y tons,
obtained no respite from toil. The slippery and inclining ground exposed
them to terrific perils: when they complained of inability to bear
their burden, they were flogged, taken back, and compelled, by
supernatural effort, to raise the load they had laid down. The numerous
orders were enforced without momentary relaxation, and the scourge was
the chief agent of control.

When the settlement was new, the men suffered from scurvy; they were
not, subsequently, unhealthy: diseases of the heart formed a large
proportion of their maladies. Many instances of great hardship have been
authenticated; and several committed murder to be removed from misery by
a public execution. The possession of a piece of tobacco was penal, and
for this offence alone multitudes were flogged; but its use was only
limited by the supply: many men would have risked the rack, rather than
rejected this valued indulgence. A wesleyan missionary was accustomed to
reward his servant with the luxury, until he found that being
distributed, others were involved in punishment. Visitors usually
carried tobacco, which they dropped on the tramway by which they were
conveyed; and even when the prohibitions were most severely enforced,
money would procure a supply.

The effect of Capt. Booth's administration was soon visible: the
stoutest hearted gave way. Inexorably just, according to the system he
represented, the accused might plead, but were never pardoned. The
gentlemen convicts, clad in a prison dress, were employed in lighter
labor and worked together; but were transferred to more penal gangs, for
the least disorder. It is said that the terrors of Port Arthur were
preventive of crime; that its rigour controlled and reformed, for the
time, such as were sent there; but, both by those who vindicated, and
those who condemned its severity, it is admitted that relapses were
usual;[204] that it operated on the will by mechanical force, but
debased the soul.

However heavy the hand of authority, it was not capricious. The
overseers and constables were less brutal than at the road parties and
previous penal stations. Compared with every other settlement of its
class, Port Arthur, during Booth's management, was more humane because
more equal and impartial. Constantly exhibited as a place of profound
misery, it carried the vengeance of the law to the utmost limits of
human endurance.

It would be improper to withhold the common testimony in favor of this