234 ACCOUNT OF THE ENGLISH COLONY [December, 



unprepared. By the next Saturday, a quantity of wheat fufficient for 

 one ferving having been paffed through the large mill ?t Parramatta, 

 the convicts received their ration of that article ground coarfe. 



Short as was the quantity of flour in ftore, they did not, however, 

 defpair of being able to iffue fome meal of that feaibn's growth before 

 it could be entirely expended. About the middle of the month, the 

 wheat that was fown in April, about ninety acres, being perfectly ripe, 

 the harveft commenced ; and from that quantity cf ground it was cal- 

 culated that upwards of twenty- two bufhels an acre would be re- 

 ceived. Moft of the fettlers had begun to reap ; and they, as well as 

 others who had grown grain, were informed, that " wheat, properly 

 dried and cleaned, would be received at Sydney by the Commiffary at 

 ten millings the bufhel ; but that none could be purchafed from any 

 other perfons than thofe who had grown it on their own farms ; 

 neither could any be taken into the ftores at Parramatta." 



The precaution of receiving w T heat only from thofe perfons who 

 had raifed it, was intended to prevent the petty and rafcally traffic 

 which would otherwife have been carried on between free people off 

 the ftores, and perfons who might employ them to fell the fruits of 

 their depredations on the public and other grounds. 



An idea very generally prevailed among the convicts, that the 

 Lieutenant-Governor was not authorifed to caufe a fentence of death 

 to be carried into execution : a notron that was in their minds con- 

 firmed by the mercy which had been extended to one of them who 

 had been condemned, and pardoned by him. It became, therefore, 

 abfolutely neceffary, for their own fakes, to let them fee that he was 

 not only pofTefTed of the power, but that he would alfo exercife it. On 

 this account, a prifoner then under fentence was executed on Tuefday 

 the ioth of December ; and, moft fortunately, there did not exift in 

 the colony at that time a fitter object for example. The poor wretch,, 

 to his laft moment, cherifhed the idea that he mould not fuffer ; and 

 confequently could have been ill prepared for the change that he was 

 about to experience. 



Independent 



