and pleasure, were deserted, and no compensation was awarded. Bitterly, indeed, did they complain of their arch-enemy, and heavy were the charges made against him for unnecessary haste, and for the wanton destruction by fire of property left behind.
The settlement was formed in April 1831, in a little bay on the western side of Gun Carriage, and Dr. Maclachlan was left in charge of the sixty people. Sergeant Wight was ordered there in June, with a small military party, to take charge of the stores, to protect the females from ill-treatment, to keep off the sealers, and to govern in the absence of Mr. Robinson.
It was not long before the utter unsuitability of the location became intelligible to all. It is true that, though so small, the island was but half a mile from Cape Barren Island, in whose wooded retreats it was thought the men would find superior hunting-grounds. But the passage was too full of rocks, and too often boiling with contending currents, to tempt the swimmers. The unfortunate creatures, having no motive for exercise—for little game ran within those narrow boundaries—used to sit day after day on the beach, casting tearful glances across the stormy sea toward the mountains of their native land. Those denizens of the thicket and the forest, with no maritime tastes, with nothing at every turn but the ever-restless, hateful waters, pined in their rocky prison. Their officers were as dissatisfied with the dungeon-like residence. Strong representations were made as to the wretchedness of the climate, and the barrenness of the ground. No means existed tot the arrest of the terrible home sickness which was carrying off so many of the Natives. An Old Hand assured me that they "died in the sulks, like so many bears." This was in allusion to the Kaola, or tailless opossum, which rarely survives its capture, but mopes at its chain, refuses its food, and dies.
This was the Elysium contemplated by Hobart Town in the distance, and described by the Courier as presenting "the most favourable openings for a safe receptacle," and possessing "much fine open tracts of rich and fertile soil." No kangaroos were there, and the whole colony of the place would have perished for want of supplies, had not a sealer's boat, laden with potatoes, most providentially called in for shelter in a storm.
This second refuge must be abandoned, and that after so short a trial. The sealers, whose huts and crops had been so cruelly
