26 THE -pjLVnm 07 178d-M. 1^^ Clearing fresh ground was a laborious and tedious pro- cess, while the necessities of the people were immediate and Norfolk pressing. At Norfolk Island less clearing had to be done, Wand- and the returns from the soil were both larger and quicker than at Sydney. Phillip felt no anxiety regarding the people he had sent away by the Sirius and Supply, and their absence placed at the disposal of those who were left a quantity of ground already in cultivation, together with a few head of live stock. No sooner had the vessels left than conj^' Phillip set about distributing the plots of garden-ground amongst those convicts who had been, up to that time, with- out gardens, some of them without huts.* The reamlts of this considerate and well-judged action will be seen later on. In one direction the convicts did their best to neutralise Dertraction the good which Phillip w€ks trying to do them. With reck- of live stock j^^^ selfishnoss they killed most of the live stock in their possession, heedless of the fact that they were destroying the means upon which their support in the future largely depended. They were, apparently, impelled to this suicidal course by the fear that, when the salt meat was exhausted^ their stock would be seized by Government, In the despatches which he wrot-e in April, 1790, Phillip made no reference to the circumstance. Possibly he thought that, considering the diflSlculty of finding food for the stock, caused 1* would be better, as the evil had been done, to let them go. ottwdf^ That there was some cause for the belief that the stock would be taken over by Government is evident from the
- " Immediately after the departure of theBeshipB [theSirius and the Suppl j],
the Governor directed his attention to the regulation of the people who were left at Sydney, and to the preservation of the stock in the colony. For these purposes, he himself visited the different huts and gardens whose tenants had just quitted them, distributing thera to such convicts as were either in miser- able hovels or without any shelter at all. It was true that by this arcaoge- ment the idle found themselves provided for by the labour of many who had been industrious ; but they were at the same time assured that unless t^ej kept in good cultivation the gardens which they were allowed to possess they would be turned out from the comforts of a gopd hut, to live under a rook or a tree. That they might have time for tills purpose, the afternoon of Wednesday and the whole of Saturday in each week were given to them." — Collins, vol. i, p. 99.
