LAND, LABOUR AND COMMERCE. 139 



peck of wheat ; in clothes, tea, sugar, tobacco and money to the 

 value of 15 a year, unless they are idle and worthless, when I 

 confine the allowance to 10, which is the rate of wages estab- 

 lished by Government. To those who behave well I give 

 gratuities varying from i to 5, but I regret to say this 

 practice does not much swell the amount of my expenditure.'^ 



His house-servants he paid from 10 to 15, and that he 

 was a good master is evinced by the fact that not one of his 

 servants ever attempted to run away. 



In addition to the convicts he employed some ticket-of-leave 

 men and free labourers, whom he paid according to contracts 

 made with each of them individually, and not in accordance 

 with the scale of wages drawn up by the Governor in 1816. 

 Cox, who had 1 20 convict servants as well as some who were 

 not convicts, paid his ploughmen (convict or free) 10 to 1$ 

 a year, and his mechanics 15 to 2$, but as he may have paid 

 the whole amount in "property" it is difficult to draw any 

 comparison between Macarthur's and his methods. 1 



These are about half the items. The lower price in Macquarie's scale is due 

 to the fact that the wages are to be paid in sterling money. In King's scale they 

 are " colonial currency," which was much depreciated. In King's time, the work- 

 ing hours were fifty a week. 



Such were the general conditions of the workmen in the 

 settlement in 1821. There was practically no distinction be- 

 tween free and convict labourers. 2 In Sydney the wealthy 

 ticket-of-leave men, who had in many cases brought money 



1 See Appendix, Bigge's Reports. R.O., MS. The G.G.O., 7th December,. 

 1816, regulates the wages of labourers, making no distinction for a few agricultural 

 operations between convict and free. It may be compared with the scale drawn 

 up by King, 3151 October, 1801. H.R., III., p. 252. 



" The convict, however, was subject to what was really a criminal jurisdiction 

 of the magistrates. 



