1836.] AT HOBART TOWN. 439 



both here and in England, be forgotten. On the whole, as 

 a place of punishment, the object is scarcely gained ; as a 

 real system of reform it has failed, as perhaps would every 

 other plan ; but as a means of making men outwardly honest 

 — of converting vagabonds, most useless in one hemisphere, 

 into active citizens of another, and thus giving birth to a new 

 and splendid country — a grand centre of civilisation — It has 

 succeeded to a degree perhaps unparalleled in history. 



January 2pth. — The Beagle sailed for Hobart Town in 

 Van Diemen's Land. On the 5th of February, after a six 

 days' passage, of which the first part was fine and the latter 

 very cold and squally, we entered the mouth of Storm Bay : 

 the weather justified this awful name. The bay should 

 rather be called an estuary, for it receives at its head the 

 waters of the Derwent. Near the mouth, there are some 

 extensive basaltic platforms ; but higher up the land 

 becomes mountainous, and is covered by a light wood. 

 The lower parts of the hills which skirt the bay are cleared ; 

 and the bright yellow fields of corn, and dark green ones 

 of potatoes, appear very luxuriant. Late in the evening 

 we anchored in the snug cove, on the shores of which 

 stands the capital of Tasmania. The first aspect of the 

 place was very inferior to that of Sydney ; the latter might 

 be called a city, this only a town. It stands at the base of 

 Mount Wellington, a mountain 3100 feet high, but of little 

 picturesque beauty ; from this source, however, it receives 

 a good supply of water. Round the cove there are some 

 fine warehouses, and on one side a small fort. Coming 

 from the Spanish settlements, where such magnificent care 

 has generally been paid to the fortifications, the means of 

 defence in these colonies appeared very contemptible. Com- 

 paring the town with Sydney, I was chiefly struck with the 

 comparative fewness of the large houses, either built or 

 building. Hobart Town, from the census of 1835, con- 

 tained 13,826 inhabitants, and the whole of Tasmania 



36, SOS- 

 All the aborigines have been removed to an island in 

 Bass's Straits, so that Van Diemen's Land enjoys the great 

 advantage of being free from a native population. This 

 most cruel step seems to have been quite unavoidable, as 

 the only means of stopping a fearful succession of robberies, 

 burnings, and murders, committed by the blacks ; and 

 which sooner or later would have ended in their utter 



