finement that if he should be hanged he would create a laugh before he was sent off by playing off some trick upon the executioner. Holding up such a mere animal as an example was not expected to have the proper or intended effect; the Governor, therefore, with the humanity that was always conspicuous in the exercise of the authority vested in him, directed that he should be sent to Garden Island, there to work in fetters; and in addition to his ration of provisions he was to be supplied with vegetables from the garden.'
Phillip, writing to Grenville in July 1790, says, in illustration of the class of men he had to deal with:—
'Experience, Sir, has taught me how difficult it is to make men industrious who have passed their lives in habits of vice and indolence. In some cases it has been found impossible; neither kindness nor severity have had any effect; and tho' I can say that the convicts in general behave well, there are many who dread punishment less than they fear labour; and those who have not been brought up to hard work, which are by far the greatest part, bear it badly. They shrink from it the moment the eye of the overseer is turned from them.'
With such men in such a situation it was not wonderful that recourse was frequently had to what were practically the only punishments of that time—the gallows and the triangles.
