Page:History of New South Wales from the records, Volume 2.djvu/98

 78. . DESPATCHES 1^^ further supply of provisions would accompany the convicts who were to be sent by the Neptune, Surprize, and Scar*- crroneous l>oro^gl^^ ^^^ added: — ^'^ I caunot help flattering mysdf calculation, ^hat after that period very little farther aids will be wanted from this country for the subsistence of the convicts."* It is inconceivable how such an expectation could have been formed, excepting on the supposition that Phillip's despatches, received several months before, had not received proper attention. It seems scarcely possible, indeed, that Grenville could have even read those passages in Phillip's despatches of the 15th May and 9th July, 1788, in which he pointed out the dependent condition of the settlement : — Phillip asks ^' Your Lordship will, I presume, see the necessity of a regular forfowo? supply of provisions for four or &ve years." t five yean. He repeats "Thtis situated, your Lordship will excuse my observing a "** ' second time that a regular supply of provisions from England will be absolutely necessary for four or ^ve years, as the crops for two years to come cannot be depended on for more than what will be necessary for seed, and what [stock] the Sinus may procure can. only be to breed from. "J An <' No country offers less assistance to the first settlers than this cou^. ' does ; nor do I think any country could be more disadvantageously placed with respect to support from the mother country, on which for a few years we must entirely depend. "§ If Phillip had known that a thousand more convicts were to be sent immediately, and that large batches were to follow, he would not have ventured to express any opinion as to when the colony would be self-supporting. Grenville, it is b^nd*"^ clear, looked at the matter simply from his own point of view ; he made little or no use of the information at his disposal. Had he done so, he would never have written that remarkable sentence in his despatch of the 24th • Historical Becords, vol. i, part 2, p. 261. t lb., p. 127. J lb., p. 146. § lb., p. 151.