Page:Memoirs James Hardy Vaux.djvu/211

188 circumstanced, and after six hours' walking arrived at Sydney. Here I lay concealed in the house of a friend till Sunday noon, when I again set out proceeding with the utmost caution, and arrived at Castle-hill the same night, conformable to the tenor of my pass. As I expererienced nothing but misery and privation during five days in each week, and found such enjoyments in Sydney, I repeated my excursion almost every succeeding Friday, but was not always equally fortunate in my proceedings. The police in Sydney having some information of my visits, were constantly on the look-out for me, and I was at last apprehended, punished with fifty lashes, and sent back in custody of a constable. This did not deter me, however, from running the same risk at several subsequent periods, only redoubling my precautions, and travelling in the night.

I had been about ten months at Castle-hill, when the person who had officiated as clerk of the camp, (that is, clerk to the superintendent,) becoming a free man, quitted the settlement, and I being the only one qualified for such an office, and in some favour with Mr. Knight, was promoted to the situation. I now found myself perfectly at ease, and the more so from having been so long kept at hard labour, for which I was but ill adapted. My duty consisted in measuring the daily portion of ground to the different gangs who were breaking up, chipping, &c., keeping a daily account of the various