OFFICIAL REPOBTS. 323 objects were perhaps never seen. Not a comfort or ,cori- 1788 venience could be got for them^ -besides the very few we 12 July, had with us/'* In another last note to Nepean, Phillip mentioned some other necessaries which were very much needed at the same time. The italics in this letter, as well as the spelling, are his own. To the articles which I have mentioned as more immediately wanted, the following, tho' so very necessary, hi^ve escaped my memory till this moment : — Leather for eoals for the men's shooes Repain <md the materuds /or moiiding them. Shooes here last hut a veiy ^*^**'» short time, and the want of these materials, and thread to mend the cloathing, will render it impossible to make them serve more than half the time for which they were intended. This coimtry requires warm cloathing in the winter. The rains are frequent, and the nights very cold. Vinegar will be very acceptable ; it is much wanted. and vinegar. The next despatch to Lord Sydney was written in com- pliance with the Boyal instruction that full reports should Reports on be transmitted with respect to the natives, and also con- and the ceming ^^ the actual state and quality of the soil at and near the settlement, the probable and most efPectual means of improving and cultivating the same, and of the mode, and upon what terms and conditions, the lands should be granted."t Phillip was not at this time in a position to report specially upon either of these topics. All the in- formation he had been able to gather about them he had already conveyed to the Home Secretary ; but conceiving that something in the shape of a formal report was expected
- Journal, p. 122. He adds : — " The sick have increased since our land-
ing to snch a degree that a spot for a eeneral hospital has been marked ont, ^d artificers alroad^ employed on it. From which it would appear that M. P^ron was misinformed when he stated that a hospital had been brought out in frame from England, capable of receiving all the sick on board the Fleet. A hospital was brought out in frame m the Justinian, which arrived in June, 1790 ; hence, probably, P^ron's mistake. The only building brought out in the First Fleet was a small house for the Governor — *' a portable canvas house,*' Collins calls it,— p. 6. + Post, pp. 485-7. Digitized by Google
