He adjudicated in petty sessions as a magistrate, and dealt in a
summary manner with capital offences, which were very numerous. To
imprison a man who was already a prisoner for life was no punishment;
the major's powers were, therefore, limited to the cat and the
gallows. And as the first gallows had been built to carry only eight
passengers, his daily death sentences were also limited to that
number. For twenty years torture was used to extort confession--
even women were flogged if they refused to give evidence, and an
order of the Governor was held to be equal to law. Major Abbott died
in 1832.
In 1835 the court consisted of the judge-advocate and two of the
inhabitants selected by the Governor, Colonel Arthur, who came out in
the year 1824, and had been for eleven years a terror to evil-doers.
His rule was as despotic as he could possibly make it. If any
officer appointed by the Home Government disagreed with his policy he
suspended him from his office, and left him to seek redress from his
friends in England--a tedious process, which lasted for years.
Disagreeable common people he suspended also--by the neck. If a
farmer, squatter, or merchant was insubordinate, he stopped his
supply of convict labour, and cruelly left him to do his own work.
He brooked no discussion of his measures by any pestilent editor.
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