An indulgence had been allowed to some of the military and others, which was now found to have produced an evil.  Having been permitted to build themselves huts on each side of and near the stream of water which supplied the town of Sydney, they had, for the convenience of procuring water, opened the paling, and made paths from each hut; by which, in rainy weather, a great quantity of filth ran into the stream, polluting the water of which every one drank.  It therefore became an object of police; and the governor prohibited removing the paling, or keeping hogs in the neighbourhood of the stream, under penalty to the offender that his house should be pulled down.

On the 13th, the Providence sailed for Nootka Sound.  She was followed by the Supply, which sailed on the 16th for Norfolk Island, having on board three officers of the New South Wales corps, and a detachment of the regiment to relieve those now on duty there.  On the 29th the Young William, having been expeditiously cleared of her cargo, sailed for Canton.

Clearing the store-ship, which was completed on the 19th, and stowing in the public store the provisions she brought out, was the principal labour of the month.  Every effort was made to collect together a sufficient number of working people to get in the ensuing harvest; and the muster and regulation respecting the servants fortunately produced some.  The bricklayer and his gang were employed in repairing the column at the South Head; to do which, for want of bricks at the kiln, the little hut built formerly for Bennillong, being altogether forsaken by the natives, and tumbling down, the bricks of it were removed to the South Head.  A person having undertaken to collect shells and burn them into lime, a quantity of that article was sent down; and the column, being finished with a thick coat of plaster, and whitened, was not only better guarded against the weather, but became a more conspicuous object at sea than it ever had been before.

November.] On the 5th of November, the Sovereign store-ship arrived from England; her cargo a welcome one, being provisions.  Like the Young William, she touched at Rio de Janeiro, and like her also had met with very bad weather after she had left that port until her arrival; from making the south cape of this country to her anchoring she had a passage of three weeks.  In this ship arrived Mr. Thomas Hibbins, the deputy judge-advocate for Norfolk Island; but unfortunately without the patent under the great seal for holding the court.  One settler also arrived, a Mr. Kennedy and his family (a sister and three nieces); and Mr. Joseph Gerald, a prisoner, whose present situation afforded another melancholy proof of how little profit and honor were the endowments of nature and education to him who perverted them.  In this gentleman we saw, that not even elegant manners (evidently caught from good company), great abilities, and a happy mode