POET ESSINGTON A MILITARY POST. 143 



be reg"arded as a complete failure. Yet it could not 

 well have been otherwise. It was never more than a 

 mere military post, and the smallness of the 

 party, almost always fiirther lessened by sickness, 

 was such that, even if judiciously manag-ed, little 

 more could be expected than that they should be 

 employed merely in rendering' their own condition 

 more comfortable. And now after the settlement 

 has been established for eleven years, they are not 

 even able to keep themselves in fresh veg'etables, 

 much less efficiently to supply any of Her Majesty's 

 vessels which may happen to call there. 



In order to develope the resources of a colony, 

 always provided it possesses any such, surely some- 

 thing* more is required than the mere presence of a 

 party of soldiers, but it appears throug"hout, that 

 Government were opposed to g'iving" encourag'ement 

 to the permanent settlement at Port Essing"ton, of 

 any of her Majesty's subjects. It is well perhaps 

 that such has been the case, as I can conceive few 

 positions more distressing than that which a settler 

 would soon find himself placed in were he tempted 

 by erroneous and hig"hly coloured reports of the 

 productiveness of the place — and such are not want- 

 ing", — to come there with the vain hopes of being- 

 able to raise tropical productions* for export, even 



* I need not here enlarge upon the unfitness of Port Essing- 

 ton for agricultural pursuits — even that point has long ago been 

 given up. The quantity of land which might be made productive 

 is exceedingly small.^and although cotton, sugar cane, and other 



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