announced total abolition. In '48, another
complete revolution took place, and all convicts were to be sent to Van
Diemen's Land. This extravagance of upstart theory and fitful experiment
without end, all tended to check colonial enterprise and destroy the
public tranquillity.

In whatever sense Earl Grey announced abolition in '47, it was clear
that free emigration was essential to his plan when he proposed to
resume it in '48. The funds he assigned for this purpose were sums,--the
cost of their exile--to be exacted from ticket-holders as the price of
freedom. But these funds were wholly prospective. Insuperable
difficulties opposed their collection. Nor was the principle just. The
sickly and unskilful would have stood at a greater distance from
liberation than the clever and robust. The successful thief could
purchase his freedom, and leave behind his more honest shipmates. The
criminal being confounded with the debtor, a penal sentence would have
ended in a civil process. Earl Grey proposed to add to the free
population by the expenditure of L10,000, granted by the parliament, but
it was found that the families of convicts were to be the chief
participants. Thus resumption cut off all hope of free emigration. Nor
was it even desirable while the laboring classes were in poverty. The
settlers had the example of New South Wales before them; where even the
sudden stoppage of transportation had been followed by rapid recovery.
They were willing to combat their difficulties alone. "Such," said they,
"will at no distant period be the condition of this country should the
government prove just. And then, with its fertile valleys, clothed with
abundance and filled with life, and its pure salubrious atmosphere
giving length of days, it will need no other attractions than nature has
conferred--no other commerce than the commerce of freedom--no patronage
save the enterprise of its children. From the crown we ask nothing
except to spare us from further wrong, and to accept our grateful
loyalty in return for the uplifting of a burden too heavy to bear."

The governor himself was adverse to the ticket system. The control
exercised over the holders was limited to the most ineffectual and
distant surveillance. They were free in reference to the colonists, and
were subject to the same laws for the regulation of service.
Restrictions were imposed on their locomotion, but without much
practical restraint. Sir William Denison now recomme