TO BOTANY BAY. 23 But there is abundant evidence to show that other and 1786 hififher considerations had been at work for some time pre- Reasone for ° , , ^ tbeexpedi- viously ; and that although the relief of the prisons was ^o^- the immediate object in view, the real motives which led to the expedition were of a much larger and more statesman- like character. The work of colonisation had so long been associated colonisation in the minds of colonising nations with the employment of labour, convict labour that, when a new colony was projected, the despatch of convicts to its shores was usually accepted as an indispensable part of the programme. This f£W5t in the history of colonisation has so far been lost sight of by many writers in the present century, that transportation to Botany Bay has generally been treated as the central idea of the whole movement ; and its history has too often been written as if ^^the new intended settlement'^ was from the first intended to be nothing more than a strictly penal one — a mere substitute for hulks and penitentiaries. Undoubtedly there is some colour for this view of the Q^^yg^^j^^^ matter. When the Government had determined to form a propomis. settlement on the coast of New South Wales, they did not announce that they were about to do so, but contented themselves with an intimation that they proposed to trans- port a number of felons in order to relieve the gaols. In the speech with which George the Third opened Parlia- ment on the 23rd January, 1787, the only reference to the subject was the following :— ^ A plan has been formed, by my direction, for transporting a The King's number of convicts in order to remove the inconvenience which speech, arose from the crowded state of the gaols in different parts of the kingdom ; and you will, I doubt not, take such further measures as may be necessary for this purpose.* Nor was anything said about the matter in the debate on no debate, the address in reply, beyond a remark from the mover to the effect that transportation was a measure of absolute
- Parliamentary History, vol. xxvi, p. 211.
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