Troops 94 9 1 5 2
Civil Department 7 0 0 0 0
Seamen Settlers 3 0 0 0 0
Free Persons 0 7 2 1 2
Total number of
persons 1440 149 3 15 21
- - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - - -
[*The convicts who are become settlers, are included in this number.]
Of my Sydney journal, I find no part sufficiently interesting to
be worth extraction. This place had long been considered only as a depot
for stores. It exhibited nothing but a few old scattered huts and some
sterile gardens. Cultivation of the ground was abandoned, and all our strength
transferred to Rose Hill. Sydney, nevertheless, continued to be the place
of the governor's residence, and consequently the headquarters of the colony.
No public building of note, except a storehouse, had been erected since
my last statement. The barracks, so long talked of, so long promised,
for the accommodation and discipline of the troops, were not even begun
when I left the country; and instead of a new hospital, the old one
was patched up and, with the assistance of one brought ready-framed
from England, served to contain the sick.
The employment of the male convicts here, as at Rose Hill,
was the public labour. Of the women, the majority were compelled
to make shirts, trousers and other necessary parts of dress for the men,
from materials delivered to them from the stores, into which they returned
every Saturday night the produce of their labour, a stipulated weekly task
being assigned to them. In a more early stage, government sent out
all articles of clothing ready made; but, by adopting the present
judicious plan, not only a public saving is effected, but employment
of a suitable nature created for those who would otherwise consume leisure
in idle pursuits only.
On the 26th of November 1791, the number of persons, of all descriptions,
at Sydney, was 1259, to which, if 1628 at Rose Hill and 1172 at Norfolk Island
be added, the total number of persons in New South Wales and its dependency
will be found to amount to 4059.*
[*A very considerable addition to this number has been made since I quitted
the settlement, by fresh troops and convicts sent thither from England.]
On the 13th of December 1791, the marine battalion embarked on board
His Majesty's ship Gorgon, and on the 18th sailed for England.
CHAPTER XVII.
Miscellaneous Remarks on the country. On its vegetable productions.
On its climate. On its animal productions. On its natives, etc.
The journals contained in the body of this publication, illustrated by
the map which accompanies it (unfortunately, there is no map accompanying
this etext), are, I conceive, so descriptive of every part of the country
known to us, that little remains to be added beyond a few general observations.
The first impression made on a stranger is certainly favourable.
He sees gently swelling hills connected by vales which possess every beauty
that verdure of trees, and form, simply considered in itself, can produce;
but he looks in vain for those murmuring rills and refreshing springs
which fructify and embellish more happy lands.
