The encouragement afforded by the government to free settlers contrasted strongly with the animosity displayed towards them by Macquarie, Macquarie had been jealous with regard to the occupa- tion of the interior. He allowed no one to depasture stock in the **new country** without special authority from him- self* Pie did not perceive what was afterwards clear to Gibbon Wakeiield, that, so long as the government might retain the freehold for sale at a fitting price, it was bene- ficial to all that the annual grasses should be converted into^ a means of prosperity. But he could not watch his ever-^M widening frontier ; and a class of men, many of them labourers who had been convicts, strayed across it, and, in secluded gullies, built huts, planted gardens, and kept a few^ cattle, Avhose numbers were unnaturally increased by theft, ■ Nor were cattle the onl}^ ol>jects of rapine. These lawless occupiers were called '* squatters." In the course of about a twenty years the term w^as transferred to all those whc lawfully occupied Crown lands under temporary Ucenses,' which w^ere readily granted by Sir T. Brisbane to the free settlers who migrated to the colony after the departure of Macquarie and the publication of Bigge's Eeports. Brisbane made no effort to prevent injustice and brutality towards the natives. Settlers who were disposed to treat them kindly could do so. Those otherwise inclined did as they listed. In Jtme 1824, Brisbane told the Secretary of State that he proposed to raise a troop of cavalry at Bathurst to coerce the natives who had been committing outrages. He did not say that the convict servants of the settlers had provoked them. But he did say that seven of those servants had been slain. In Aug, he proclaimed martial law ** in all the country w^estward of Moimt York." Accordingly, in all that country the natives were shot like wild beasts- The thing was not done in a corner* The Si/dnei/ Gazettv (30th Sept.) pub- lished an account of the killmg of sixteen blacks by an overseer and two stockmen. Five hundred acres of land were offered for the capture of " Saturday.**^ After foufa
- In after years there were stiufcements which professed to mport cir-"
cumstaati&lly the manner of Haturday's capture and death. In the lat editdoB of this work tlioae atat,eweiU 'wex^ iw^iX.ftiL The Hon. VV^ ^^
