Although for years it had been more or less a penal settlement, as now constituted it became essentially a colonial prison. Vast masses of convicts were to be congregated in its chief towns; its out-stations were to be overrun with convicts in various stages of emancipation; free convicts were to be the pioneers and settlers of its back lands: in a word, the whole colony was to be permeated, inundated, swamped with the criminal class. That I am using no figure of speech, and to give some idea of the amount of evil with which the small colony had now to deal, I will mention here that in four years no less than sixteen thousand convicts were sent out to Van Diemen's Land, and that the average annual number of transported convicts in the colony was nearly thirty thousand. The new method came into force on the 20th May, 1840. It was christened the "Probation" system, because the progressive improvement of the convicts was intended to depend on their progress through certain periods of "probation." Every convict was to be subjected to certain punishments and restrictions peculiar to the stage in which he found himself; but these rigours were to diminish, step by step, till he had passed by many gradations from actual imprisonment to the delights of unshackled, unconditional freedom. The plan of procedure is fully detailed in a despatch addressed by Lord Stanley, on the 15th of November, 1842, to Sir John Franklin, then lieutenant-governor of Van Diemen's Land. All convicts, with certain exceptions, were to be subjected to the new process. By it, as I have said, the convict was compelled to pass through certain stages, five in number; and his progress was to be regulated altogether by his good conduct in each stage. The rules were the same for boys and females, but their stations were, of course, different. Stated briefly these five stages were: 1. Detention at a purely penal station in a state of real imprisonment; 2. Removal to gangs working in various parts of the colony for government, but still under restraint; 3. The first step towards freedom, in which the convict was granted a pass to be at large under certain conditions, and to seek work for himself; 4. The second step to freedom, when the convict gained his ticket-of-leave, and was free to come and go much as he pleased; 5. Absolute pardon. Only the worst criminals entered the first stage, and for them (_a_) Norfolk Island and (_b_) Tasman's Peninsula were set apart. These were the colonial convicts, and men who had been sentenced at home to "life," or fifteen years for heinous offences. The term at Norfolk Island was to be not less than two years, and not more than four; but misconduct consigned an offender to an indefinite term within his sentence. (_a_) First as to Norfolk Island.