John Dunmore Lang

“ It may be urged, indeed, that employing the funds of the colony for carrying out emigrants from the continent of Europe, instead of from Great Britain and Ireland, would be exceedingly unwise, as it would be diverting these funds from their proper object, and diminishing the means of carrying off the superabundant population of the United Kingdom. It is not proposed, however, to supersede emigration from Great Britain and Ireland, by recommending a limited emigration from the continent of Europe, but to multiply the means of subsistence and employment for future British emigrants ”

“ Indian corn is little used as an article of food for men in New South Wales, although it forms a palatable diet, and constitutes a principal part of the sustenance of the virtuous peasantry of New England: it is of great value, however, in the colony for the rearing of all sorts of domestic stock, such as pigs, poultry, &c. The sweet potato, which also forms a palatable food for man, is wonderfully prolific at Moreton Bay; and arrow-root of the finest quality has been grown in the government-garden at Brisbane river, at the rate of a ton per acre. ”

“ The results of this system we have already seen in the present condition of the colony, as to the moral character of its anomalous population. But the new system, which is just coming into operation, will enable the government to create a class of capitalists in the colony, who will afford permanent and profitable employment for the convicts, and eventually relieve the government of the whole cost of their maintenance without setting them loose in any degree from the salutary restraints and inflictions of penal discipline. ”

“ In regard to the free emigrants, the climate of Moreton Bay, though somewhat hotter than that of Sydney, is equally salubrious; while the banks of the Brisbane river, and of the other two navigable streams that empty themselves into the Bay, together with the upland interior, present a vast extent of land of the very first quality, sufficient, at all events, to afford eligible localities for at least ten thousand families. Wheat grows sufficiently well on the uplands at Moreton Bay, but maize, or Indian corn, is a much more certain crop on the low grounds ”

“ Of the reputable Scotch mechanics, whom I carried out to New South Wales in the year 1831, to erect the Australian College buildings, there were individuals who had only been earning from fourteen to sixteen shillings a week by their labour in Scotland, and who had been frequently out of employment. Of course, persons in such circumstances were unable to raise a single shilling to assist in paying the passage of their families out, and had consequently a debt, amounting, in some instances, to upwards of £50 to pay for their passage, from their labour in the colony. ”

“ Besides, overburdened as the mother country is at this moment in certain parts of the empire, with a superabundant and unemployed population calling loudly for succour, and looking to emigration as the only source of permanent relief, the proposed appropriation of apart of the colonial land-revenue, in carrying out a considerable number of emigrants to a locality so well adapted for their immediate settlement as Moreton Bay, would evidently be not less beneficial to the mother country than to the colony. ”

“ It was not long, however, before the settlements were found to hold out to many individuals inducements to become cultivators; and thirty years' experience of the climate and fertility of the soil, has, for some time past, rendered a permission to settle in New South Wales an object of anxious solicitude to all who were desirous of leaving their native country, and had capital to apply to the improvement of land. ”

“ It must be borne in mind, however, that the successful establishment of a few such communities of virtuous and industrious free emigrant agricultural settlers, as I have described, on any part of the coast of New Holland, would eventually attract persons of a higher class, in the shape of merchants, graziers, wool-growers, professional men, together with a host of well-born and well-bred adventurers of all classes. ”

“ In short, after six or eight years' apprenticeship, the convict would become a useful labourer of the class most wanted in agricultural districts in a new country; or, if he preferred hiring himself as an agricultural labourer, he would be sure to find a ready demand for his labour among the free settlers. ”

“ Foreigners from the south of Europe would introduce the culture of the vine and the olive, would rear the silkworm, and prepare various sorts of dried fruit; for all of which occupations the soil and climate of Moreton Bay are peculiarly adapted, but which are all foreign to the habits and pursuits of the natives of the British isles. ”

“ And if each detachment of a hundred families should contain such artisans and other operatives as would be required in such a locality, they would have all the more common appliances of civilization at command; while the clergyman and the schoolmaster, forming a necessary part of their parochial establishment, would, in all probability, maintain in their full force and operation all the moral restraints of their native vicinage. ”

“ In short, as far as the emigrants are concerned, the transition from the state of the humbler classes of society in the mother country would be most desirable, while the benefit to the whole colony of New South Wales would be incalculable. ”

“ The vine, the peach, the pine-apple, the orange, the pomegranate, the banana, the guava, the sugar-cane, the tobacco-plant, the coffee and cotton-bearing shrubs, and indeed, all sorts of semi-tropical fruits and productions, grow luxuriantly at Moreton Bay; while the climate would admit of various important branches of cultivation that have hitherto been untried in New South Wales. ”

“ In short, with ten acres of cleared land to begin upon, and rations for six or eight months, to be repaid within a given period, an agricultural labourer from Great Britain or Ireland would have no difficulty in paying for his land in the course of a very few years, and in making his family comfortable and independent for life ”

“ Supposing that each farm should average thirty acres, estimated at seven shillings and sixpence per acre, and that the price of clearing ten acres for each settler should be estimated at £3 to £4 per acre (the price for clearing heavily-timbered land within the colony) ; the debt of each settler, on taking possession of his land, would be £46. 5s., and the whole debt of each parish or settlement about £4,600. ”

“ Moreover, by the arrangement proposed, the government would have a fair price for their waste land, and a fair equivalent for the convict labour employed in clearing portions of it for free settlers: their security for payment would not only be the land itself, of which the market value would immediately be doubled by being settled with a free emigrant population ”

“ This, together with the number of convicts, who after the expiration of their sentences remain with their respective families growing up under them, has so increased the population of free settlers, that the prosperity of the settlement, as a colony, has proportionally advanced ”