ralasian aspect, will not
be without utility to the colonies themselves.

Although a separate relation will derange the thread of Tasmanian
history, the reader may be compensated by a view more perspicuous and
useful.

Thousands of British offenders, who by their exile and sufferings have
expiated their crimes, trod almost alone the first stages of Austral
colonisation, and amidst toils and privations, initiated a progress now
beheld by nations with curiosity and admiration. Economists still weigh
in uncertain balances the loss and the gain, and the legislator longs
for facts which may decide the perpetual conflict between them who
denounce and those who approve this expedient of penal legislation. It
is not the intention of this narrative to anticipate conclusions: its
design will be accomplished when the story of the past is truly told.

Exile, the penalty denounced by the Almighty against the first homicide,
was among the earliest affixed by man to lesser crimes, or whenever the
presence of the offender endangered the public repose. The Roman law
permitted the accused to withdraw from impending judgment by a voluntary
exile. Such was the practice in the time of Cicero. When men sought to
avoid bondage or death, adjudged by the laws, they had recourse to exile
as to an altar; nor did they forfeit their civic standing, except with
their lives.[37]

At a later period, under the imperial government, the islands of the
Mediterranean became places of exile: several thousand Jews were
banished from Rome to the Island of Sardinia.[38]

Transportation was unknown to the common law of England, but abjuration
of the realm, which resembled the Roman practice, was not infrequent:
"it was permitted," said Sir Edward Coke, "when the felon chose rather
to _perdere patriam quam vitam_,"--to lose his country rather than his
life. The culprit having found sanctuary within the precincts of a
church, took oath to abjure the realm: assuming the character of a
pilgrim, he received a cross to protect him on his journey. By the Act
of James I. the privilege of sanctuary was taken away,[39] and thus the
abjuration, founded upon it, virtually abolished.

The Spanish was the first Christian nation which to banishment united
penal labor. Columbus found it difficult to allure adventurers: to work
the mines, was necessary to gratify his patrons, and he prevailed on
Ferdinand to furnish colonists by clearing the galleys. These recruits
atten