f his
own people had either committed the burglary, or had given information to
others how and when it might be committed, as the part of the house
broken into was that which Mr. Johnson had applied to a store-room.
Several people were taken up, and some of the articles found concealed in
the woods; but those who stole them had address enough to avoid discovery.

Very shortly after this a most daring burglary was committed in a house
in the old marine quarters occupied by Mr. Kent, who arrived here in the
_Boddingtons_ from Ireland in August last, as agent of convicts on the
part of Government. He had secured the door with a padlock, and after
sun-set had gone up to one of the officers' barracks, where he was
spending the evening, when, before nine o'clock, word was brought him
that his house had been broken into. On going down, he found that the
staple, which was a very strong one, had been forced out, and a large
chest that would require four men to convey it out of the door had been
taken off. It contained a great quantity of wearing apparel, money,
bills, and letters; but, though the theft could not have been long
committed, all the search that twenty or thirty people made for some
hours that night was ineffectual, no trace being seen of it, and nothing
found but a large caulking-iron, with which it was supposed the staple
was wrenched off. The chest was found the next morning behind a barrack
(which had lately been fitted up as a place of divine worship for the
accommodation of the chaplain of the New South Wales corps), and some of
the wearing apparel was brought in from the woods; but Mr. Kent's loss
was very little diminished by this recovery.

In addition to these burglaries a highway robbery was committed on the
supercargo of the _American_, who was attacked in the dusk of the evening,
close by one of the barracks, by two men, who, in the moment of striking
him, seized hold of his watch, and with a violent jerk wrenched off the
seals, the watch falling on the ground. The place was, however, too
public to risk staying to look for it; and the owner was fortunate enough
to find it himself, but the seals, which were of gold, were carried off.

All these offences against peace and good order were to be attributed to
the horrid vice of gaming, which was still pursued in this place, and
which, from the management and address of those who practised it, could
not be prevented. The persons of the peace-officers were we