some particulars of the first attack, at Risdon, in 1804. Mr. Gellibrand, attorney, admonished the colonists not to shoot any Aborigines when they should be flying before them. Mr. Hackett doubted the ability of the dark race to know the wishes of Government, as not five white persons could speak their language.
The first resolution passed declared it the duty of every man cheerfully to contribute to the common cause every assistance in his power. The second suggested the means; that of personal service in the field, or performing the duties of the military during the absence of the latter from town. The third pledged the meeting to five weeks' service in the capital, dated from the 2d of October. The fourth urged the propriety of the inhabitants selecting their own particular scene of duty, and the election of their officers. The last resolution was concerning the nomination of fifteen persons to form a committee, six of whom were to wait upon the Governor. Two dozen gentlemen, however, volunteered to take the battery guard, if independent of this general committee.
There was not unanimity of opinion. Mr. Gregson, a barrister of no mean talent and oratorical power, had been opposed to Government on political grounds, and took legal exception to their mode of procedure, contending that such a warlike demonstration was uncalled for, and that the Natives, as real masters of the soil, ought not to be forced from the territory bequeathed to them by their fathers, and now usurped by the British crown. He would not, therefore, go himself, nor would he permit one of his servants "to follow to the field some warlike Lord." His opponents professed to be surprised that a gentleman owning such dignified, moral, and correct sentiments, should continue to hold a fine estate, as he did, upon a title granted by public robbers of a nation, and urged him to leave a land desecrated by such violation of the rights of man and honour of civilization.
The Governor felt himself strengthened by the moral support of his subjects, and modified and expanded his original views. Instead of a number of separate and unsupported, though simultaneous, operations over the whole of the settled districts, comprehending three-fourths of the island, it was resolved to make one grand, united effort to capture the Oyster Bay and Big River tribes, by drawing a line from Waterloo Point on
