But it must be further evident that this equal division of the colonial revenue has been assumed merely by way of exemplification, and that it is a fiction, the realization of which is beyond the extreme verge of possibility:  a fiction which never has been and never can be verified.  In this colony as in every other community, there is a regular gradation of property, and perhaps there is no country on the face of the earth, except Russia, where it is so partially distributed.  If then I have reconciled the probability of the wretched condition of the colonists, with the assumption of an equality of wealth, when there is, in fact, the greatest inequality, it must be evident that the picture which I have drawn, pregnant and glowing as it is with distress, is far from surcharged, and still requires both colouring and expression to convey a perfect representation of the scene.

Of the whole colonial income about L100,000 annually may be considered as arising from the labours of the agricultural body.  This is undoubtedly that portion of the colonial wealth which gets into most general circulation; but even it is far from undergoing that minute subdivision and universal diffusion which are requisite for the maintenance of a constant internal circulating medium.  Created in the first instance by the government in payment of the grain, meat, etc. furnished by the settlers, it is immediately handed over by them to the traders to whom they may be indebted, and from these again passes to the importing merchants, on whom they may be dependent for their supplies of merchandize, who in their turn eventually transmit it to their foreign correspondents.  It may consequently be perceived that the purchases and sales which must be incessantly occurring, besides those to which this part of the colonial income is thus devoted, such as the sales of provisions in the markets, the payment of wages, and, in fine, the infinite transactions to which the wants or the whims of society are eternally giving birth, and to which a common medium of determinate value is essential are but little, if indeed at all facilitated by a sum of money, which after passing through a few hands, disappears from the colony for ever.  To prevent, therefore, the interchanges and activity of the community from being brought to a stand, it became necessary to create some other circulating medium; and as the government took no part in this highly important affair, the whole burden of the arrangement fell upon the inhabitants.  The arrangement itself was, in consequence, such as might have been expected from their circumstances and situation:  the whole of them who had any real, or apparent pretensions to responsibility, became with one accord bankers; issuing small promissory notes to provide for their minuter occasions, merely on the strength of their credit, and frequently in anticipation of their means.  This “Colonial currency,” as it was termed, soon experienced that depreciation