Page:History of Australia, Rusden 1897.djvu/43

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DISPOSAL OF CONVICTS. 15 Had the French founded a colony it is not probable that under their management it would have prospered ; and if it had, it would, in the ensuing wars, have fallen a prey to the English. A careful study of published and unpublished contemporary documents leaves no doubt as to the fact that the English were always on the alert to keep the French from their new South Land. The disposal of convicts was, without doubt, one element in guiding the government to the colonization of Australia. Transportation to the States in America was rendered impossible by the war in 1775. Precise statistics as to the numbers transported thither between the years 1619 and 1784 cannot now be obtained ; but an official estimate made in 1790 stated the ** mercantile returns" as £40,000 per annum, ** about 2000 convicts being sold for iJ20 each." An Act (4 Geo. IV, c. 2) explains this strange process. The court, when sentencing prisoners, was empowered to " convey, transfer, and make over such offenders to the use of any persons contracting for their transportation to tnem and their assigns for the term of seven years." Accordingly the " contractors" sold the prisoners in the colonies to settlers, who became the recognised " owners or proprietors" of their fellow-countrymen for a term of years. The Home government thus strove to wash its hands of responsibility, the contractors made more or less profit out of their brethren, and the colonists obtained labourers more or less valuable. When the American Eevolution ground these arrange- ments to powder so far as the United States were concerned, the English government sought relief from the accumulation of convicts by sending some of them to Africa. It appears from a paper submitted to the English govern- ment in 1783 (when Fox and North were in power) that, in 1775 and 1776 746 convicts were sent to Africa ; that "334 died, 271 deserted no one knows where, and of the remainder no account could be given. "^^ •• ** Historical Records of N.S.W.," vol. i, part 2, p. 7. Paper drawn up by Mr. J. M. Matra, who communicated also with members of the Pitt ministry at later dates. Like many framers of plans Matra was inaccur- ately speculative. His proposal was to deport American loyalists to Australia, and he declared that **a sum not exceeding £3000 will be more than adequate to the whole expense of Government."