Page:History of West Australia.djvu/218

 170

secreted about their persons. This was done at every return. When the examination was completed they filed into the building, tramped up the iron staircases, prepared for their meal, and again stood outside waiting for the food to be brought around. This took a very short time; each convict entered his cell, shut the door, and made his simple repast. In winter a light was allowed in the cell up to a given time, when it must be extinguished. The cell doors were locked and the prisoners retired to rest until another day. In winter months the time of rising was an hour later, and the routine was consequently slightly changed. At certain times an association ward was used, in which the men slept in three tiers of beds.

Each of the hundreds of convicts in the Establishment had a systematic allowance of clothes and food—one no more than another, all of like dismal complexion, cut, and brand. The food was weighed out with as certain evenness as if golden scales were used. The chef of this club must make reports; if he used more than a given quantity of condiments and commodities he had to pay the difference. He did not make mistakes. The daily rations in 1852 were:—Meat, 18 ozs.; bread, 22 ozs.; potatoes, 16 ozs.; tea, ⅓ oz.; sugar, ½ oz.; barley or rice, ½ oz. The Comptroller-General and his officials believed they discovered, in 1854-5, that the convicts were too well fed; their health was injured by overeating. The allowance was reduced; the health of the men was said to have "wonderfully improved;" the Imperial Treasury gained at the rate of £4000 per annum by the reduction. Other authorities disagreed with the officials. The allowance in 1855 was:—Meat, 14 ozs.; bread, 22 ozs.; potatoes, 12 ozs.; treacle, 2 ozs.; barley or rice, ½ oz. (twice a week); tea, ⅓ oz. In after years even this was found to be generally too liberal. The diet in 1880 was:—Meat, 10 ozs.; bread, 18 ozs.; potatoes, 16 ozs.; oatmeal, 2 ozs.; tea ⅓ oz.; sugar 1½ oz.; salt, ½ oz. Clothes were issued to the convicts twice a year; the garments and boots of each member of the club were marked with his arithmetical number so that the officers might know him easily—the bold brand of the broad arrow was affixed with satirical liberality. The annual list of clothing was:—2 pairs boots; 4 pairs socks; 4 handkerchiefs; 4 cotton shirts; 2 flannel shirts; 1 fustian jacket (winter); 1 fustian vest (winter); 1 fustian trousers (winter); 1 duck jacket (summer); 1 duck vest (summer); 2 duck trousers (summer); 1 felt hat. The convict was given a leather belt when admitted, and at the end of every six months he returned his old clothing to the store.

He was subject to a system in his bodily safety and his spiritual welfare. The medical officer must examine every convict when admitted to the prison, and have him washed; must attend "complaining sick;" examine prisoners and prison every month; be present at all corporal punishments, and keep a journal of everything within his department. The chaplain must preach two sermons on Sundays, Christmas Days, Good Fridays, and days "appointed for a general fast or thanksgiving;" read prayers selected from the Liturgy in the mornings on ordinary days; superintend the school; visit the infirmary; issue books and tracts; perform burial services; administer the sacrament of the Lord's Supper "once in every quarter, or oftener, at his own discretion;" keep a journal containing the name of every prisoner, and an opinion on his "moral and religious progress;" read all letters addressed to or written by such prisoner, and converse with him when admitted, and daily with every convict undergoing special punishment or discipline. Broadly, he must endeavour to "obtain an intimate knowledge of the character and disposition of each prisoner." His reports on all these matters were used as references.

The convict was managed and superintended under certain clearly defined rules and regulations. If the officials infringed these they were fined according to a systematic scale. Their first duty was "to treat the prisoners with kindness and humanity, and to listen patiently to and report their complaints and grievances." The officials' first object must be that of reclaiming criminals—"they should strive to acquire a moral influence over the prisoners by performing their duties conscientiously, but without harshness. They should especially try to raise the prisoners' minds to a proper feeling of moral obligation, by the example of their own uniform regard to truth and integrity even in the smallest matters," thus obtaining respect and confidence. Records of each man's character must be kept, bad or good; familiarity with the convicts was disallowed; prisoners must be made to wash and shave themselves at certain intervals; officers must be temperate, possess unblemished characters, engage in no business—in fact, details of convicts' officers' lives must be on prescribed lines. The schoolmaster taught by a system. Convicts were supposed to attend school twice a week.

The runaway slave was hunted by dogs; the convict was as relentlessly tracked by blacks. Occasionally he groaned under the discipline of the Establishment, and contrived to outwit his guards and escape. He wished to reach eastern settlements or the islands of the north-west. The fugitive might make a rush for liberty while away from the prison out on public works, or he might be doing isolated duty about the prison, and detect his opportunity. A warder with a rifle stood on sentry duty; he seldom aimed to hit the escapee; it was not necessary. A gun boomed out the news of an escape, and a signal was raised on the hill. A few mounted troopers were on regular duty ready for such emergencies; black trackers waited too. A minute after the report of the gun, trooper and native dashed out of their quarters on horseback. They soon picked up the track, and he must be a very clever man who could escape the keen eye of the black tracker. Generally it took but a few minutes to effect the capture. Rewards of from £1 to £5 or more, according to the circumstances, were given for the recovery of an escapee.

Sometimes the convict obtained several hours' start. He had little hope of getting clear, for what native and trooper could not accomplish an invulnerable nature would do for them. Generally it was only newly transported convicts who sought to escape; the others understood the sullen difficulties too well. A convict once boastfully remarked to his warder in the bush that he intended to escape; the warder coolly replied that he was at liberty to try. The convict might escape from the prison; he had little chance of getting out of the "prison yard"—the impassable, inhospitable bush. Captain Henderson, in one of his reports, termed Western Australia a "vast natural gaol." On one side was a great stretch of ocean; inland, nature denied passage to eastern settlements. The scattered population, the unsurveyed desert stretches, the dangers of life among natives, the distance from South Australia, were barriers secure as Trojan walls. Viewed "simply as a gaol, the colony appeared as if nature had intended it for no other purpose," wrote Mrs. Millett. Convicts, convicts' officials, and the Colonial Office in London soon recognised that nature's scheme as worked out in Western Australia supported the convict system. According to Governor Kennedy not a single probationer escaped up to 1862, and only a few ticket-of-leave men.

No member of the convict brotherhood flouted the system with impunity. The gallows, additional imprisonment, the cat-o'-nine-tails, the dark cell, the chain-gang, a diet of bread and water, were