Page:History of Australia, Rusden 1897.djvu/309

 DURIAULT SENT AWAY IN RM.S. "CALCUTTA." 281 vol. of ** State Trials," **this worthless man died in 1815 while a subscription was raising for his relief." Those who have cited his evidence may charitably be presumed to have been ignorant of his character. The French %ngneron, Francois Duriaiilt, was sent away in H.M.S. Calcutta. King kept his counsel so well that the editor of the Sifdney Gazette (though it was subject to government control) was allowed to say that *'Diiriault, or Girault," against whom the Government had obtained I ** presumptive evidence,'' had escaped in the Calcutta, But on the 8th March King had applied to Captain Woodriff to give Duriault a passage on the ground that his conduct rendered it '* absolutely necessary that he should leave the colony," and on the l'2th, in a despatch to Lord Hobart, which Captain Woodriff carried, the same fact was reported to the Secretary of State. Duriault had certain relations with Holt. The latter averred that they were innocent, but the magistrates thought otherwise. To facilitate his com- munication with the Irish at the different gangs Duriault had acted as pedlar for some time before the insurrection. On the 12th the Governor reported the suppression of the rebellion. He trusted that the temporary suspension of the civil law and the substitution of martial law would be approved. He was convinced that it had been the iittempt. I deeply lament the necessity enforced on me by the existing <jirGimiBtanceB of directing the execution of those who were selected from upwardfj of two hundred taken with arma in their hand a* ..... Thia painful duty will, I truat, be considered an example of the ntinost necessity, nor do I doubt of its liaving the moat lasting gotxi etfects/^ Two parties of rebels, of fifty men each, had lost their way, and could not find the rebel force. Had they found it King thought all the Irish of the Hawkesbury would have risen and caused miicli trouble, but he had '* no dotibt of its terminating as it has done/* Johnston's activity and the general exertions had probably convinced the '* deluded people of the absurdity of their having recourse to similar desperate expedient^," At the same time, if great promi>- titude had not been used the rebels would probably have been strengthened by all the Irish in the colony, amounting to two thousand, or half the male population* However, nothing but the appearance of a foreign enemy would ^tvt
 * 'sole means of putting ao decisive a etop to Buch a sudden and daring