"months, during which period the other two died, an infant and a convict (disease not known).
"At Melville Island I could not learn the number of deaths, there being no records on the island. At different times four or five had been killed by the natives, in consequence of coercive measures adopted towards them; since which they have quite estranged themselves from both settlements.
"Since the formation of these settlements, they have been under the immediate military government of an officer of one of the regiments at Sydney, 'whose turn it was for detached duty,' without reference to his habits, interest, or inclination; indeed, so far from the latter, that a Commandant at Melville Island told me that he hesitated whether he would not give up the army rather than go to that station; and since his arrival he has never been half a mile from the house he occupies; the consequence is, that what they have seen has been with jaundiced eyes, and their representations made accordingly, describing the climate to be such as to preclude the possibility of keeping the settlement, and the soil incapable of producing any thing fit for the sustenance of man.
Now, looking at the number of deaths, and considering that every individual at both settlements are natives of Great Britain or Ireland; and that none of the officers, and not more than six of the men, had ever resided within the Tropics before, a tolerable estimate may be formed of the climate, which I do not hesitate to say is one of the best within the torrid zone,—indeed the difference we felt between it and India, was surprising. We had no instance of sickness during our stay in these seas, though I am convinced, had our people been as much exposed in wooding and watering in any part of either the East or West Indies, we should have had many cases of fever, if not of death. The principal disease appears to have been scurvy, the presence of which may be attributed to a want of the most ordinary precaution, owing to the inexperience of the individuals themselves, there being many indigenous roots and vegetables, among which are yams, arrow-root, and a kind of parsnip, together with a pea or calavance, and an abundance of the Palmyra cabbage, so invaluable to all the natives of Hindoostan. To obtain these, it is required to climb the tree, which they did not attempt, but procured a scanty supply by cutting it down to get a single cabbage; and
