A New Brick Store House, Covered With Tiles,
100 Feet Long By Twenty-Four Wide, Is Nearly Completed, And A House
For The Store-Keeper.
The first stone of a barrack, 100 feet long
by twenty-four wide, to which are intended to be added wings for the officers,
was laid to-day.
The situation of the barrack is judicious, being close
to the store-house, and within a hundred and fifty yards of the wharf,
where all boats from Sydney unload. To what I have already enumerated,
must be added an excellent barn, a granary, an inclosed yard to rear stock in,
a commodious blacksmith's shop, and a most wretched hospital, totally destitute
of every conveniency. Luckily for the gentleman who superintends
this hospital, and still more luckily for those who are doomed in case
of sickness to enter it, the air of Rose Hill has hitherto been
generally healthy. A tendency to produce slight inflammatory disorders,
from the rapid changes* of the temperature of the air, is most to be dreaded.
[*In the close of the year 1788, when this settlement was established,
the thermometer has been known to stand at 50 degrees a little before sunrise,
and between one and two o' clock in the afternoon at above 100 degrees.]
'The hours of labour for the convicts are the same here as at Sydney.
On Saturdays after ten o'clock in the morning they are allowed to work
in their own gardens. These gardens are at present, from the long drought
and other causes, in a most deplorable state. Potatoes, I think,
thrive better than any other vegetable in them. For the public conveniency
a baker is established here in a good bakehouse, who exchanges with every
person bread for flour, on stipulated terms; but no compulsion exists
for any one to take his bread; it is left entirely to every body's own option
to consume his flour as he pleases. Divine service is performed here,
morning and afternoon, one Sunday in every month, when all the convicts
are obliged to attend church, under penalty of having a part of their allowance
of provisions stopped, which is done by the chaplain, who is a
justice of the peace.
'For the punishment of offenders, where a criminal court is not judged
necessary, two or more justices, occasionally assemble, and order
the infliction of slight corporal punishment, or short confinement
in a strong room built for this purpose. The military present here consists
of two subalterns, two sergeants, three corporals, a drummer, and twenty-one
privates. These have been occasionally augmented and reduced, as circumstances
have been thought to render it necessary.
Brick-kilns are now erected here, and bricks manufactured by a convict
of the name of Becket, who came out in the last fleet, and has fifty-two people
to work under him. He makes 25,000 bricks weekly. He says that they are
very good, and would sell at Birmingham, where he worked about eighteen months
ago, at more than 30 shillings per thousand.
Nothing farther of public nature remaining to examine, I next visited
a humble adventurer, who is trying his fortune here. James Ruse, convict,
was cast for seven years at Bodmin assizes, in August 1782. He lay five years
in prison and on board the 'Dunkirk' hulk at Plymouth, and then was sent
to this country. When his term of punishment expired, in August 1789,
he claimed his freedom, and was permitted by the governor, on promising
to settle in the country, to take in December following, an uncleaned piece
of ground, with an assurance that if he would cultivate it, it should not
be taken from him. Some assistance was given him, to fell the timber,
and he accordingly began. His present account to me was as follows.
I was bred a husbandman, near Launcester in Cornwall.
I cleared my land as well as I could, with the help
afforded me. The exact limit of what ground I am to have,
I do not yet know; but a certain direction has been
pointed out to me, in which I may proceed as fast as I
can cultivate. I have now an acre and a half in bearded
wheat, half an acre in maize, and a small kitchen garden.
On my wheat land I sowed three bushels of seed, the
produce of this country, broad cast. I expect to reap
about twelve or thirteen bushels. I know nothing of
the cultivation of maize, and cannot therefore guess
so well at what I am likely to gather. I sowed part
of my wheat in May, and part in June. That sown in May
has thrived best. My maize I planted in the latter end
of August, and the beginning of September. My land I
prepared thus: having burnt the fallen timber off the
ground, I dug in the ashes, and then hoed it up, never
doing more than eight, or perhaps nine, rods in a day,
by which means, it was not like the government farm,
just scratched over, but properly done. Then I
clod-moulded it, and dug in the grass and weeds. This
I think almost equal to ploughing. I then let it lie
as long as I could, exposed to air and sun; and just
before I sowed my seed, turned it all up afresh. When
I shall have reaped my crop, I purpose to hoe it again,
and harrow it fine, and then sow it with turnip-seed,
which will mellow and prepare it for next year. My
straw, I mean to bury in pits, and throw in with it
every thing which I think will rot and turn to manure.
I have no person to help me, at present, but my wife,
whom I married in this country; she is industrious.
The governor, for some time, gave me the help of a
convict man, but he is taken away. Both my wife and
myself receive our provisions regularly at the store,
like all other people.
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