292 PHILLIP 1788 two hundred rendered incapable of doing any work. It is not 15 May. possible to Send the Sirius to the northward, for she must then have lier carpenters, and only three of those hired from the trans- ports now remain; and tho' the detachment began to build Barmcka. barracks for the use of the men and huts for the officers the 14th of February, and near a hundred convicts were given to assist in Hoepitaiand this work, they are not yet finished, nor is the hospital or the store-house that is to receive the provisions still remaining on board three transports, and on these works the carpenters of the Sirius are employed. I have before pointed out the great labour in clearing the ground as one cause of our slow progress. Your loixlship will, I hope, excuse the confused manner in which I have in this letter given an account of what has passed since I left the Cape of Good Hope. It has been written at dif- The Go- ferent times, and my situation at present does not permit me to vaTiufiue?" begin so long a letter again, the canvas house I am under being neither wind nor water proof. The second and third despatches were written on the 16th May, and related chiefly to military matters. Their contents show that unpleasant differences of opinion had already occurred between Phillip and the officers of the Unpieauant marines, arising from their determination to confine their relations . with the services within the strict limits of military duty. They declined to support the Government by exercising a moral control over the convicts ; they complained of having to sit as members of the Criminal Court; and at the same time they complained because they could not get their grants of land immediately. I have in my first letter had the honor of observing to your lordship the great want of proper persons for to superintend the convicts. The officers who compose the detachment are not only few in number, but most of them have declined any interference with the convicts, except when they are employed for their own Q« particular service. I requested soon after we landed that officers decline to would occasionally encourage such as they observed diligent, and point out for punishment such as they saw idle or straggling in the woods ; this was all I desired, but the officers did not understand that any interference with the convicts was expected, and that Digitized by Google
