Page:The founding of South Australia.djvu/39

 decrees and ages were moving about without employment, useless to themselves, and a burden to the public. The spirit of turbulence was abroad, too, and when, owing to stagnation in trade, there was a movement among employers of labour to reduce wages, the only argument the mass of the working classes knew how to use effectively, was violence. Throughout the country riotous assemblies were held for the discussion of grievances, and, in the factory districts, where the introduction of machinery appeared to the ignorant to be the end of all their hopes, mobs of discontented men employed themselves in breaking the windows of the factories, smashing the machinery, destroying the looms, and in many instances setting fire to the mills.

It was in this year that Sir Robert Peel, owing to the enormous increase in the population, instituted the new police force in the metropolis, which superseded the staff of parochial watchmen, who were wholly inadequate for the public protection. In their day plunder and robbery of all kinds were committed with impunity, and after sunset no one considered it safe to venture out of doors.

The question, therefore, at that time, which affected the minds of all thoughtful people was. What is to be done with the unemployed and surplus population? Into this question Robert Gouger threw himself heart and soul, and in every action he took he was supported by the advice and