Many of the convicts have been
greatly reformed when in the service of considerate and judicious
masters; but, with all this abatement, there is so much peculation, so
much insubordination, insolence, disobedience of lawful orders, and so
much drunkenness, that reference to the magisterial authority is
constant, and always attended with loss of time and expense to the
settlers. There can be no doubt things appear better in the colony than
they really are; for, in numberless instances, masters are known to
submit to peculation rather than incur the additional expense of
prosecuting their servants. Two hundred felons, after having been for a
longtime under confinement in the gaols or hulks of England, and
subsequently pent up on board a transport, are placed in charge of the
masters or their agents to whom they have been assigned. The master has
then to take the convict to his home (either to the other extremity of
the island, a distance of 140 miles, or nearer, as the case may be), and
well would it be if he could get him quietly there, but the contrary is
of too frequent occurrence.
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