268 
Excursion to Port Arthur . 
Lovely land ! and still more lovely water! what might 
you not now be—what must you not inevitably become, 
when the felon race (the only blot on your fair faces), 
shall be merged in the active, industrious, moral 
peasantry!—and yet, humiliating as is the spectacle of 
man’s degradation, it is still one cheering feature of the 
picture, that it leads, in a great measure, to his ultimate 
compulsory regeneration. 
At 9 o’clock we bade adieu to the staunch and fleet 
Eliza , landing on the railway jetty at the head of 
Norfolk Bay. This rail, or rather tramway, is formed 
from the hard wood of the country, and passes over a 
space of five miles, thereby affording a rapid and easy 
means of transit between the heads of Norfolk and 
Long Bays, the latter of which leads directly to Port 
Arthur. This tramway, the projection of Captain 
Booth, has proved to be a work of the utmost 
utility; shortening the distance betwixt Hobart Town 
and Port Arthur, and ensuring a rapid and certain 
communication at times when the long sea-passage 
might be impracticable. Like many men of superior 
intellect, it was the fortune of Captain Booth to encounter 
the sneers of the common herd, who, in their narrow¬ 
mindedness, predicted nought but failure to his enter¬ 
prise. Nothing daunted, and possessing the confidence 
of the Governor, Captain Booth toiled on till they that 
came to jeer went back to admire. The tramway, unlike 
our English railways, follows the natural levels of the 
ground, the ascent of a hill being compensated in its 
opposite descent. 
No horse, no ox, no locomotive traverses its course: 
the waggons are propelled by felons—three men being 
generally allotted to do the work of each waggon, which 
is capable of conveying half a ton of goods at each transit. 
Upon emergency, the same gang have made their three 
