Page:History of Australia, Rusden 1897.djvu/600

 advised that Maria Island shook! be selected as their home. It was pleasant to the eye and the Hoil was good. Bnt there was a penal settlement ah'eady there and the Government f^rndged such a concession to the proscribed race. They must go to the l>arren and repulsive King*s Islanrl. After temporary occupation of Swan Island, and a conlineiiient on Gun Carria|i;e Inland, during which their gnarde could not account for their deaths otherwise than by calling them *' sulky," it was determined to make Flinders* Island their home. In Jan, 1882 the first detachment were sent thither. They instinctively shuddered when they saw it. Their fate must be tohl hereafter. More than 200 had been captured. There was one family still left amongst the native wilds. Fires, distant sounds^ and other signs, betokened their existence, and in 1842 they also were caught and sent to join their countrymen io exile and in death, lii 1838 Sii' George Arthur sunnned up thus his dealings with them; — " Uiidoiiljtedly the bemg ledueed to the ttecesssity of driving a iiimplb and wui likti, imd, as it now appears, iioljl«-(iiiinled race from their native hiiiitiiig'gt'ounds is a ineaaure in itself «(> diatreaBiug that I am riUing to make almost an}" priulent saciifiee lliat may tend to e<nnpcnaate for the injuiits that the iJoverumeiit is miAviUingly and njiavoidably the means of infikting." Had the first Governor of Van l)ieraen*s Land been just, film, and wise as Phillip, this sad elegy might not have ,been drawn from his successor. All the education and sperience of all Arthur *s predecessors had made none of them as sagacious as EobinBon the bricklayer, of whom it is necessary to add that he was a pious Christian, without which qualilication he would perhaps have w'anted the motive for his humane exertions. Bushranging was rife during the early part of Ai*thur's rule. Terrilile revelations were made. One gang, escaping from Macquarie Harbour, and starving in the woods, turned eyes upon one another. Three out of eight left the rest. Four then liilled one and ate hiru, A secontl and a third met a like fate. The two survivors watcJied one another with tleadly eyes, each striving to catch the other off his gUBid. Exhausted nature brought sleep to one and imme- diate death. The wretch who killed and devoured him at last reached a frieudly xqqL Hti joined some bushrangers,