as tall, loose-limbed and fair, with small features, and though strong, not so athletic looking as Englishmen. They made clever and daring sailors,[1] were already proud of their horsemanship[2] and were willing and quick to learn any trade. It was of course impossible that in one generation a new type could have been evolved, and the fact was that the children of the convicts, born into better conditions and growing up in a healthier environment, reverted to the type of which their parents were debased examples. It must also be remembered that many men were at that time transported for very slight offences, and that political prisoners from Ireland at the time of the Rebellion and from England and Scotland in the years of reaction after 1795, gave to Australia a fine and sturdy stock.[3]
The convict parents were in general anxious that their children should grow up decent and honest, and desired them to have the advantages of schooling and the ministrations of the Church.[4] In cases where the parents were dissolute and disreputable, their example was said to act rather as a deterrent than a temptation.[5] Under Macquarie there was an increase in the number of schoolmasters, and two of the chaplains sent out had some training in the National Schools in London. Though there were neither schoolmasters nor schoolhouses in sufficient numbers to cope with the population, there were Government schools of some sort in each district, and in Sydney there were also several private "seminaries".
- ↑ When Bigge was going from Sydney to Van Diemen's Land the ship was manned exclusively by Australians in order to ensure a trustworthy crew. See Report III.
- ↑ There were many complaints in the Gazette of reckless riding and driving. A favourite trick was to drive through the town without reins. Macquarie wished to raise a volunteer corps of mounted dragoons from amongst the young men.
- ↑ It is rather curious that the only prisoners against whose character Macquarie was ever warned were five men who had been convicted of High Treason and were transported in May 1820. He was cautioned against their designing characters and the "wicked principles which they may attempt, if not narrowly watched, to instil into the minds of others". See letter from Home Office with assignment of convicts, 11th May, 1820. R.O., MS. Hunter (C. on T., 1812) and Riley (C. on G., i819) both gave very favourable accounts of the Irish convicts.
- ↑ The Rev. Mr. Cross said that he had heard "a man who was a Catholic say: 'I have been very bad myself and I don't wish my child to be as bad; I would rather he should be a Protestant than that'." Appendix, Bigge's Reports. R.O., MS.
- ↑ See Bigge, III. and Evidence of Riley, C. on G., 1819; also Evidence of several colonists in Appendix to Bigge's Reports. R.O., MS.
