The time that he must
linger in this uncomfortable situation could not well be less than
fifteen or eighteen months; and, admitting that the length of it might
have deadened the acuteness of his first sensations, and rendered him
thoughtless as to the event, yet how would that acuteness be aggravated,
should, unhappily for him, the sentence be at last confirmed by the royal
approbation!*
[* It may be pleasing to the reader to learn, that both Isaac
Nichols (see Chapter XVII viz: "The criminal court was only once
assembled during this month; when one man was condemned to death for a
burglary, and another transported for fourteen years to Norfolk Island.
This man, Isaac Nichols, an overseer, had been accused of receiving
stolen goods; but from some circumstances which occurred on the trial,
the sentence was respited until his Majesty's pleasure could be taken.")
and this man, have recently received his Majesty's pardon.]
The body of the settlers having again represented their total inability
to bear any reduction in the price of the wheat of this season, on
account, not only of their former heavy losses, but of the exorbitant
price of all those necessaries of life which they required for paying
their labourers, the governor at length consented to receive the wheat
only at the former price of ten shillings per bushel, and they were at
the same time told to prepare for the reduction that would certainly take
place in the next season.
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