

Monthly Review ef Literature. 535 



midable and corrective punishment, for that question has been canvassed by 

 Archbishop Whately with a talent, to which we dare not even aspire. We shall 

 therefore content ourselves with a very brief statement of the evils and abuses 

 connected with that colony, and shall cite from the books under our considera- 

 tion a few extracts in proof of those statements. 



But we must premise a few historical statements respecting penal colonies 

 in general. If we were to coincide with the superficial views of Filangieri, 

 we should trace the punishment of transportation to a high antiquity ; but 

 that single statement is sufficient to convict that celebrated politician of very 

 gross ignorance ; for banishment in Greece is known by every school-boy of 

 modern times to have been a mulct for political offences not a visitation for 

 moral delinquency. Under the Roman law, first of all, was banishment first 

 regarded as a moral punishment, although then it was used rather for politi- 

 cal offences ; but from that time even to a very late period the business of 

 transportation and the choice of abode were left to the criminal. The Portu- 

 guese, in modern times, were the first to establish final settlements in Western 

 Africa and in the East Indies. The year 1596 is the earliest period in Eng- 

 lish history, to which we can trace the establishment of transportation as a 

 ^punishment for " rogues and vagabonds." Transportation to the American 

 '^colonies continued from the reign of James I. to that of George III. ; when 

 the settlers, seeing the disadvantages resulting to the free settlers from the 

 convict 'population, refused to admit any further increase of their numbers. 

 This refusal obliged the home-government to look for some new place of con- 

 signment for the criminals ; and their accumulation during the war became 

 so frightful, that an immediate remedy became absolutely necessary. The 

 penitentiary plan of Blackstone and Howard having been rejected, confine- 

 ment 'in the hulks was first adopted ; and subsequently a penal settlement 

 was formed in 1/88 at Port Jackson, and in two years the colony was peopled 

 with 2,300 male and 120 female convicts a very pretty proportion indeed in 

 a settlement of such a nature ! 



The evils of which the American colonists complained were mere trifles 

 when compared with those which form the subject of Australian grievances. 

 In the former the convict population at the commencement of the American 

 war was only 50,000, the free settlers being 1,800,000 ; while in Australia 

 the proportion of convicts to free settlers is about twenty-three to ten : that 

 is, in plain language, the profligate portion of the inhabitants were more than 

 the double the ostensibly respectable part of the population. This is bad 

 enough, and not very encouraging to free emigrants : but this is not all. The 

 government so badly arranges matters, that transportation, so far from being 

 formidable, acts as a premium on crime, and Sydney is looked on as a land 

 of promise by the profligate members of the parent community. The dispro- 

 portion between the virtuous free emigrant population, and " the scum of the 

 people and wicked comdemned men, presents great primd facie difficulties to 

 a proper arrangement of colonial affairs ; but the facilities afforded to eman- 

 cipated or ticket-of-lease convicts for evading penal discipline, and acquiring 

 wealth and importance according to the present system, are, besides, so extra- 

 ordinary and so discouraging to the better portion of the society, that we are 

 not at all surprised at the loud complaints made by the authors of the books 

 now before us. The plan of assigning convicts to the free colonists has alto- 

 gether failed, and is now very generally regarded as the main cause of the 

 evils that so much demand reform. The only discipline that individuals can 

 exercise over such servants is quite insufficient to curb the rampant profligacy 

 of Newgate ; and the experience of forty years and upwards should have con- 

 vinced the government that some reform was quite necessary in the method 

 of employing convicts. It'is quite absurd that a convict should, under the 

 most favourable circumstances, be ever admitted to equal privileges with the 

 honest settler : yet such is the case. Transportation must be a bondfde 

 punishment, if it is to be one at all. It must be " a terror to evil doers," 



