the convicts were employed in cleaning the decks of the prison, and making themselves as comfortable as possible.

16th. Sunday.-The Rev. Mr. Reddall and Captain Brown accompanied me this day to the prison, where Mr. Reddall read to the convicts a discourse on the conversion of St. Paul. Some thoughts having suggested themselves as appropriately applying to their immediate condition, I offered a few brief observations to that effect, which I have reason to hope were heard by them with serious interest.

A recent circumstance may here be introduced, to show the happy influence already extending over the minds of these forlorn females. Mary Hough, one of those sent from Stockport, was married to a man of dissolute character, who not only, as she asserted, induced her to commit the offence for which she was sentenced to her present punishment, but had taken up with another female, whose misfortune in knowing him was similar to her own; for the same woman is also a convict in this ship, with a young child by the same man, of which she was pregnant at the time of her commitment to prison. Mary Hough was at first, she acknowledges, full of resentment and rage against this unfortunate woman; but she has latterly become so altered in her mind, from the effects of religious exercises, that she has made the most sincere declarations of forgiveness to the object of her jealous enmity, and even sends a part of her own ration of wine to assist the poor mother in supporting the infant in health. This Hough is exemplary in

her behaviour, and frequently expresses anxious wishes for her wicked husband's reformation.

17th. The sameness which has hung over the reports in the preceding weeks, has at length met some variation from an occurrence which has just taken place. In consequence of a regulation which had been long organized and established, I had, at the earliest moment possible after opening the prison this morning, intelligence of a transaction which happened shortly after last midnight. During yesterday a secret arrangement, it appears, had been made by three of the sailors, in pursuance of which they watched a convenient opportunity of going down to the prison-door at the fore hatchway, which is always secured with two locks, and there endeavoured to open a passage for three of the convicts, Ann Farrell, Ann Newton, and Ann Harwood, who had consented to accompany them below. After some feeble endeavours, the sailors, fearing detection, desisted, and retired in savage disappointment.

Having received this information, on the truth of which I could rely, I lost not an instant to confer with Captain Brown, who offered the most prompt assistance. I sent for the three offending prisoners, who, with the utmost plausibility and perseverance, insisted that they had no participation in the design. Being, however, convinced of their criminal intention in the affair, I placed them in strict confinement, positively forbidding any one of them to appear again on deck during the remainder of the voyage; which must operate upon them as a heavy punishment.

The greatest precautions were used at the same time, by Captain Brown, to place a grating, and more secure fastenings, over the hatchway, where the attempt had been made; and more strict regulations were issued for the conduct of the sailors. It may be recollected that Newton, one of the offenders in the present instance, had lately shown strong inclination to amendment, having applied herself assiduously to working straw-plait ; but, unfortunately, the materials being all worked up, the mischief of idleness returned upon her volatile disposition, and the effects are, her being involved in the above improper conspiracy. Let this suffice, without further comment, to prove the unhappy consequences that result from the convicts not having means of permanent employment during the voyage.

19th. This morning a woman, who conducted herself throughout the voyage with exemplary propriety, solicited my protection against the insulting abuse and infamous threats of two of the sailors, which she declared had been quite unprovoked. Having investigated the case, I found her statement correct. These fellows, who had attempted to break into the prison on the night of the 16th, believing it was this woman who communicated to me the facts of that infamous transaction, took this opportunity of venting their low malice against her, using the most dreadful oaths and imprecations, that they would throw her overboard before the voyage was over; or that they would most certainly kill her in the colony; one of them at the same time seizing her as if he was about to put the threat into execution.

I soothed the poor woman's alarms, as well I could, with promises of protection to the utmost of my ability, and represented the affair to Captain Brown, declaring to him, that any injury done to the prisoners should be followed with punishment, to the utmost extent and rigour of the law, on our arrival in the colony-from him I experienced the most ready and friendly co-operation, in no degree marked by the lukewarm impulse of mere duty, but by the elevated principle of moral rectitude. He represented to the men what I had said, and assured them, that such disgraceful and unmanly behaviour should not only be discountenanced, but be visited with all the punishment he had the power to inflict. Unfortunately, however, in vessels of this description, the law has provided no remedy against the most unbridled licentiousness; and sailors may, in fact, commit any crime short of mutiny, or injury to the ship's concerns, without the least apprehension of penal consequences, while they almost always act up fully to the extent of this unreasonable immunity.

The rest of the prisoners expressed their feelings respecting the misconduct of the three thoughtless females in terms of bitter indignation;-they declared. such behaviour unworthy and disgraceful to beings on whom such care had been lavished. Scoffs and insults from every part of the prison were poured on the now mournful offenders, who complained piteously of their sufferings, and declared they were so wretched that life was not worth preserving. I had to entreat and command the others to desist from persecuting them; but on this occasion my authority

had weight no longer than I was present to enforce it, although on every other occasion my orders met with the most prompt obedience. To screen them from personal violence, and preserve peace among them, I found it necessary to remove the offenders into the hospital. This circumstance proved the strong feeling that habit, if not a better state of mind, had given birth to.

20th.-An effort was made last night, by two of the sailors, to break into the prison, to communicate with the three girls in confinement; but it does not appear that any effort on their side was made to encourage such proceeding: one of the fellows threw down a letter through an opening in the deck made for the admission of air to the hospital, but it was torn without having been read. I have strong expectations that these weak creatures are becoming again sincerely steady, having conversed with them almost every hour since their separation from the others, and found them constantly in tears, without expressing a wish to have their confinement relaxed.

At noon, Captain Brown and the Rev. Mr. Reddall accompanied me to the prison, where I read a sermon, and made a few remarks, approving of their prudent behaviour in avoiding such solicitations as had involved the others in the disgrace of the late transaction, and commending them for the reserve shown generally towards those who sought only to lead them again astray from virtuous obedience. I advised them also to cultivate that peaceful and friendly disposition towards one another, which heretofore formed so praiseworthy a feature in the charac