The cat was the cure for all ills in those days, when almost any one was appointed magistrate of his district. A., the holder of so many assigned men, would be a justice, and one of his men would offend. In that case, he would send him over to B., the magistrate of the next district. B. would also be a squatter and holder of assigned convict servants. There would be a short examination; A's man would be well flogged and sent back. In due time B. would require the same service performed, and would send an offender over to A. to have him punished in turn. In the growing town, assigned servants were employed in a variety of ways; and it was common enough for relatives of the convicts to apply and have husband, son, or brother assigned to them, the ticket-of-leave-man finding no difficulty there on account of being a jail-bird, where many of the most prosperous traders and squatters had once worn the prison garb. Robert Hallam was soon released, and at the end of a very short time Stephen Crellock followed; the pair becoming ostensibly butler and coachman to a wealthy lady who had settled in Sydney--but servants only in the Government books; for, unquestioned, Hallam at once took up his position as master of the house, and, to his wife's horror, Crellock, directly he was released, came and took possession of the room set apart for him as Hallam's oldest friend. A strange state of society perhaps, but it is a mere matter of history; such proceedings were frequent in the days when Botany Bay was the depot for the social sinners of our land. All the same though, poor Botany Bay, with its abundant specimens of Austral growth that delighted the naturalists of the early expedition, never did become a penal settlement. It was selected, and the first convict-ship went there to form the great prison; but the place was unsuitable, and Port Jackson, the site of Sydney, proved so vastly superior that the expedition went on there at once. At home, in England, though, Botany Bay was spoken of always as the convicts' home, and the term embraced the whole of the penal settlements, including Norfolk Island, that horror of our laws, and Van Diemen's Land. Opportunity had served just after Hallam was released, and had taken up his residence in simple lodgings which Mrs Hallam, with Bayle's help, had secured, for one of the best villas that had been built in the place--an attractive wooden bungalow, with broad verandahs and lovely garden sloping down towards the harbour--was to let. Millicent Hallam had looked at her husband in alarm when he bade her take it; but he placed the money laughingly in her hands for furnishing; and, obeying him as if in a dream, the house was taken and handsomely fitted. Servants were engaged, horses bought, and the convicts commenced a life of luxurious ease.