Page:History of Australia, Rusden 1897.djvu/72

 showed that Dorsetshire led the way in meeting Phillip's wishes.

Before he received instructions as to the quantity of land he might grant, Phillip wrote (4th Oct., 1792) that he did not object to officers cultivating land, but he had not convicts enough to assign labour to them all, though already he had assigned fifty-one to Major Grose and those under his command. After Phillip's departure, Grose was restrained by no public considerations in assigning convicts to officers, and while Phillip still held the reins, Grose urged (Oct., 1792, Dundas' instructions not having then arrived) that officers ought to have grants of land so that they might grow food. "One half of the ground allotted a convict who becomes a settler would be a matter of more accommodation than may be supposed;" but the Governor was without instructions on the point. The same volume (Record Office) which contains Grose's urgency of Oct. comprises a previous letter from him lauding the colony as furnishing "vegetables in great abundance. . . . I live in as good a house as I wish for. . . I am given the farm of my predecessor, which produces a sufficiency to supply my family with everything I have occasion for. (There was wanting only one ship freighted with corn and black cattle, and) all difficulties would be over."

Phillip had taken a wider view of the needs of the colony, and it may be well to cite one of the careful warnings with which he supplied the Secretary of State as to its general condition and requirements. He wrote:—

"I beg leave to observe (Feb., 1790) that if settlers are sent out, and the convicts divided amongst them, this settlement will very shortly maintain itself, without which the country cannot be cultivated to advantage. At present I have only one person, with about 100 convicts under his direction, who is employed cultivating the ground for the public benefit, and he has returned the quantity of corn above-mentioned into the public store. The officers have not raised sufficient to support the little stock they have. Some ground I have had in cultivation will return about 40 bushels of wheat into store, so that the produce of the labour of the convicts employed in cultivation has been very short of what might have been expected. This I take the liberty of pointing out to your lordship in this place, to show as fully as possible the state of the colony, and the necessity of the convicts being employed by those who have an interest in their labour. The giving convicts to officers has been hitherto necessary, but it is attended with many inconveniences, for which the advantages arising to officers do not make amends. It will not, therefore, be continued after this detachment is relieved, unless parti-