THE FIRST LEGISLATIVE COUNCIL 349 



Legislative Council had increased their numbers by sixteen elective 

 and eight nominee members, and they met for their third session 

 in August, 1853. On the 31st of that month Mr. Latrobe sent 

 down the Bill his advisers had concocted, but the enlarged Council 

 was even more hostile to the Government than the first had been 

 they insisted on the restoration of all the old clauses, and added 

 others still more stringent. Any person who had been convicted 

 of felony was liable to punishment if found in Victoria within three 

 years of the completion of his sentence. Only one elective member 

 supported the Executive, and he was balanced by one of the official 

 members going over to the opposition. There was no possibility 

 of altering the issue and Mr. Latrobe reserved the Bill for the 

 Royal pleasure, and said nothing about the disallowance of the 

 original measure, which therefore remained in force. But before 

 it came to the final struggle Mr. Latrobe had sent home his resig- 

 nation, and the settlement of the question passed into other hands. 

 It may be concluded here in anticipation. When Sir Charles 

 Hotham was leaving England, the Duke of Newcastle pressed him 

 to use his best endeavours to induce the Legislative Council to 

 amend the Act in conformity with the wishes of the Crown. Sir 

 George Grey, who assumed the office of Colonial Minister soon 

 afterwards, directed him in June, 1854, to release any offenders 

 who had been illegally imprisoned under an Act to which Her 

 Majesty had not consented. The publication of these instructions 

 aroused intense feeling, and at a public meeting held in Melbourne 

 a petition was adopted to the Council which contained passages 

 amounting practically to defiance, e.g. : 



" That your petitioners emphatically protest that the Sovereign 

 of the British realms, neither hath, nor ought to have, any right, 

 prerogative, or power, warranting the letting loose in the colony of 

 Victoria of the convicted criminals of other countries or colonies. 



" That your petitioners feel that the carrying out of Sir George 

 Grey's suggestions will render the Eoyal prerogative odious to the 

 colonists, and will seriously endanger the connection existing between 

 this colony and the parent state." 



It wound up by praying the Council to reject the modified Bill 

 which the Governor favoured and to re-enact the original measure 



