ON THE HIGH SEAS. 187 



authority 'I beg leave, with submission, to express my hope, 

 that your Excellency on reconsideration will be satisfied that 

 the tendency of my observations as to any influence goes no 

 further than as to legal construction and principle not upon 

 the facts merely, but on the facts as involving legal distinctions, 

 proceedings, etc., and in this sense I trust I may be free from 

 any apprehension that your Excellency would think it unfit to 

 be observed that your opinion ought to be influenced not upon 

 the facts abstractly considered but ' by high legal authority ' on 

 legal considerations and points arising from these facts and to 

 which I myself thought it due, on a difference of opinion, to 

 enter so at large into the grounds, as was the only motive that 

 urged me at all to the remark in general excuse and explan- 

 ation. I trust that no assurance on my part will be requisite 

 to satisfy your Excellency that I could not have any intention 

 of even in the least remarking upon that independence of judg- 

 ment and conduct which so peculiarly belong to your Excel- 

 lency's measures and Government." 1 



The Governor closed the correspondence in a conciliatory 

 fashion, adopting all Wylde's proposals and expressing his 

 feeling "that in such cases as the present, involving 'questions 

 of a legal nature and construction,' it is peculiarly the province 

 of the first Law Officer of this Government not merely to 

 suggest but also to carry into effect the measures to be adopted 

 for the ends of justice." 2 



All the papers bearing on the case, the witnesses, including 

 ten soldiers and fourteen convicts, the three soldiers and the 

 two officers, were sent to England early in December. They 

 arrived in June, 1818. The surgeon at once applied to the 

 Navy Board to be released from his arrest. The Board wrote 

 to the Colonial Office supporting his petition and stating that 

 they could not find that he had been to blame for what had 

 happened. The matter was referred to the Home Office, who 

 decided that the surgeon must remain under arrest until the 

 case had been inquired into by the magistrates. 



The inquiry was held and a prosecution instituted against 

 the three soldiers. In January, 1819, six months after their 



1 Wylde to Macquarie, z8th November, 1817. R.O., MS. 



2 Macquarie to Wylde, agth November, 1817. R.O., MS. 



