquillity. Persons detected in
robbing gardens, or pilfering provisions, were never screened because, as
every man could possess, by his utmost exertions, but a bare sufficiency to
preserve life*, he who deprived his neighbour of that little, drove him
to desperation. No new laws for the punishment of theft were enacted;
but persons of all descriptions were publicly warned, that the severest
penalties, which the existing law in its greatest latitude would authorise,
should be inflicted on offenders. The following sentence of a court
of justice, of which I was a member, on a convict detected in a garden
stealing potatoes, will illustrate the subject. He was ordered to receive
three hundred lashes immediately, to be chained for six months to two other
criminals, who were thus fettered for former offences, and to have his
allowance of flour stopped for six months. So that during the operation of
the sentence, two pounds of pork, and two pounds of rice (or in lieu of the
latter, a quart of pease) per week, constituted his whole subsistence. Such
was the melancholy length to which we were compelled to stretch our penal
system.

[*Its preservation in some cases was found