charitable funds of society. If the pauper and the labourer are to be on the same footing (as they were under the old poor-law), there can exist no motive for forethought and good conduct. But as the poor must be fed at the expense of the industry of the country, if the number of poor be very great, the reward of industry must be very low. It is the interest of the industrious labourers, therefore, that the number of unemployed should not be great, and any man who removes workmen from spots where they are in abundance, to places where their industry can be turned to good account, is not only a friend of those who are so removed, but of those who are left behind-because the condition of both is thereby bettered.

"Whatever increases (says Mr. Ricardo) the permanent prosperity of a neighbourhood is an actual good both to landlord and tenant; and though each may have to pay a little in the shape of an Emigration Rate, yet it will be more than repaid to them, by the increased prosperity of all classes. I anticipate the greatest advantage from a well-conducted. system of emigration-if we saw a man with a large family, and struggling with difficulties in finding the means for their support, let us take away half his children, and half his difficulties would be removed: such is the case here, this neighbourhood is but one vast family, and if we were to take away a portion of the more active, and put them in a situation to provide for themselves, the bread that supported them is still left behind, and will be divided among those who remain, will be given to them in the shape of an increase of wages."

But

Do those who deny the necessity for emigration thoroughly weigh the pernicious influence of poverty upon the moral character? It is his cheerless home which too often drives a man to the ale-house-to relieve the wretchedness of his family he often commits crime. "Kindle the domestic affections in the poor man's hut," says Dr. Channing, " and you give him the elements of the best earthly happiness." woman, a drudge and in dirt, loses her attractions. A family, crowded into a single, and often small, apartment, which is to answer the ends of parlour, kitchen, bed-room, and nursery, must want order, neatness, and comfort. Its members are perpetually exposed to annoying interference. The decencies of life can be with difficulty observed. The young grow up without the delicacy of feeling and modest reserve in which purity finds so much of its defence. Coarseness of manners and language, too sure a consequence of a mode of

life which allows no seclusion, becomes the habit of childhood, and hardens the mind for vicious intercourse in future years. Crowded and in filth, they cease to respect one another, and the social affections wither amidst the trying and painful circumstances in which they are placed.

We ought to dread the consequences of driving the labourers to desperation, and therefore, something should be done by the wealthy to avert a public mischief. The Poor-law merely meets extreme cases. To extricate the labourers from distress, where they are found in any place in disproportionate numbers, measures of adequate efficiency ought to be adopted. It is one of the evils of a low social condition that individuals are too much depressed to have the heart to help themselves. They are in the state of a sufferer from the effects of malaria, in the Pontine Marshes, who, when urged to remove from such a pestilential neighbourhood, had not suf ficient energy left to do this. If some well-disposed individual had dragged him to a healthier situation, he would have perhaps recovered his vigour. The labourers suffering under moral malaria are without heart and energy, and should in like manner be enticed and assisted to places where they can more healthfully exist.

It is not want of comfort or moral improvement alone, among the poor, we have to dread at present however, it is absolutely the slow starvation of multitudes.

"We have heard of cases of extreme distress that no prudence could have averted," says Mr. Wakley, in the Lancet of the 10th of February, 1838; "and here is room for the legitimate exercise of the benevolence which we see so deeply implanted in the human breast."

This is but the tale that almost every other medical man can tell; and ask the Home-missionary what is the awful amount of misery in the country. Every emigration is something towards its removal or amelioration.

How can the philanthrophist plan the prosperity of the poor, whether those sent away, or those left in this land, more certainly than by encouraging and assisting many to emigrate? Much mischief is doing to the cause, however, by misrepresentations and entrapping the poor to where the heat is so intense that they suffer severely, where provisions are ruinously high, and where there is a constant want of that essential, good water.

In consequence of my investigation, my own choice is deliberately resolved on; and this, after a long experience of

the advantages and pleasures of the climate, may have some weight with those unacquainted with them. I intend, as soon as my private concerns permit, to proceed to settle in NEW SOUTH WALES, convinced that it offers to every one advantages far superior to, and more certain than, any other colony or country.

Thus speak the Scriptures of a similarly situated country, and the verse is particularly applicable to New South Wales:"The Lord thy God bringeth thee into a good land—a land of wheat and barley-of vines, and fig trees, and pomegranates—a land of oil, olives and honey--where thou shalt eat bread without scarceness-thou shalt not lack any thing in it a land whose stones are iron, and out of whose hills thou shalt dig brass!"

In this compilation I have endeavoured to make the information plain and conclusive on each point, to “ nothing omit, nor aught set down in malice," as has been too much the case lately with the agents of those who have ends to answer; but I have always exposed errors, mis-statements, and trickery, where my duty to the reader required it. I have no aim but the welfare of the small capitalist and the working classes; and I would submit to the wealthy and benevolent the advantage of spreading such a publication, and the knowledge of it-IT IS THE WANT OF SUCH INFORMATION AS

CAN BE DEPENDED ON, WHICH PREVENTS MANY PERSONS FROM EMIGRATING.

TWENTY YEARS' EXPERIENCE

IN AUSTRALIA,

&c. &c.

CHAPTER I.

ON THE GEOGRAPHY, &c.

"THE situation of New South Wales, both for agriculture, commerce, , and maritime enterprise, is one of the most favourable that can be found upon the wide surface of the earth.

"From the river Boyne, near Moreton Bay, on the north, to Port Phillip on the south, it extends from the 23d to the 38th degree of south latitude,* -embracing a coast line of more than 2500 miles, with numerous safe, capacious, aud convenient harbours, communicating with a country of diversified aspect and average productiveness, abounding with coal and iron, and intersected by numerous rivers.

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These, for the most part, take their rise on the high tableland of the western interior, at a distance of from forty to one hundred miles in a direct line from the eastern coast, on which, after a tortous course, they discharge themselves. For the purposes of water communication they are comparatively unimportant, but the vales through which they flow are of extreme fertility and beauty."-M'ARTHUR.

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New South Wales lies at the distance of 16000 miles from Great Britain, and its capital, Sydney, to which most vessels proceed, is reached in from 100 to 120 days' sailing. Lying on the opposite side of the globe from us, its seasons are reversed

*The territory now extends from Cape York, on the E. coast, in 10.37. S. Lat. to the shores of Bass's Straits; and westward, as far as 141° E.Long. Norfolk Island is included in the New South Wales Government.

B

in relation to ours; its winter is in May, June, and July, and its summer in November, December, and January. Its climate is one of the finest in the world-far superior to that of England, and perhaps only comparable to that of Italy and Turkey. Snow is never seen except in the higher regions, and in the lower parts there bloom an eternal spring and summer."-CHAMBERS. "East Australia, or New South Wales, is a large portion of one side of the island of New Holland, stretching from the furthest point to the south, along the east coast for 3000 miles, and along the south for 400 miles, being between the latitudes 38 and 10.37.* On the east and south it is bounded by the Pacific Ocean, and on the west by the Gulf of Carpentaria, and the desert of South Australia.

"One advantage of its situation is, that it must be for ever separated by many thousand miles from all foreign foes, and therefore a stranger to wars and their ills, having no expensive balance of power to maintain, while from the variety of climate it must be independent of all the world.

"The Pacific, or great Southern Ocean, separates it from Peru and Chili, the nearest continent on one hand (distant about 6000 miles), and from China on the other, which is 3000 miles distant from it. The Colony runs back 300 miles, but the farthest settled point at present, is a station of troops, 237 miles from the coast. The present colony occupies a space three times as great as England, Scotland, Ireland, and Wales;—you may therefore imagine the scope for settling, for the next century at least.

"From the sea, the country rises gradually till it terminates in the Blue Mountains, 90 miles from the coast; they are in general about 4000 feet high (about the height of the highest land in this country), but some few peaks are 6000 feet above the level of the sea, they run the whole length of the old part of the colony, and behind them are beautiful plains, while the country on the sea side is hill and valley. These mountains are one source of the delightful climate, as they cool the air with

* The colonial boundary having been extended within the last few months to the southern extremity of the Australian continent, and a settlement having been actually formed by authority at Port Phillip, in Bass's Straits, a vast extent of eligible land of the first quality has been thrown open to the numerous intending purchasers, who had already taken temporary possession of large tracts for their rapidly increasing flocks and herds, both in that district and at Twofold Bay. There are at least upwards of three millions of acres of available land, generally equal to the best in Van Diemen's Land, at Port Phillip.-Dr. Lang.