‘The period, December, 1845, when I became Colonial Secretary, was one when the British Government had begun to feel nonplussed by the question of Transportation. Under the pressure of this difficulty, Lord Stanley, or the Colonial Office of his day, framed a plan for the establishment, as an experiment, of a pure penal colony without free settlers (at least, at the outset). ‘When I came in, the plan might have been arrested in the event of disapproval; but the Government were, I think, committed, and I had only to put the last hand to the scheme. ‘So it went on towards execution. ‘In July, 1846, the Government was changed, and Lord Grey succeeded me. He said he would make none but necessary changes in pending measures. He, however, annihilated this scheme. For that I do not know that he is to be severely blamed. But he went on and dealt with the question in such a way as to produce a mess—I think more than one—far worse than any that he found. The result was the total and rather violent and summary extinction of the entire system. ‘Here I lost sight of the fate of “Gladstone.” It has my good wishes, but I have nothing else to give. ‘Yours very faithful, ‘W. E. GLADSTONE.’ Mr. Hogan deals with the decline and fall of transportation. It had ceased in New South Wales before Mr. Gladstone came into office. It had broken down also in Norfolk Island, and the hideous practice in Van Diemen’s Land, known as ‘the probation system,’ was causing considerable excitement. It was at this time that Lord Stanley conceived the notion of a new penal colony in North Australia, and it fell to his successor, Mr. Gladstone, to give it form and substance. Mr. Hogan does not spare Mr. Gladstone’s political errors; he is, on the contrary, rather given to dwelling upon them with an acerbity which is to be regretted. We all know that the venerable statesman, who has now well-nigh outlived the bitterness of party rancour, had in those days much to learn. He was undoubtedly, at one time, of opinion that the right of the mother country to found penal settlements at the Antipodes was incontestable; but this view was then shared by most politicians outside the thoughtful circle of the Philosophical Radicals. It is clear, moreover, that Mr. Gladstone came to the subject of transportation with a sincere conviction that it was possible to convert criminals into good citizens, whose presence on the soil would be, not a curse, but an advantage. There is a remarkable State paper in the shape of a memorandum addressed to Sir Eardley Wilmot, who had been sent out specially to inaugurate the probation system. In this, after commenting with the enthusiasm natural to a young statesman on the practicability of reformation, he goes on to say: ‘Considerations yet more sacred enhance the importance of it, for it is impossible to