Page:History of Australia, Rusden 1897.djvu/645

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(;OMMITTEE REPORT FAVOURABLY TO GOV. DARLING. 617 imprisoned, and in which Darling's conduct with regard to Sudds and Thompson was pronounced undeserving of censure. Governor Darling proved at a very early period that he was no respector of persons. In 1827, in a Public Order referring to "an individual" whose convict servants had been withdrawn by an order of one of a bench of magis- trates, the Governor announced, to prevent misunderstand- ing on a point of so much importance to the inhabitants and the prisoners of the Crown, that he had been instructed that the local government was not precluded from making any necessary regulation "respecting the re-assignment of the service of convicts," and that the Governor, " em- powered to assign that service, is fully competent to modify" it " as justice and good policy may require." If convicts should be insufficiently fed or clothed, impro- perly treated, or suffered to woi'k abroad or go at large, their masters were liable to lose them. The Governor's enemies styled such an announcement tyrannical because it recognized his power to recall prisoners who had been assigned or transferred to their wives or friends, and who might desire to remain in such nominal bondage. Previous to the introduction of the bill for restraining the press there was a questioning of Judge Stephen which deserves to be recorded. He had, in discharging prisoners brought before him under the Habeas Corpus Act, declared that he deemed their rights as ** sacred in the eye of the law as those of freemen ;" and Governor Darling inquired whether the report of his remarks was correct. Stephen disclaimed accountability to the Governor for his judicial exercise of his functions, and requested that the letter of inquiry, with the reply to it, might be forwarded to the Secretary of State. The Aitstralian newspaper was not slow to comment on the wretched state of "vassalage" to which it was sought to reduce a British judge and the Courts of Judicature. In 1828 Darling appointed a board to assist him in determining on applications for grants of land, which became oppressively numerous as immigration and popula- tion increased. The earliest grants had been coupled with conditions of residence, cultivation, reservation ot tisaki^st