Page:A colonial autocracy, New South Wales under Governor Macquarie, 1810-1821.djvu/134

 the Judge-Advocate at the office of the Clerk of the Peace, and these were sent down to the Court House. The magistrates thought Wylde had left them already signed for this purpose, and allowed them to be granted to the four publicans. When Wylde heard of what had happened he wrote to Wentworth explaining the mistake, and pointing out that such a course would not be admissible in the future. He also sent a copy of this letter to Macquarie, who replied in his very worst style. "I return you my best thanks for informing me in this manner of the law respecting licenses, which had you condescended to have made me acquainted with sooner I should have been fully disposed to have regulated my conduct by. But not knowing the law on this particular subject, and the persons who had subsequently to the 19th February applied for spirit licenses being equally ignorant of it, I exercised my own judgment and what I considered my prerogative—agreeably to the customs and usages observed and acted upon in this Colony for the last thirty-two years—in promising a few additional licenses for the current year to persons under peculiar circumstances. &hellip; These persons, therefore, to whom such promises have been made by me, of receiving spirit licenses for the present year, must receive them accordingly." The Judge-Advocate answered shortly. In effect he said that the Governor had handed over the matter to the magistrates, who had at their meeting publicly stated their policy, and now the Governor was taking the matter out of their hands again. "On the present occasion," he concluded, "it is for your Excellency to determine as to the obligation of promises made (as your Excellency suggests) under an ignorance of the law—a plea, however, which cannot at all stand the applicants in stead".

In accordance with this opinion, when the memorials came before the Bench on the 11th March, 1820, an entry was made in the Book of Proceedings that they did not consider it competent for them to make for the ensuing year any additional