Page:History of New South Wales from the records, Volume 2.djvu/299

 .OBOSE AND THE IiAND. 255 .Instructions, to non-connnissioned officers who had wives, ^^^ and thirty acres less than he was authorised to grant to un- married non*commisaioned officers.* The result was seen immediately. Grose reported on the 16th February, 1793,t five weeks after the instructions had reached him, that the officers were making rapid progress with their farms. He informed Miutary Dundas that they were doing this " at their own expense," farmers. and that he expected in six months to see them with cultivated areas "more than equal to a third of all that has ever been cleared in the colony." To convey a correct impression, Grose ought to have stated that each officer was allowed the services of ten convicts, victualled and clothed oovemmeak , aid. from the public store free of any charge; and that, in addi- tion, they were allowed to purchase the services of gangs of convicts, when not employed on Government work, paying for the same with spirits or other articles. Seven months later (September, 1793) Grose reported that Grose the officers were ^^ daily clearing ground to a considerable p«Sgr« • extent." With his despatch of the 29th April, 1794, he sent a report from the Surveyor-General, which showed that since Phillip^s departure 2,962^ acres had been put in culti- vation, of which 982 acres belonged to the civil and military of the despatch authorising him to give land to officers. Apparently, this waa treated as a special case, but the circumstances ore not stated in the despatches, which do not eren mention the fact. Collins, however, notices the issue of the grant on the 31st December, 1792, and makes the foUowing comments (vol. i, p. 256) : — " In the instructions for granting lands in this country, no mention of officers had yet been made ; it was, however, fairly presumed that the officers coiild not be intended to be precluded from the participation of any advantages which the Crown might hare to bestow in the settlements ; particularly as the greatest in its gift, Uie free possession of land, was held out to people who had forfeited their lives before they came into the country." According to Collins, the first land taken up by officers was at a place known then as the "Kangaroo" ground, " situate to the westward of the town of Sydney, between that settlement and Parramatta," where " aUotments of one hundred acres each were marked out for the clergyman (who, to obtain a giant here, relinquished his right to cultivate the land allotted for the maintenance of a miniBter), for the principal surgeon, and for two officers of the corps."— lb., p. 266. t Historical Records, vol. U, p^ 14.
 * Qrose issued oae grant (twentj-five acres to Cammings) before the arriyal