6 



SETTLEMENT OF NORFOLK ISLAND. 



Under these circumstances the progress of the settlement was 

 very slow, but gradually, as the little colony was reinforced by 

 fresh drafts from Sydney, ground was cleared and brought 

 under cultivation, huts and store-houses were erected, and a 

 weatherboard cottage, 24 feet by 12 feet, was built for a Govern- 

 ment house. In January, 1790, two years after his first 

 landing, there were on the island 79 male and 33 female 

 convicts and 32 free settlers ; in all 144 souls. King's adminis- 

 tration of Norfolk Island lasted (with one interval) from 

 February, 1788, to September, 1796, a period of eight and a half 

 years. He has left a diary of those days extending over many 

 quarto pages of print. It is dreary reading, being a chronicle 

 of petty crimes and rough punishments, of crops destroyed by 

 blight or grub, of disorders, conspiracies, and mutinies among 

 the prisoners, of discontent among the settlers whether free or 

 emancipated. King ruled this turbulent community like a 

 sailor, with a mixture of rough severity and good-natured 

 lenity, dealing out barbaric punishment to offenders, and eqally 

 barbaric indulgences as a reward for improved behaviour. 



The early attempts at agriculture were not very successful. 

 When his first little patch of wheat came up the south-west 

 wind blighted it and turned it black ; the next crop (and many 

 a one after that) was nipped oft by a small black caterpillar 

 which came in thousands; others were destroyed by a great 

 worm ; much was eaten by parrakeets; and even when the wheat 

 was harvested it was attacked by the weevil and rendered 

 useless. The rats— the only animals on the island— ate his 

 Indian corn, in spite of traps and pounded glass mixed with 

 oatmeal which slew them in hundreds. The most successful 

 crops were potatoes and vegetables. Nor was he more success- 

 ful with his live stock than with his agriculture. There being 

 no grass on the island the stock had to be fed on herbs and 

 plants. The sheep succumbed and died, partly from starvation, 

 partly from scab. The pigs suffered greatly from poisonous 

 herbs, and he had great difficulty in feeding them until he 

 found that a tall palm or fern, growing 80 feet high, had a soft 

 core tasting like a bad turnip, on which the hogs throve 

 splendidly. 



In spite of all these misfortunes, however, and in spite of the 

 calamity of a hurricane of wind and rain from the south-east 

 which laid waste and nearly destroyed the camp and the 

 plantations, the little settlement struggled ahead. 



In January, 1790, the Commandant records with pride that 

 he had 30 acres of land in cultivation and his free settlers 18 

 acres. He had in store 300 bushels of wheat and 140 bushels 

 of Indian corn. 



While King was thus rejoicing in the progress of his little 

 colony, he little thought of the troubles which were impending, 



