LAND, LABOUR AND COMMERCE. 161 



Macquarie mutilated each by cutting out a small coin for ex- 

 change. The value of the large coin was 53. and of the small 

 is. 3d. 1 



The Proclamation insisting that the notes should be immedi- 

 ately payable in sterling money was a failure, and the courts 

 were unable to enforce it. 2 Its objects were made more un- 

 attainable by the action of Commissary Allan, who arrived in 

 June, 1813. He persuaded the Governor to allow him to replace 

 the old system of store receipts at the Commissariat by the issue 

 of promissory notes signed by the Commissary, pointing out the 

 greater convenience and simplicity of the method. But Allan 

 issued notes for private as well as public purposes, and improved 

 his own while injuring the Government's credit Had he kept, 

 as he promised to do, within his monthly estimate, he would 

 have run no risk. But he did not, and Macquarie was practic- 

 ally forced to restore the old custom of store receipts. He did 

 it, however, so suddenly as to cause Allan great financial em- 

 barrassment, and to procure him the sympathy of the whole 

 settlement. 3 In 1816 a determined effort was made to do away 

 with the depreciated paper currency. At the end of November 

 the tender of sterling money for the face value of the currency 

 notes was again made compulsory, but finding that this could 

 not be enforced, on the /th December a Proclamation was issued 

 containing a schedule of the rates at which they were to be ex- 

 changed, and this was carried out very leniently. 4 Wylde in 

 his desire to find a stable currency to replace the promissory 

 notes proposed that a bank should be established, a scheme 



1 D. 5, May, 1812, Bathurst to M., R.O., MS. also D. i, 28th June, 1813. 

 R.O., MS. 



2 Proclamation, nth December, 1813. Bent and Wylde both admitted actions 

 founded on the notes which by this Proclamation were declared illegal. See 

 Evidence of Wylde, Appendix, Bigge's Reports. R.O., MS. 



3 D. 6, 23rd June. 1815. R.O., MS. A similar attempt was made by Allan's 

 successor in 1817 with precisely the same result. 



4 Wylde described the state of affairs when he arrived in 1816 in the following 

 words :..."! very soon . . . had to discover, that to give effect and validity to 

 any of the currency notes, for the non-payment of which actions were brought, 

 it would be necessary altogether to overlook and dismiss from the consideration 

 of the Court in Judgment several colonial Proclamations and Orders not only of 

 old but of very recent date, which declared all such notes as (were) in question 

 and their negotiations to be absolutely null and void ". Wylde to Goulburn 

 3rd March, 1817. R.O., MS. The Proclamations were those of 1813. It was 

 this state of affairs which gave rise to the above-mentioned meetings, etc., and 

 the Proclamation, yth December, 1816. 



II 



