Note 271 — TRANSPORTATION (continued 5)

The writer thus records his opinion in 1850:—"If transportation were discontinued, and the colonists, under a free government, were allowed to exercise their own intelligence and develop the resources of their country, the stain and evils of having been the receptacle of criminals would gradually and speedily disappear.... For nearly ten years have the colonists been struggling to relieve themselves from the annual importation of criminals, and throughout that long period they have displayed a spirit and disposition worthy of the highest admiration. Regardless of the profits of convict labor, and of the immense government expenditure, they preferred any sacrifice to the continuance of what they considered demoralising their community. In future ages their conduct will be regarded as one of the few examples of a people struggling against temporal advantages for morality and virtue; and if the desire of removing a grievous injury, and aiding the sufferers in recovering from its effects, be a noble feeling, the people of England are bound to afford their powerful sympathy and assistance to the inhabitants of Van Diemen's Land."—A System of Penal Discipline, with a Report on the Treatment of Prisoners in Great Britain and Van Diemen's Land. By the Rev. H. P. Fry, A.B.