Page:History of Australia, Rusden 1897.djvu/440

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All impartial posterity may perhaps disuiiss the charge, although from Blif^h's isolated position he coaltl produce no evidence to rehut that of the aukliers who found him. Lieut, Minchin (one of the six officers summoned to appear before Bligh at Government House on the morumg of 27th Jan.) having thus arrested Bligh on the evening of , the ^Othj escorted him to Johnston, and asserted afterwards lat Bligh extended his hand to the Major, who expressed ^his regret that *' for the preservation of the colony/* he was compelled to act upon the request of the inhabitants. Johnston, Mm chin, and Dr. Harris declared that Bligh thanked Johnston for the handsome manner in which he had been treated, and the wishes of the people had been carried into execution. The formal letter addressed by Johnston to Bligh was as follows : '* I am caUed upon to execute a moat painful duty. You are cliarged by the respectable inhabitants of crimes that render you iiiifit to exercise the supreme autliority another niotneut in thiB colony, and in that charge all the officers serving under my couuuand have joined, I therefore require you, in His Majesty s sacred name, to resign yinn' anthority, ami to aobtidt to the arreat which I hereby place you under, by the advice of all iny officersj and by the advice of every resp&ctable inhabitant iu the town of Sydney. " Georuk Jt)MN9T0X, Acthti/ LL-Govcmor and Major t:omniandinff New Sotith Wahs Corpi, To WilUam BUgK AV?., F.R.S:' Johnston kept Bligh nnder arrest, proclaimed martial law, weized official papers, secured the pubh'c seal, issued a short but bomhastic General Order, thanking the ^led them to trettson and rebellion to the State .... he, with a Mr. iKicliolasBayley^ seduced Major Johnston and all the ot!ii.er8 and privates of ■ the New South Wales Corps from their duty and allegiauce, (Macarthur's) very breath m sufficient to coutMUiinate a multitude, he has been a disturber of public society, and a venomous serpent to His Majeaty^s (Governor. J When Johnston acted) '* nothing Imt calamity upon calamity was to be expected, even mass^acreand secret unirder. ... 1 had only jwat time to retire upstairs to prevent giving myself up and to see if anything could be done for the restoration of my authority, but they soon found me in a )>ack room, and a daring set of ruffians under arniK, intoxicated by flpirituous liquor which waa given them fen- the purpose, and threatening to plunge their bayonets into nm if 1 resisted, seized me." 1'he despatch sbowa that Bligh laboured under apprehension, if not fear, when arrested; and the terms applied to Macarthur justify the worst suspicions as to what might have been the result if Bligh and Crossley could have WTcaked their will upon him.