that the
crimes of amateur assassins are left to oblivion.[15]

FOOTNOTES:

[Footnote 12: "Unless the blacks are exterminated, or removed,
conciliation is in vain. Shall the sons of a country give way before the
aborigines, _after having repulsed the arms of France_? They are now
shot, with as little remorse as so many crows!!"--_Col. Advocate_,
1828.]

[Footnote 13: A party, under Major Grey, went out in pursuit: overtook a
few blacks; one was seized; but he was so smeared with grease, that he
slipped through the hands of his captors. A paper of the day recommends,
that the arms of the pursuer be thrust under the arms of the black; and,
the hands being raised, to be firmly clasped over the back of the
fugitive's neck--an expedient, that reminds us of the salt specific for
catching birds, with which most children have been delighted and
disappointed.]

SECTION V.

However just these representations of individual conduct, and with
whatever severity the measures of government bore upon the aborigines,
that unhappy people afforded ample reason for apprehension, and even
abhorrence. Their crimes were fearful, and the effect of their outrage
on the colonial mind can only be imagined. The fierce robbers, of
European origin, who had infested the land, were not half so terrible:
these were at least restrained by early associations and national
sympathies; often by conscience, and even by each other. But the natives
now united the antipathy of a national foe, and the rapacity of a
banditti, with the spite of individual revenge: they were at once a
people in arms, and a distributed band of assassins.

The correspondence between the local and imperial authorities exhibits
the feelings of the Governor, and his full consciousness, that however
necessary his proceedings might seem on the spot, surveyed from the
distance, they would wear the aspect of cruelty. In 1828, he apprised
Lord Goderich, that the proposal to remove the natives from the island,
had not met his concurrence; and that the commissioners for lands had
pointed out the north-east coast as adapted to their wants, well
sheltered and warm, abounding with game, accessible by water, and easy
to guard. It was stated by Colonel Arthur that harsh measures were
demanded by the colonists; but that he could not dismiss from his
recollection, that the whites were the aggressors, and that every plan
should be tried before treating the natives as accredited enemies. Thr