[Footnote 81: _Dr. Lang's History of New South Wales._]
[Footnote 83: The decision of a magistrate was not necessary, to inflict punishment. The overseer stalked about with a military cane, and was not sparing of its use. "He would walk out behind the convict-hoers in a morning gown and morocco slippers, with a _Penang Lawyer_ hugged close under his right arm, or borne like a royal sceptre before him, plucking at every tuft as he paced about, and drumming such a tattoo upon the shoulders of the unlucky wight, whose ground was not completely chopped, and grass fairly uprooted, as made the whole brush dance with fire-flies before him!"--_Cunningham._]
[Footnote 84: "The other inhabitants of the island (Britain) still maintained themselves by pasture: they were clothed with skins of beasts; they dwelt in huts, which they reared in forests and marshes, with which the country was covered."--_Hume's History of England_, chap. i.]
[Footnote 85: "A little wicked tailor arrives, of no use to the architectural projects of the Governor: he is turned over to a settler, who leases this sartorial Borgia his liberty for five shillings a week, and allows him to steal and snip what, when, and where he can. The nefarious needleman writes home, that he is as comfortable as a finger in a thimble: that, though a fraction only of humanity, he has several wives, and is filled every day with rum and kangaroo. This, of course, is not lost upon a shop-board, and for the saving of fifteen pence a-day (to government), the foundation of many criminal tailors is laid."--_Edinburgh Review_, 1823.]
The adventurous habits of a hunting life, favored by the early necessities of the settlement, trained the prisoners to bushranging.[86] The lawless pioneers of the settlers repeated in Tasmania the exploits once common in Great Britain, when the merry green wood was the retreat of the outlaw; and always found where the population is scanty and the government feeble: the popular names of places denote the character or tastes of their early visitors and heroes.[87] The bushrangers at first were absentees, who were soon allured or driven to theft and violence; but so early as 1808, Lemon and Brown, by systematic robbery, had excited feelings of alarm: one of these men was surprised asleep, and decapitated, at Lemon Springs, which bear his name.