Page:History of Australia, Rusden 1897.djvu/298

 composed of rebels and deserters convicted by courts- martial previous to the law of 1799, and who were sent during the rebellion to the military department of New Geneva barracks, and eiubarked by the officer commanding there without any trace of such proceedings having been anywliere recorded/' Those wlio mont appreciate the manner in which designing intriguers in 1798 and 1848 deluded their Irish victims by forged tales, must admit the hardship of the servitude of a man who believed that his sentence had expired, and who yet was held in chains. The only local remedy w^as to enfranchise the well-behaved, and this was freely apphed. Plots of various kinds were rankling in 1808. The guard at Castle Hill required strengthening in consequence of " the daring behaviour of the convicts there." This ' was at the time when Dr. Harris (acting as Jndge- ^Advocate at a court-martial) w^as put under arrest hy the officers who sat with him ; and when, on the conclusion of the Peace of Amiens, the New South AVales Corps, in common with others, was under orders to be reduced. Emboldened by reflecting on the small force at the disposal of the Governor, who was already taking steps to form settlements elsewhere, and thus diminish the guard at Sydney, the disafifected prosecuted their schemes. A French gentleman. Chevalier de Glambe, had settled in New South Wales, where he received a grant of land. He was Knight of the Order of St. Louis, had been captain of a regiment at Pomhcherry, and had afterwards served undur Indian princes, before he took np his abode in the colony* His countrymen, mider command of Captain Baudin, had shared his hospitality. Some of the Ii'ish marked him for destruction. On 15th Feb. 180B, while he was absent, his house was attacked.'*''* On the 17th the energetic Marsden informed the Governor of the capture of '* Tim Chevalier thus L6port«d the outrage. *'Tlii3 evening before I came from Parramatta., many men did eoratt at iny house and did rob all my pliitCj cloth, linen, flrearni,a luid ammunition, coutelas, &c. &c.; and struc and tfireat with jjiHtol on the breaat my houaekewper. Some men in employment at Castle H ilia' settlement are very much implicated in It, but I fear for it to seonre tliem ; so if yuii would be so kind to come yourself to-man-ow niouming, I will not move noting, so that you ahall see sU by your one eyes,** the ^