hence she had brought with her one thousand seal skins and
thirty barrels of oil, which had been procured there among the islands.

The court of criminal judicature being assembled on the 16th, two mates
of the _Walker_ were brought before it, and tried for using menaces
to a person who had stopped their boat when attempting to land spirits
without a permit; but as he had not any special authority for making the
seizure, or detaining the boat, they were acquitted.

One man, John Chapman Morris, was found guilty of forgery by the the same
court, and received sentence of death; but as this had been determined by
the majority of one voice only, whereas the letters patent for
establishing the court expressly say that five of the members are to
concur in a capital case, this business must, as provided also by the
patent, be referred to the King in council. It was hoped that this
circumstance would but seldom occur, as the object of it must, during the
reference, remain a prisoner, with all the miserable sensations that a
person would experience under sentence of death. The time that he must
linger in this uncomfortable situation could not well be less than
fifteen or eighteen months; and, admitting that the length of it might
have deadened the acuteness of his first sensations, and rendered him
thoughtless as to the event, yet how would that acuteness be aggravated,
should, unhappily for him, the sentence be at last confirmed by the royal
approbation!*

[* It may be pleasing to the reader to learn, that both Isaac
Nichols (see Chapter XVII viz: "The criminal court was only once
assembled during this month; when one man was condemned to death for a
burglary, and another transported for fourteen years to Norfolk Island.
This man, Isaac Nichols, an overseer, had been accused of receiving
stolen goods; but from some circumstances which occurred on the trial,
the sentence was respited until his Majesty's pleasure could be taken.")
and this man, have recently received his Majesty's pardon.]

The body of the settlers having again represented their total inability
to bear any reduction in the price of the wheat of this season, on
account, not only of their former heavy losses, but of the exorbitant
price of all those necessaries of life which they required for paying
their labourers, the governor at length consented to receive the wheat
only at the former price of ten shillings per bushel, and they were at
the same time told to p