Had his plan been carried out, instead of 4,000 convicts sent to Van Diemen's Land there would not have been more than five or six hundred." When Earl Grey instructed Sir William Denison in reference to certain reforms, he intimated his expectation that transportation would terminate. Soon after Sir William Denison addressed to the magistrates of the territory a series of enquiries (March, 1847), of which the first was awfully momentous. "Do you consider it desirable that transportation of convicts to this country should cease altogether?" The character of the enquiry was described in a letter signed by the private secretary. The governor preferred communicating with these gentlemen, and by them with their neighbours, rather than with popular assemblies. It was not, however, to be expected that a subject of direct and universal concern would be resigned to the discussion of a single class; nor did persons holding magisterial distinctions, on that account command the confidence of the people. This was felt by the magistrates themselves. A preliminary meeting was convened at Hobart Town to discuss the subject of the circular. A difference of opinion was apparent, and an angry altercation ensued. Mr. Carter, a storekeeper, defended transportation as necessary to trade. Mr. Gregson advised his auditors to cast the question of crocks and slops to the wind, and to secure at once the final liberation of the colony. A public meeting was held at Hobart Town. Ineffectual attempts to postpone the question by the advocates of transportation were offered, and the speakers on the popular side were loudly cheered. The party defeated signed a memorial representing that they were not heard at the meeting, and repudiating its decision. Sir William Denison promised to place it in the hands of Earl Grey "as a record to be employed in the support of the facts it contained."