message to the Governor by Campbell. The Governor then wrote to Wylde in the following terms:—
"I have received a communication from you by Mr Secry. Campbell to the effect that you and Mr. Wentworth feel yourselves so fully satisfied of the accuracy of your late report … that you do not conceive you can by any further revision be induced to alter it, and at the same time suggesting that in the present stage of the business, you can conceive that the proceeding most proper for me to adopt would be to call on you as chief Law Officer of the Crown to furnish me with your opinion and advice in regard to the measures to be adopted in the further prosecution of this affair."[1] This advice Macquarie asked for and received a few days later.[2]
Wylde proposed to send the officer in command of the guard and the surgeon, who held a naval commission, to England to answer either before a Court-Martial or a Court of Criminal Jurisdiction. To secure the due appearance of the master and three mates, he proposed to take recognisances or to hypothecate the ship. The latter course, which was the one adopted, "whether ultimately valid or not, is justified by the occasion and in terrorem". In the case of the three soldiers already mentioned, the ordinary course could be followed. The witnesses, he thought, should enter into recognisances of £100 each to appear when called upon, except, of course, the soldiers and convicts, who would simply be sent home by the Government.
There was a possible difficulty in regard to the arrest of the surgeon, but Wylde was of opinion that "whatever question might be raised as to his being amenable to a Court-Martial in respect of charges arising in service as a surgeon and superintendent of a convict transport during the passage, yet in consideration of the full and general powers of your Excellency's Commission as Governor, I can only give it as my opinion that your Excellency will be equally empowered and justified, upon the report made, to adopt, at least in limine, the same measure and proceeding as against Lieutenant Busteed" (the officer of the guard) "leaving Surgeon Dewar 'to be in England proceeded against and tried as the merits of his offence shall require'."
