"Mr. Busby, when asked respecting the prevalence of bush-rangers, who are escaped convicts and others who have taken to the bush, says, in his Evidence (5th Aug. 1831,) that within the last twelve months, or two years, bush-rangers have been so numerous that it was scarcely possible to travel a hundred miles on the road without being stopped: there was scarcely a newspaper, in which there were not two or three instances of persons, of every rank, being stopped. It was quite an unusual thing formerly--but of late there has been a regular system of highway robbery. The laws that have been enacted to put down this horrible state of things, will serve for an index of the condition of the colony. They do away with every appearance of personal liberty. 'One act empowered magistrates to issue a warrant, authorizing constables to enter or break into any house, within their district or county, by day or night, at their own discretion; and to seize any person they might suspect to be highway robbers or burglars; or any individual in the colony, without any warrant or authority, may take another into custody, on the mere suspicion that he is a convict illegally at large: if it appear to the magistrate that he had a just or probable cause for suspicion, he is justified in doing so. The onus of proving that he is not a convict illegally at large, is thrown upon the suspected person, and if that is not established to the satisfaction of the magistrate, he is liable to be retained in custody, or sent to Sydney to be examined and dealt with.'