A SOCIAL PROBLEM. 277 I am to request that your lordship ^ill be pleased to direct me 1788 to what extent that indulgence may be granted the officers of the u May. garrison. The Sirius shall be sent to the northward to barter for stock, Live stock, and which shall be employed solely for the purpose of increasing the breed of such cattle as she may procure. The Supply is noways calculated for this service, as in the least sea her decks are full of water. The very small proportion of females makes the sending out an Females additional number absolutely necessary ; for I am certain your ^" lordship will think that to send for women from the islands, in our present situation, would answer no other purpose than that of bringing them to pine away in misery. One of the many mistakes made by the Government in organising the Expedition is seen in Phillip's reference to Domestic the want of proportion between the sexes. Out of a total number of seven hundred and fifty-six convicts put on board the transports, there were only one hundred and ninety -two women, or one in four; many of whom were old and enfeebled by disease. The character of these women, and the difficulty of holding them under restraint, may be judged from Surgeon "White's account of their gambols during the passage out.* With such an excess of Excess males to females, it was a desperate effort of the imagina- tion to suppose that the morals of the community could be sensibly improved by means of marriage; since if every woman had found a husband, there would still have been three hundred and seventy-two men left without any chance of obtaining wives. This defect in the organisation of the colony was not unknown to the Government before the First Fleet sailed ; but they seem to have thought that an easy remedy might be found by procuring women from the island islands in the Pacific. This idea appears to have been prevalent in England at the time ; probably originating in the highly-coloured descriptions of female beauty in the tropical islands which became popular after the publication
- Joamal, pp. 30, 31.
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