Page:The A. B. C. of Colonization.djvu/23

18 may work, I shall here mention a case of a respectable mechanic at Lambeth who has a wife, two adult children, and two under ten years of age. He knew of no families in his own locality that wished to emigrate, and he was therefore concerned at not being able to join a group, for he could pay £40. towards the passage of his family; on his informing me of this I directed him to call on a certain evening at my residence, when I offered to place him in communication with a group. The result has been, and as I calculated, very satisfactory; an acquaintance was formed, when they satisfied each other agreeable to Rule 20, as to "references," and they are now on intimate terms and members of the same group.

I shall now, Gentlemen, ask you to view these groups ready and prepared to embark. Grandfathers and grandmothers may be there; the strong and the young will keep them, nay, they will be useful in the bush, for the eye of age is at times of more service than the strong arm of youth. About twenty days since I sent off a family to Australia in which there was one female 72 years old; a relation had sent for them. And shortly before I got a passage for one old man, aged 75, to join an only son near Sydney. Hope seemed to invigorate their frames, and the dread of the Union had left them; one was from Ireland, the other from Scotland. In these groups, then, you will find the aged—those again in the prime of life—the saplings and the shoots of the family—the youth and the child in arms; no exception is to be made on account of age; the only voucher required will be a good character. The groups are now assembled, we will suppose, at the port of embarkation. A very important point now is to be considered, the arrangement of berths—the classification of the parties