History of New South Wales
From the Records
VOLUME 1 - GOVERNOR PHILLIP 1783-1789
G. B. Barton - 1889
PART I
The Chronicles of Sydney Cove
THE value of contemporary records in connection with the foundation of a colony was fortunately recognised in the official circle which surrounded Phillip; and thus it happened that no less than four members of his staff devoted their attention from the first to the work of recording in their journals from day to day the various events of importance connected with the work they had in hand. Captain Hunter, Captain Tench, Judge-Advocate Collins, and Surgeon White, each kept his diary faithfully, and each did so with a view to the publication of its contents. Lieutenant King also entered in his note-books the various incidents of the voyage out in the First Fleet, and the proceedings at Norfolk Island during the time he was in command there; but he did not write for publication, although his Norfolk Island journal was published in Captain Hunter's volume. Taken altogether, these records comprise a very full and varied account of the "transactions" connected with Phillip's expedition. Each was written from a different standpoint, and consequently each presents the reader with a different view of the events recorded. Their subsequent appearance in print attracted very considerable attention, not only in England, but on the Continent - a fact attested by the appearance of successive editions as well as of several translations into foreign languages (1).
The first publication which gave the English public an authentic account of the results of Phillip's expedition was the book commonly known as Phillip's Voyage (2) — a handsome quarto volume, "embellished with fifty-five copperplates," which made its appearance in the year 1789. It was practically an official production, published by John Stockdale, of Piccadilly, the well-known Government printer of the day. The historical part of the work was based on the despatches received from Phillip, the latest date being November, 1788; the rest of the matter being made up partly of descriptive sketches of animals, birds, and fishes, illustrated by hand-painted engravings; and partly of accounts of voyages made by some of the transports on their return from the colony to Batavia, England, and China. Phillip's despatches, " which were liberally communicated by Government," were written out with editorial decorations by the compiler for the purpose of presenting a connected narrative of events. The portion of the work devoted to natural history was apparently done by several hands, and judging from the appearance of the illustrations, few of them were drawn and coloured from real life. The Voyage proved a very readable publication, and no doubt made a good impression on the public mind with respect to the prospects of the distant settlement. The work passed through three editions in the course of the following year, and was shortly afterwards translated into French and German. It contains a curiosity in the shape of an "elegant vignette" on the title-page, representing Hope standing in classical attire on the shores of Sydney Cove and addressing words of encouragement to Art and Labour, attended by Peace. This vignette was engraved from a medallion, " which the ingenious Mr. Wedgwood caused to be modelled from a small piece of clay brought from Sydney Cove." The Wedgwood's clay had been sent by Phillip through Lord Sydney to Sir Joseph Banks, and had been handed by him to Wedgwood for the purpose of being chemically analysed. It was then pronounced "an excellent material for pottery," and an opinion was expressed that " it might certainly be made the basis of a valuable manufacture for our infant colony." The idea thus suggested was illustrated by the medallion; and in order to give further effect to it, the aid of poetic inspiration was sought in the person of Dr. Erasmus Darwin — " a mighty master of unmeaning rhyme," as Byron called him, and an old friend of Wedgwood's — who wrote the prophetic lines describing the " Visit of Hope to Sydney Cove, near Botany Bay," published with the vignette in Phillip' s Voyage (3).
The next publication in order of date was Captain Tench's Narrative of the Expedition — a small octavo published in 1789, the author's introduction being dated from Sydney Cove, July 10, 1788. In offering his little tract — as he called it — to the public, Tench remarked that it was his wish to supply amusement as well as information; and it may be admitted that he was not unsuccessful in his effort — his book being pleasant reading, notwithstanding an occasional glimpse of the gloomy times he lived in. He was evidently an observant traveller, with a keen eye for a picture or a dramatic situation; disposed to take a genial view of everything, as far as he could; and much given to poetical quotations and good stories (4). He had a faculty for description of which he does not seem to have been conscious, or he would have been tempted to make greater use of it. The excitement on board the Fleet at Botany Bay, when the two French ships suddenly appeared in the offing, can be seen at a glance in the following lines :—
The thoughts of removal [from Botany Bay to Port Jackson] banished sleep, so that I rose at the first dawn of the morning. But judge of my surprise on hearing from a sergeant who ran down almost breathless to the cabin where I was dressing, that a ship was seen off the harbour's mouth! At first I only laughed, but knowing the man who spoke to me to be of great veracity, and hearing him repeat his information, I flew upon deck, on which I had barely set my foot, when the cry of " another sail " struck on my astonished ear. Confounded by a thousand ideas which arose in my mind in an instant, I sprang upon the barricade, and plainly descried two ships of considerable size standing in for the mouth of the bay (5).
In another passage, Tench mentions his first meeting with the natives on the south shore of Botany Bay. He had scarcely landed with his party, when he and his party were met by " a dozen Indians, naked as at the moment of their birth " :—
I had at this time a little boy, of not more than seven years of age, in my hand. The child seemed to attract their attention very much, for they frequently pointed to him and spoke to each other; and as he was not frightened, I advanced with him towards them, at the same time baring his bosom and showing the whiteness of his skin. On the cloaths being removed, they gave a loud exclamation, and one of the party, an old man with a long beard, hideously ugly, came close to us. I bade my little charge not to be afraid, and introduced him to the acquaintance of this uncouth personage. The Indian, with great tenderness, laid his hand on the child's hat and afterwards felt his cloaths, muttering to himself all the while.
The scene is suggestive of the allegorical representations which used to be in vogue at the Court of the Faerie Queene — Civilisation, in the form of a fair European child, making its first appearance on the shores of a new world, and advancing towards Barbarism in its decay, represented by an ancient Indian gazing wistfully into the child's face, and " muttering to himself all the while."
A few lines enable him to describe the troops and prisoners at work on the shores of Sydney Cove, immediately after their landing :—
The scene, to an indifferent spectator at leisure to contemplate it, would have been highly picturesque and amusing. In one place, a party cutting down the woods; a second, setting up a blacksmith's forge; a third, dragging along a load of stones or provisions; here an officer pitching his marquee, with a detachment of troops parading on one side of him, and a cook's fire blazing up on the other (6).
In the following year appeared Surgeon White's Journal of a Voyage to New South Wales (7) — another fine quarto, somewhat resembling Phillip's Voyage in appearance and contents. Mr. White had the great advantage of a taste for natural history, and was consequently in a position to enliven as well as to illustrate his pages by descriptions of the new world of animal and vegetable life in which he found himself. The birds are exceedingly well drawn and coloured ; but a curious difference may be noticed between the representations of the same specimens in White's Journal and in Phillip's Voyage. The cassowary, the parrots and the cockatoos, for instance, which adorn the two volumes, have very little resemblance with each other when placed side by side for comparison; and as they all purport to be drawn and coloured from nature, it is not easy to account for the difference. So far as the history of the settlement is concerned, White's volume is not of much importance; the record of events dates only to November, 1788, and does not travel beyond the limits of an ordinary journal. It contains a good deal of information, however, not to be found in the pages of his contemporaries, and is consequently entitled to a permanent place in our historical collections.
The good reception which his little Narrative seems to have met with naturally induced Captain Tench to follow it up with a rather more ambitious effort, which appeared in 1793 — the same year in which Captain Hunter's book was published. In his later work — entitled " A Complete Account of the Settlement at Port Jackson " — Tench gave the "transactions of the colony" year by year as he had noted them in his journal, followed by extracts from his "travelling diaries " relating to his exploring expeditions; the rest of the book being occupied with miscellaneous remarks on the climate, the soil and its productions, and the natives. His pages may be read without any sensation of weariness, being full of anecdote and character. The unhealthy society which surrounded the author did not depress his mind to such an extent as to render him insensible or indifferent to better things. He seems to have kept up his spirits in spite of it, and to have written with a light heart; graphically, too, like an artist sketching the scenes around him with pencil and brush. The result is that his reader has a succession of pictures passing before him, which serve to illustrate the chronicle of events. In this respect Tench stands alone among his contemporaries. Although he had no talent for sketching, like Hunter, his work is essentially picturesque. The difference between his method and theirs may be seen in the fact that there is hardly a line in the bulky volumes they produced that can be said to give the reader any idea of Phillip as a man. There is no attempt to outline his character in any way, either directly or indirectly. Not a word, for instance, of the many conversations which he had with the captain of the Sirius and the Judge-Advocate is preserved in their pages. It is consequently difficult to form any clear idea as to Phillip's individuality from all that they relate of him. The only writer of that time who brings him distinctly before us is Tench. When summoned to attend him for the purpose of receiving instructions as to the military expedition to punish the natives at Botany Bay, Tench had a long conversation with him, and luckily reported some of his remarks (8) :—
To the latter of those causes — misapprehension on the part of the natives - I attribute my own wound; but in this business of McEntire, I am fully persuaded that they were unprovoked, and the barbarity of their conduct admits of no extenuation, for I have separately examined the sergeant, of whose veracity I have the highest opinion, and the two convicts; and their story is short, simple, and alike. I have in vain tried to stimulate Baneelon and Colbee, and the other natives who live among us, to bring in the aggressor. Yesterday, indeed, they promised me to do it, and actually went away as if bent on such a design; but Baneelon, instead of directing his steps to Botany Bay, crossed the harbour in his canoe in order to draw the foreteeth of some of the young men; and Colbee, in the room of fulfilling his engagement, is loitering about the look-out house. Nay, so far from wishing even to describe faithfully the person of the man who has thrown the spear, they pretended that he has a distorted foot, which is a palpable falsehood. So that we have our efforts only to depend upon; and I am resolved to execute the prisoners who may be brought in, in the most public and exemplary manner, in the presence of as many of their countrymen as can be collected, after having explained the cause of such a punishment; and my fixed determination to repeat it, whenever any future breach of good conduct on their side shall render it necessary.
Phillip seems to have had some doubt in his own mind as to the wisdom of these measures — which involved the destruction of ten lives — for Tench goes on to say that —
Here the Governor stopped, and addressing himself to me said, if I could propose any alteration in the orders under which I was to act, he would patiently listen to me. Encouraged by this condescension, I begged leave to offer for consideration whether, instead of destroying ten persons, the capture of six would not better answer all the purposes for which the expedition was to be undertaken; as out of this number a part might be set aside for retaliation, and the rest, at a proper time, liberated after having seen the fate of their comrades, and being made sensible of the cause of their own detention. This scheme his excellency was pleased instantly to adopt, adding, "If six cannot be taken, let this number be shot. Should you find it practicable to take so many, I will hang two, and send the rest to Norfolk Island for a certain period, which will cause their countrymen to believe that we have dispatched them secretly."
Here we get a good illustration of Phillip's way of dealing with matters requiring energy as well as promptness of decision; and at the same time his views on the native question become as distinctly perceptible as they are in his despatches. He had evidently allowed his indignation at a wanton murder — as it seemed to him — to overcome his judgment for the time; but how ready he was to listen to any plea for mercy is seen in his prompt concession to Tench.
The state of distress and consternation into which the settlement was plunged when news arrived of the wreck of the Sirius at Norfolk Island, and the subsequent rejoicing when a ship at last arrived from England, are nowhere so well described as in Tench's pages (9). For months previously the non-arrival of supplies had filled every mind with alarm, the stock of provisions in the public store having become so small that the rations had to be reduced to the lowest possible limit. In order to relieve the pressure on the public resources, Phillip had despatched the Sirius and Supply to Norfolk Island with several hundred men and women on board; the Sirius being under orders to sail to China, on her return, for supplies of salt provisions. Her wreck increased the danger of the situation to a still more serious point; for the only chance of saving the people from starvation was to send the little brig Supply to Batavia. The extent of the suffering endured at this crisis may be seen in the following extract:—
Three or four instances of persons who have perished from want have been related to me. One only, however, fell within my own observation. I was passing the provision store when a man, with a wild haggard countenance, who had just received his daily pittance to carry home, came out. His faltering gait and eager devouring eye led me to watch him; and he had not proceeded ten steps before he fell. I ordered him to be carried to the hospital, where, when he arrived, he was found dead. On opening the body, the cause of death was pronounced to be inanition.
When matters had reached this stage, nothing but the arrival of a ship from England could have averted the most dreadful consequences :—
A party of seamen were fixed on a high bluff called the South Head, at the entrance of the harbour, on which a flag was ordered to be hoisted whenever a ship might appear, which should serve as a direction to her, and as a signal of approach to us. Here, on the summit of the hill, every morning from daylight until the sun sank, did we sweep the horizon in hope of seeing a sail. At every fleeting speck which arose from the bosom of the sea, the heart bounded and the telescope was lifted to the eye.
They were in much the same plight as shipwrecked people floating on a raft. The long-expected ship appeared at the very moment when hope had given way to despair:—
At length the clouds of misfortune began to separate, and on the evening of the 3rd of June, 1790, the joyful cry of " the flag's up" resounded in every direction. I was sitting in my hut, musing on our fate, when a confused clamour in the street drew my attention. I opened my door, and saw several women with children in their arms running to and fro with distracted looks, congratulating each other, and kissing their infants with the most passionate and extravagant marks of fondness. I needed no more; but instantly started out and ran to a hill, where, by the assistance of my pocket-glass, my hopes were realised. My next-door neighbour, a brother officer, was with me; but we could not speak: we wrung each other by the hand, with eyes and hearts overflowing.
It must have been a terrible pinch indeed that could make two officers of marines in those days show such signs of emotion.
Finding that the Governor intended to go immediately in his boat down the harbour, I begged to be of his party. As we proceeded, the object of our hopes soon appeared: a large ship, with 1793 English colours flying, working in between the heads which form the entrance of the harbour. The tumultuous state of our minds represented her in danger, and we were in agony. Soon after the Governor, having ascertained what she was, left us, and stept into a fishing-boat to return to Sydney. The weather was wet and tempestuous; but the body is delicate only when the soul is at ease. We pushed through wind and rain, the anxiety of our sensations every moment redoubling. At last we read the word " London" on her stern. " Pull away, lads ! She is from old England ! A few strokes more and we shall be aboard ! Hurrah, for news from our friends !"
One of the most striking passages in Tench's work describes the effect produced upon the minds of the natives by the flogging of a prisoner. Although the man was punished for having stolen some fishing tackle belonging to one of themselves, the only effect of the exhibition was to create feelings of sympathy with the offender and disgust at the exhibition itself :—
The Governor ordered that he should be severely flogged in the presence of as many natives as could be assembled, to whom the cause of punishment should be explained. Many of them, of both sexes, accordingly attended. There was not one of them that did not testify strong abhorrence of the punishment and equal sympathy with the sufferer.
Phillip was anxious to show the natives that the law was no respecter of persons ; it did not occur to him that he was exhibiting the law in a shape not at all calculated to create respect for it, even in the minds of savages. The contrast between the civilised and uncivilised codes on this point is curious. Among the natives, a man who wronged another belonging to the same tribe was compelled to stand and defend himself with his shield, while his fellows hurled their spears at him. The idea of flogging a man seemed to them a savage refinement of cruelty (10).
ABOVE: Hunter's Sketch of Sydney Cove
Captain Hunter's book appeared as an official publication in 1793 - a quarto, with maps and illustrations (11). In every way it was a creditable production, abounding in evidence of its author's personal merit. Besides his own journal of the voyage out with the First Fleet, of subsequent events at the settlement, and of his voyage to Batavia and England, it includes Lieutenant King's journal kept during his residence as Commandant at Norfolk Island in 1788, and also his journal of a voyage to Batavia and England; the history of the colony from June, 1790, to December, 1791, compiled from Governor Phillip's despatches; and it concludes with the journal of a voyage in the Supply from Sydney to England, written by her commander, Lieutenant Ball. Hunter's narrative of events from the founding of the colony to his departure in February, 1790, for Norfolk Island, where he was wrecked, is well written, and forms a valuable chapter in the annals of that time. His skill in sketching is shown in the View of the Settlement on Sydney Cove, Port Jackson, 20th August, 1788, which faces page 77 of his volume. It is of peculiar interest at the present day from the fact that it forms the earliest illustration of the scene known to exist. Another sketch of his appears as a vignette on the title-page, representing an incident of the expedition to Broken Bay, in June, 1789, when the Hawkesbury River was discovered. A young native woman, was found by the sailors hiding herself in the long grass, having been unable to make her escape with her friends when they were alarmed by the arrival of the white men. Hunter's account of the matter brings Phillip personally on the scene (12):-
Information was immediately brought to the Governor, and we all went to see this unhappy girl, whom we found just recovered from the small-pox, and lame: she appeared to be about seventeen or eighteen years of age, and had covered her debilitated and naked body with wet grass, having no other means of hiding herself; she was very much frightened on our approaching her, and shed many tears, with piteous lamentations. We understood none of her expressions, but felt much concern at the distress she seemed to suffer; we endeavoured all in our power to make her easy, and with the assistance of a few expressions which had been collected from poor Arabanoo while he was alive, we soothed her distress a little, and the sailors were immediately ordered to bring up some fire, which we placed before her: we pulled some grass, dried it by the fire, and spread round her to keep her warm; then we shot some birds, such as hawks, crows, and gulls, skinned them, and laid them on the fire to broil, together with some fish, which she eat; we then gave her water, of which she seemed to be much in want, for when the word "baa-do" was mentioned, which was their expression for water, she put her tongue out to show how very dry her mouth was; and indeed from her appearance and colour she had a considerable degree of fever on her. Before we retired to rest for the night, we saw her again, and got some firewood laid within her reach, with which she might in course of the night recruit her fire; we also cut a large quantity of grass, dried it, covered her well, and left her to her repose, which, from her situation, I conjecture was not very comfortable and refreshing.
Phillip and his men spent the following day in exploring Pittwater; but on their return in the evening, they lost no time in looking after the poor girl they had left. Hunter goes on to say :-
Our tents were no sooner up than we went to visit our young female friend, whom we found in a little bark hut upon the beach; this hut was the place in which she and her friends were enjoying themselves when the arrival of our boat alarmed them. She was not alone as before, but had with her a female child, about two years old, and as fine a little infant of that age as ever I saw; but upon our approach (the night being cold and rainy, and the child terrified exceedingly), she was lying with her elbows and knees on the ground covering the child from our sight with her body, or probably sheltering it from the weather, but I rather think on account of its fears. The, little infant could not be prevailed on to look up; it lay with its face upon the ground, and one hand covering its eyes. We supplied her as before, with birds, fish, and fuel, and pulled a quantity of grass to make her a comfortable bed, and covered her little miserable hut so as to keep out the weather.
The kindly fooling which animated Phillip arid his friends in their intercourse with the natives, could not be better illustrated than, it is in this passage; nor has the part of the good Samaritan ever been more nobly played by British officers. Phillip and Hunter were rough old sailors; they had been all their lives at sea; but had they been shepherds with their crooks in the days of pastoral poetry, they could not have shown a finer feeling towards a damsel in distress. The facts, as told by Hunter, deserve to rank among the pathetic tales of the Australian bush; none the less touching because the central figure happens to be carved in ebony. Incidents of this kind should not be forgotten in estimating Phillip's character; especially when we find it represented as wanting in the very quality so conspicuously shown in this instance (13).
Last on the list of tho old chronicles is the ponderous work published by Judge-Advocate Collins in two quarto volumes, the first of which appeared in 1798 (13), and the second in 1802 (14). There can be no doubt as to the value of the work for historical purposes, seeing that it contains a mass of information with respect to the colony which none of the writer's contemporaries had been diligent enough to collect. But the merit of the compilation is largely affected by the mistaken principle on. which the author worked, especially in the first volume. Instead of writing an account of the colony, as his title-page expressed, he wrote an account of a penal settlement - occupying himself almost exclusively with the unhappy creatures who had been sent to work out their redemption in chains. The impression left upon the reader's mind is that of having waded through a. lengthy catalogue of crimes and their punishments, added to a dismal tale of suffering and privation. From page to page he finds his attention concentrated on the unsavoury details connected with the early years of the settlement, almost everything that could relieve the depth of shade in the picture being ignored. The result is that he finds himself slowly descending from one gloomy circle of the Inferno to another, each, filled with a succession of repulsive groups. There is little or nothing to relieve the monotony of woe. There is not a word, for instance, about the scenery of the harbour and the surrounding country, which, by the way, seems to have left no other impression upon Collins than one of loneliness and desolation. He found no such source of encouragement as Phillip did in the prospect of future greatness for the country, when the inevitable difficulties attending the foundation of a colony had been overcome, and the unbounded resources it contained had been fully developed by the industry of successive generations. The work of exploration in which Phillip, Hunter, Tench, and Dawes made themselves conspicuous, had very little attraction for him. Although he accompanied them on more than one occasion in their excursions, he made very slight allusion to the matter in his book; in some cases none at all. The discovery of the Hawkesbury did not by any means inflame his imagination. He was a member of the expedition which traced it up to Richmond Hill, and yet he disposed of the whole matter in a paragraph as curt and dry as if he had been describing the robbery of a cabbage-garden and the execution of the thief. He makes no mention of the discovery of the Nepean, beyond a passing allusion to " the freshwater river, first seen some time since by Captain Tench, and supposed to be a branch of the Hawkesbury (15)." But the discovery of those rivers was undoubtedly a turning point in the history of the settlement, and must have done much to dispel the doubts which had previously hung over its future.
The monotonous tone of lamentation which marks so many of his pages is mainly the result of a peculiar frame of mind, which led him to concentrate his attention on the unpleasant side of every picture placed before him. If an occasional gleam of humour had lightened up his reflections on passing events, the narrative he has left us would have been none the less faithful. But there is no attempt at any time to deal pleasantly with the subject he has in hand. He speaks sometimes like Virgil when conducting Dante through the shades below; sometimes like a warder when showing an inquisitive traveller through the corridors of a gaol, stopping now and then at the doors of a cell to tell the dreadful story of its inmate. Even when a fair opportunity comes in his way for amusing himself and his readers with the scenes and topics to which he alludes, he seems to turn away from it, as if the bare suspicion of a jest would compromise his judicial dignity. Any other writer in his place, suffering from a dearth of subjects free from any criminal flavour, might have welcomed the phenomenon recorded by him with respect to the breeding operations of the settlement. " It was observed with concern," he says (p. 76), " that hitherto by far a greater proportion of males than females had been produced by the animals we had brought for the purpose of breeding." This fact he does not attempt to account for; he has no turn for speculation. He contents himself with saying that " this, in any other situation, might not have been so nicely remarked; but here, where a country was to be stocked, a litter of twelve pigs whereof three only were females became a subject of conversation and inquiry." It did not occur to Collins, or any of his friends, that the pigs were only carrying out the principle on which Lord Sydney had acted in populating the colony - an excess of males to females, by four to one. Another event which might have induced a less serious chronicler to relax was the first performance of a play by the convicts, " in a hut fitted up for the occasion." They were allowed to amuse themselves in this manner on the occasion of his Majesty's birthday in 1789, Farquhar's comedy - the Recruiting Officer - being the piece selected. A sketch of the performance, a copy of the prologue, or any other information of the kind, might well have found a place in the chronicler's pages; but he confines himself to the remark that the performers " professed no higher aim than 'humbly to excite a smile,' and their efforts to please were not unattended with success."
Collins having left the colony in September, 1796, and remained in England until he received his commission as Lieutenant-Governor of the projected colony at Port Phillip in 1803, the materials for the second volume of his work, published in 1802, were necessarily furnished by another hand; but whose the hand that furnished them was not mentioned by him, and consequently the authorship of. the second volume was never made known. There is no difficulty, however, in discovering the author; internal evidence being quite sufficient to show that the journal which forms the contents of the volume was written by Governor Hunter. He left the colony in September, 1800, and the narrative closes with an account of his embarkation. The only allusion made by Collins to the question of authorship is in his preface, in which he says that the very flattering reception which his first volume had met with had induced him to continue his labours in the character of historian ; " having been furnished with materials for this purpose, on the authenticity of which I can safely stake my credit." So far as style is concerned, there is a good deal more resemblance than contrast between the two volumes; Hunter having had no difficulty in adopting the melancholy air and manner which distinguish his predecessor; as if, when sitting down to write, he had wrapped himself up in the inky cloak which Collins had left behind him for the purpose. The reader is too often reminded of the propensity for moralising on the iniquity of human nature which figures so prominently in the first volume. At the same time Hunter did not neglect the opportunity for displaying the, nature and extent of his own services, as well as defending himself from charges which he knew might be made against his administration. The energy unconsciously displayed in passages of this description reveals the author's hand: as, for instance, where he tells us (p. 86) - in. reference to the trading monopoly which the officers of the New South Wales Corps had succeeded in establishing - " it must have been evident to every one who had sense to see it, that the Governor, from the hour of his arrival, had used his utmost endeavours to put an end to the practice of so much imposition." That fact is not made at all so clear to the reader as might be wished; more especially as Hunter, for reasons which he does not explain, carefully refrains from any explanation on the subject, or any allusion to the officers concerned. His reserve is the more remarkable because, during his residence among them, those gentlemen had encircled him in their folds like so many cobras. He endured the painful struggle for five years; and then, finding that the only means by which he could shake them off was by leaving the colony in their grasp, he said goodbye to them in an order in which he expressed his admiration for their services, and the confidence he had so long reposed in them.
NOTES:
(1) The evidence given by these translations of the interest felt throughout Europe in the colonising experiment of the British Government deserves notice. Phillip's Voyage, published in 1789, was translated into French in 1791, and into German in 1789, 1791, and 1794. Hunter's Journal, published in 1793, appeared in two different German editions in 1794, and in a Swedish one in 1797. Tench's Narrative, published in 1789, was republished in Dutch in 1789, in French in 1789 and 1791, in Swedish in 1797; his Complete Account of the Settlement at Port Jackson, published in 1793, was translated into German in 1794. White's Journal, published in 1790, did not appear in a foreign language until 1795, when it was published in French. There is no trace of any translation of Collins's Account, the first volume of which was published in 1798, and the second in 1802; a fact which may be accounted for partly by the unusual size of the work and partly by its having appeared rather late in the field — the greater part of its contents having been anticipated by earlier publications.
(2) Post, p. 581.
(3) Post, p. 548.
(4) His social qualities seem to have made him popular — two places having been named after him; Tench's Prospect Hill, by Phillip; and Tench's Island, by Lieutenant Ball, on the voyage to Batavia with Lieutenant King in 1790. — Hunter, Journal, p. 421.
(5) Narrative, p. 49.
(6)
Miratur molem AEneas, magalia quondam;
Miratur portas, strepitumque, et strata viarum.
Instant ardentes Tyrii: pars ducere muros,
Molirique arcem, et manibus subvolvere saxa;
Pars optare locum tecto, et concludere sulco.
Hic portus alii effodiunt; hic alta theatris
Fundamenta locant alii, immanesque columnas
Rupibus excidunt, scenis decora alta futuris.
Eneid, I, 418.
(7) Post, p. 582.
(8) Complete Account, p. 93; ante, p. 126; Collins, vol. ii, pp. 27-8.
(9) Complete Account, p. 44.
(10) The effect produced by exhibitions of this kind upon the natives, is shown in another instance. Collins records that, in November, 1796, " the Court having ordered that Francis Morgan (convicted of murder) should be hung in chains upon the small island which is situated in the middle of the harbour, and named by the natives Mat-te-wan-ye, a gibbet was accordingly erected and he was hung there, exhibiting an object of much greater terror to the natives than to the white people, many of whom were more inclined to make a jest of it; but to the natives his appearance was so frightful - his clothes shaking in the wind and the creaking of his irons, added to their superstitious idea of ghosts (for these children of ignorance imagined that, like a ghost, this man might have the power of taking hold of them by the throat) all rendering him such an alarming object to them - that they never trusted themselves near him, nor the spot on which he hung ; which, until this time, had ever been with them a favourite place of resort." - Vol. ii, p. 10.
(11) Post, p. 584.
(12) Journal, p. 139.
(13) Woods, in his History of the Discovery and Exploration of Australia (p. 66), expressed the opinion that "Governor Phillip does not appear to have been over endowed with mercy," because there was a good deal of hanging and flogging in his time - as if it had all been done at his instance and by his order.
(14) Post, p. 589.
(15) Account of the Colony, pp. 72, 89.
