While the cargo of the Bellona was landing much of it was found to be damaged; the ship had been overloaded, and had met with very boisterous weather on her passage.  This practice of crowding too much into one ship had in many instances been very prejudicial to the colony; in the present instance, of the Russia duck, which was excellent in its kind, and which had cost the sum of L6636 0s 9d; sixty-eight bales, containing thirteen thousand one hundred and forty-eight yards, were damaged; sixty-nine casks of flour also were found to be much injured.  Of seventy-six hogsheads of molasses, eleven hundred and seventy-two gallons were found to have leaked out; one cask of pork was stinking and rotten; seventy-nine gallons of rum, and one hundred and ninety-eight gallons of wine, were deficient, owing to improper stowage; three hundred and thirty-five hammocks, thirteen rugs, five hundred and twenty-seven yards of brown cloths, and one case of stationary, were rendered totally unfit for use.  Of the articles thus found to be unserviceable to the colony, there was not one which in its proper state would not have been valuable; and when the expense attending their conveyance, the risk of the passage, the inconvenience that must be felt from the want of every damaged article, and the impossibility of getting them replaced for a great length of time, were considered, it was difficult to ascertain their precise value.

Among the occurrences of this month one appears to deserve particular notice.  On Friday the 18th, Eleanor McCave, the wife of Charles Williams, the settler, was drowned, together with an infant child, and a woman of the name of Green.  These unfortunate people had been drinking and revelling with Williams the husband and others at Sydney, and were proceeding to Parramatta in a small boat, in which was a bag of rice belonging to Green.  The boat heeling considerably, and some water getting at the bag, by a movement of Green’s to save her rice the boat overset near Breakfast Point, and the two women and the child were drowned.  If assistance could have been obtained upon the spot, the child might have been saved; for it was forced from the wretched mother’s grasp just before she finally sunk, and brought on shore by the father; but for want of medical aid it expired.  The parents of this child were noted in the colony for the general immorality of their conduct; they had been rioting and fighting with each other the moment before they got into the boat; and it was said, that the woman had imprecated every evil to befal her and the infant she carried about her (for she was six months gone with child) if she accompanied her husband to Parramatta.  The bodies of these two unfortunate women were found a few days afterwards, when the wretched and rascally Williams buried his wife and child within a very few feet of his own door.  The profligacy of this man indeed manifested itself in a strange manner:  a short time after he had thus buried his wife, he was seen sitting at his door, with a bottle of rum in his hand, and actually drinking one glass and pouring another on her grave until it was emptied, prefacing every libation by declaring how well she had loved it during her life.  He appeared to be in a state not far from insanity, as this anecdote certainly testifies; but the melancholy event had not had any other effect upon his mind.