ed
in the black hole at the guardhouse at Sydney, out of which he escaped a
night or two after, by untiling a part of the roof. After this he was not
heard of, till the watch apprehended him at Parramatta, where he had
broken into two houses, which he had plundered, and was caught with the
property upon him.

The frequency of enormous offences had rendered it necessary to inflict a
punishment that should be more likely to check the commission of crimes
than mere flagellation at the back of the guardhouse, or being sent to
Toongabbie. Crow, therefore, was lodged in the custody of the civil
power, and ordered for trial by the court of criminal judicature.

During the time the _Fairy_ lay at anchor in this cove, a sergeant and
three privates of the New South Wales corps were sent and remained on
board, for the purpose of preventing all improper visitations from the
shore, and inspecting whatever might be either received into or sent from
the ship in a suspicious manner: a regulation from which the master
professed to have found essential service, as he thereby kept his decks
free from idle or bad people, and his seamen went on unmolested with the
duty of the vessel.

On Saturday the 23rd, the flour and rice in store being nearly expended,
the ration was altered to the following proportions of those articles,
viz:

To the officers, civil and military, soldiers, overseers, and the
settlers from free people, were served, of biscuit or flour 2 pounds;
wheat 2 pounds; Indian corn 5 pounds; peas 3 pints.

To the male convicts were served, women and children receiving in the
proportions always observed, (of biscuit or flour, none, and for the
first time since the establishment of the colony) wheat 3 pounds; Indian
corn 5 pounds; paddy 2 pints; gram 2 pints.

This was universally felt as the worst ration that had ever been served
from his Majesty's stores; and by the labouring convict particularly so,
as no one article of grain was so prepared for him as to be immediately
made use of. The quantity that was now to be ground, and the numbers who
brought grain to the mill, kept it employed all the night as well as the
day; and as, from the scarcity of mills, every man was compelled to wait
for his turn, the day had broke, and the drum beat for labour, before
many who went into the mill house at night had been able to get their
corn ground. The consequence was, that many, not being able to wait,
consumed their allowance unprepa