1 799.] OF NEW SOUTH WALES. 491 



ducing the expences of the colony, Thefe expences were certainly- 

 great, and had been confiderably increafed. The fettlement was at 

 this time much in want of many neceffary articles of life; and when 

 thefe were brought by fpeculators and traders who occafionally touched 

 there, they demanded more than five hundred per cent, above what 

 the fame articles could have been fent out for from England, with 

 every addition of freight, infurance, &c. 



It having been for feveral days reported, that the crews of two 

 boats, which had been permitted to go to Hunter's River, had been 

 cut off by the natives, the Governor ordered his whale-boat to be well 

 armed, and to proceed thither in queft of the boats and their crews ; 

 fending in her Henry Hacking, a perfon on whom he could depend. 

 This man, at his return, informed the Governor, that on his arrival 

 an attempt had been made to burn the fmaller boat, which had three 

 men in her, who were each provided with a mufquet. The boat was 

 there, but the men were not to be found. Going in fearch of them, 

 he fell in with a large body of natives, all armed. On defiring them 

 to inform him what was become of the white men, they told him 

 that they were gone to Sydney. This, however, did not fatisfy him, 

 as he found that they had taken away the fails of the boat, the men's 

 blankets, and every thing that they had with them. He then threat- 

 ened to kill them if they did not inftantly inform him, and prefented 

 his mufquet ; at which they laughed, and {aid, that if he did not go 

 away, and leave them a fmall boat which he had with him, and the 

 whale-boat, they would deftroy every white man there, and poifed 

 their fpears in a threatening manner. He again levelled his mufquet, 

 in the hope of alarming them ; but they were not fo eafily frightened, 

 and became more noify and violent. Finding that an attack was al- 

 moft certain, he charged his gun with buck-mot, and ordered them 

 to leave the place ; but, their clamour increafing, he fired, and four 

 of them fell, one of whom got up again and ran off, the other three 

 remaining upon the gtound, probably mortally wounded. The whole 



3 R 2 difap- 



