CO885(1-2) — Page 603

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Males.

Females.

Total.

December 1845

3,268

October 1846

3,073

October 1847

2,328

December 1845

1,091

བྷ ཆེ ིི ཚི ། |

3,509

3,347

2,493

1,288

Thus in three years there was a reduction of two-

thirds in the number of unemployed convicts.

It is true that the total number of convicts

under sentence in Van Diemen's Land has been

diminishing each year: it was about 30,000 in

The number of convicts in Van Diemen's Land at

1846, and 26,000 in 1848; but then this would by the undermentioned periods, was as follows: no means necessarily imply a proportionate decrease

in the number of able-bodied convicts who could

Maler. Females Total.

not obtain engagements, for the men who had

July become free, would equally remain competitors for December 1846 ..

April employment, so that the only relief to be taken into account is the removal of such of them as may have emigrated.

1846

1847 ..

26,100

25,905

26,157

4470

4271

30,570

30,176

4544 30,701

April

1848

December 1848.

22,678

21,494

3936

26,614

3965

25,459

23

dition four years ago; and many of the faults then most loudly complained of in public have been remedied. And a small additional outlet is opening itself in Western Australia. This, however, cannot be extensive; nor must it be supposed that time- expired or pardoned convicts will easily remove from thence to the adjacent countries. The com- munications are not frequent, and the distances are great. In recording, therefore, a decided and a gratifying improvement in Van Diemen's Land, the compiler of the present paper, who has not in the previous pages wished to obtrude opinions of his own, hopes that he may be per- mitted to offer the concluding remark, that the prospects of that colony do still appear to him dark and full of danger, if indeed this island alone (or virtually alone) is to receive all the criminals for whom under the present system of secondary punishments it will be impossible to provide at home. What the number of these criminals may roughly be estimated to be, will appear from the second and remaining part of this paper.

PUBLIC RECORD OFFICE

C.O.

Reference :-

885

2 PUBLIC RECORD OFFICE, LONDON

ALLY WITHOUT PERMISSION OF THE BE REPRODUCED PHOTOGRAPHIC-

COPYRIGHT PHOTOGRAPH-NOT TO

47. Great reductions have been effected. The commissariat expenditure for convicts, which was 300,000 in 1840, was reduced to 293,000, in 1847, and to 244,500l. in 1848; being a diminu- tion in the second year, of 56,5001. The military force also has been reduced from two regiments to one (a saving which, it is believed, is usually reckoned at about 25,000%), and this must in time involve various contingent savings for barracks. commissariat services, &c. >

48. This therefore closes the review of the Colo- An nial part of the Transportation question. attempt in 1849 to distribute such convicts as had undergone due preliminary punishment among several colonies, instead of crowding them in one- although the reasonableness of the aim appeared at

first sight to be felt in Parliament-has been de- feated; and Parliament has sympathized with each colony that objected, although perhaps it was inclined to admit as a general proposition, that a dispersion of convicts was better than their conden- sation.

49. In the meanwhile Van Diemen's Land has unquestionably recovered wonderfully from its con-

II. Statistics of Transportation, and extent of the Question.

50. Many of the opinions and feelings current on the subject strike at any use of Transportation at all. The determination shown by one settlement after another to receive no convicts; the encourage- ment afforded to that sentiment by Parliamentary speeches, which exercise a considerable influence in the colonies; the dislike exhibited to the recep. tion of convicts even in Van Diemen's Land, into which the Government may claim a more especial right to continue sending them, because it has always been a penal colony, but where many of the free settlers do not disguise that they submit from weak- ness alone, and with a growing feeling of resent- ment and disaffection; all these are movements which, whether consciously or not on the part of those by whom they are supported, tend towards the entire disuse of Transportation. Is this punish- inent then to be given up? or if upheld, can the Island of Van Diemen's Land alone receive all the criminals convicted of transportable offences, of