Justice Burton.
In 1836 Sydney covered an area of about 2,000 acres and contained about
20,000 inhabitants; of this number 3,500 were convicts, most of them in
assigned service, and about 7,000 had probably been prisoners of the
Crown. These, together with their associates amongst the free
population, were persons of violent and uncontrollable passions, which
most of them possessed no lawful means of gratifying; incorrigibly bad
characters, preferring a life of idleness and debauchery by means of
plunder to one of honest industry. Burglaries and robberies were
frequently perpetrated by convict servants in the town and its vicinity,
sometimes even in the middle of the day. No town offered so many
facilities for eluding the vigilance of the police as Sydney did. The
unoccupied bush near and within it afforded shelter to the offender and
hid him from pursuit. He might steal or hire a boat and in a few minutes
place an arm of the sea between himself and his pursuers. The want of
continuity in the buildings afforded great facilities for lying in wait
for opportunities of committing crime, for instant concealment on the
approach of the police, and for obtaining access to the backs of houses
and shops; and the drunkenness, idleness, and carelessness of a great
proportion of the inhabitants afforded innumerable opportunities and
temptations, both by day and night, for those who chose to live by
plunder.
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