in coming out to the colony and working there gratis, with all expenses paid by the government at home. The poor black fellows only get tobacco on such a very rare holiday occasion as that I have described; but the white men from England, who had scuttled ships and the like, get their weekly supply regularly,--as gentlemen should. I own that I grudged it them. At Port Arthur I saw men in solitary cells, who had been there long, who would be there long,--who had spent almost their lives either in solitude or under the lash. At Freemantle there were only two or three in the cells, and they only for a day or two each. I rather complained of this to the officer who was showing me the place, giving him to understand that I had expected something more exciting. He had, he said, one man locked up for making himself generally objectionable, whom I could see if I liked; but he warned me, that if I did see him, I might find it very difficult to check his eloquence. The cell was opened, and the man came out and made his speech;--or so much of it as we would consent to hear. At last the warder explained to him that his indulgence could not be prolonged, and he was gently put back, and locked up again. I was assured that he would have gone on for hours;--but there was nothing interesting in his speech, whereas the eloquent prison lawyer at Port Arthur delighted me by the malignity and audacity of the charges which he brought against everybody. The large prison at Freemantle is fitted to hold 850 prisoners. I do not know that so many have ever been confined there. The men, as they have arrived, seem to have been told off into gangs, and the majority of them have been employed at distances from the head-quarters,--chiefly on the construction of roads. When I was in the colony there were still such gangs, some on one road, and some on another; but the system of so employing the men was being brought to a close, because their cost was greater when thus spread about the country than when maintained at one centre establishment. This was declared to be the case, and the allegation was made that the reduction was forced upon the colony by home parsimony. The allegation was made, but did not reach me from official lips,--and I do not believe that they who have the management of the convicts, the governor and comptroller, have ever received orders to put the men to comparatively useless works, in order that the money spent upon them from Great Britain might be lessened. I do not doubt but that general, and perhaps stringent, instructions have been given as to economy. In what branch of the public service have not such instructions been given during the last four or five years? But the zeal which has complied with these instructions by withdrawing the men from the distant and more useful works has probably been colonial, and is, I think, to be lamented. As the colony has had the convicts, it should at any rate get from