246 HISTORY, GOVERNMENT, ETC., 



attempted a robbery in the middle of the day, on a Sunday, on the 

 high-road from Sydney to Paramatta, armed with a musket, another 

 person being in his company ; and very many robberies were com- 

 mitted through convict servants being left too much at liberty to 

 roam where they pleased, during the hours of night." 



In Judge Burton's report to the colonial secretary, as to whether 

 juries in the colony have answered the ends of justice, he gives a full 

 account of the jury system, its formation, &c, some passages of 

 which I shall also quote, as it will tend to show the manner in which 

 the law is administered in the colony, and the difficulties encountered 

 in the proper punishment of crime. 



"In civil cases, such as form the ordinary business of the court, 

 the matters in dispute are so simple as to afford but little field for any 

 undue bias on either side. 



" It is only in cases occurring between the government and an 

 individual, or involving some point of political or party feeling, that 

 any trial can be had of the principles of the jurymen, and happily 

 there have been no instances of any such during the time (the last 

 three years) that jury trial has been established. 



" In criminal cases, there is a greater and more constant ground for 

 apprehension of improper influences, and undue bias upon the minds 

 of the jurymen. The prisoners for trial before the court, are chiefly 

 of a class transported hither for crimes committed out of the colony, 

 and persons of the same condition, and others very low in respecta- 

 bility and character, and frequently allied to them, are qualified, 

 according to colonial law, to serve as jurymen. 



" The qualifications are, a clear income, arising out of lands, houses, 

 or other real estate, of at least thirty pounds per annum, or a clear 

 personal estate of three hundred pounds. 



" The disqualifications as they now stand are : ' Every man not a 

 natural-born subject of the king, and every man who hath been or 

 shall be attainted of any treason or felony, or convicted of any crime, 

 (unless he shall have received for such crime a free pardon, or shall 

 be within the benefit and protection of some act of Parliament, having 

 force and effect of a pardon under the great seal,) or, secondly, if any 

 person who, either while serving under any sentence passed upon 

 him in any part of the British dominions, or after the expiration or 

 remission of such sentence, shall have been convicted of any treason, 

 felony, or other infamous offence.' " 



Respecting the qualifications arising from property, Judge Burton 



