2793-3 OF NEW SOUTH WALES. 22c 



tinued fo had they not been called forth by a defire of placing him- 

 felf in competition with the mill-wright fent by Government to the 

 fettlement of Sydney. 



His machine was a walking mill, the principal wheel of which was 

 fifteen feet in diameter, and was worked by two men : while this 

 wheel was performing one revolution, the mill-ftones performed 

 twenty. As it had been in oppofition to the public mill-wright that 

 he undertook to conftruet this mill, he of courfe derived no afhftance 

 whatever from the other's knowledge, and had to contend not only 

 with his opinion, but the opinion of fuch as he could prejudice againfl 

 him. The heavy part of the work, cutting and bringing in the tim- 

 ber, and afterwards preparing it, was performed by his fellow-prifo- 

 ners, who gave him their labour voluntarily. He was three months 

 and five days from his taking it in hand to his offering it for the firft 

 trial. On this trial it was found defective in fome of the machinery, 

 which was all conftructed of the timber of the country, and not pro- 

 perly feafoned. Its effects in grinding were various ; at firft, two 

 bufhels an hour ; afterwards four ; and at lad only one. Had the 

 whole of the machinery been upon a larger fcale, there was every rea- 

 fon to fuppofe that it would have anfwered the expectation of the 

 mod interefted. The conftructor, however, had a great deal of me- 

 rit, and, perceiving what the defects were, undertook to make ano- 

 ther upon a larger fcale at Sydney, and on an improved plan. For 

 this purpofe, all the artificers and a gang of convicts were fent down 

 from Parramatta, and were firft employed in forming a timber-yard at 

 Feterfham, two hundred feet fquare. 



At that place (a fmali diftrict in the neighbourhood of Sydney, fo 

 named by the Lieutenant-Governor) nine huts for labouring con- 

 victs were built, and fixty acres of government ground cleared of tim- 

 ber, twenty of which were fown with Indian corn. This was the 

 only addition made to the public ground that feafon ; and the fore dif- 

 ference that was obfervable in the progrefs of their cultivation, con- 

 fided in fawing that year with wheat a large portion of that ground 



which 



