ecent
events, and facts which are incontrovertible, is, of all evils,
the most sincerely to be deprecated and guarded against. Of the
capability of the settlement to produce adequate means for the
subsistence of its members, there can be but a single opinion
amongst persons who are enabled, from experience, to judge of the
nature and fertility of the soil; and it must, consequently, form
an evident conclusion, that some unnatural check must have sprung
up to impede the ordinary course of proceedings. My object,
however, is not to deprecate the opinions of others, but to give
to the public those ideas of improvement which have arisen in my
own mind, and which have been confirmed by the approbation of
others, who are equally as well or better qualified to decide
upon this important subject.

Complaints having been made by the government of the expenses
of the colony, which have accumulated, rather than diminished,
with the increasing growth of the settlement, I shall first enter
into a statement of the causes of this augmented expense, part of
which, as I shall hope to demonstrate with clearness, has arisen
out of the nature of things, and the other part may be attributed
to various causes.

1st, As to the retarded progress of public buildings, and the
diminution in the labour of the convicts.--This decrease in the
quantity of labour performed, is to be attributed to the natural
falling-off in the strength of the convicts employed in
government labour, from deaths, desertions, and their becoming
free. Those who were first sent to the colony, and had been
originally transported for seven and fourteen years had served
their times, the former in 1793, and the latter in 1800; numbers
had been released from their servitude on account of their
exemplary behaviour, or of services done to the colony; and all
who became settlers being allowed one, two, or more convicts to
assist in the cultivation of the tracts assigned to them, the
reduction in those who laboured for the crown must necessarily
have been very considerable, and must still continue in an
increasing degree, owing to the great numbers of free settlers
who have been allowed to go out from England, many of whom have
only been a great expense to government, and an hindrance to the
settlement. From a correct estimation taken in the year 1800, it
was ascertained that three-fourths of the convicts employed in
the service of government at the close of 1792, had been
su