A sad event occurred about this time, which, as it was in a way connected with our ship, I will relate here.  It was the custom of Government at that time to send out to the Australian Colonies for employment as domestic servants, possibly wives for young colonists (women being much in the minority), a number of girls from the Reformatory Schools in London; and in the “Mary Anne” some twenty or thirty of them had arrived.  While on board they were under the charge of matrons, and on arrival were received in a house maintained at Government expense, until they obtained service or were otherwise disposed of.  This house was under the superintendence of a medical man, Dr. T——­, whose acquaintance we had made on our first arrival.  He was a middle-aged man, a thorough gentleman, a bachelor, and a great favourite in Christchurch society.  Amongst the shipment of young women was a very handsome, ladylike, and well-educated girl, and an accomplished musician.  The doctor was smitten, proposed to her, and married her quietly.  On the day on which we first heard of the event we happened to be sitting with some acquaintances in the public room of the White Hart Hotel, when Dr. T——­ entered, and walking over to the fire, called for a glass of water, nodding to us all round in his usual friendly way.  On receiving the water, he threw into it and stirred up a powder which he took from his pocket, and immediately drank off the mixture.  “I’ve done it now,” he said; “I have taken strychnine!” and remained standing with his back to the fire in an unconcerned manner.  We scarcely heeded his remark, taking it as a joke, till he suddenly crossed to a sofa, and called to us for God’s sake to send for a doctor.  One was sent for, but he arrived too late, if indeed his presence could have been of use at any time.  A doctor knows how much to take to ensure death.  After a few fits of convulsions, very terrible to witness, Dr. T——­ was a corpse.  The cause of his committing suicide was due to his discovery, very soon after his marriage, of the true character of the woman he had taken to his home.

I do not know whether the custom of sending out to the Colonies persons of this class still exists, but it certainly cannot be a good one, and I fear that but a very small percentage of them really turn over a new leaf.  There must be now, at any rate, better means of disposing of the surplus members of reformatory establishments in the Old Country than sending them to run wild amidst the freedom and temptations of the new world—­a custom as hurtful to them as to the Colony which receives them.

C——­ and I at length decided to commence work as carriers; we rented a four-acre paddock, and built a small wooden hut, and were in treaty for the purchase of the necessary drays and teams, but it was all being done in a half-hearted way, as well as in opposition to the best of our advisers.  C——­’s aversion to undertake anything where he was not entirely his own master was unconquerable.  Doubtless the carrying business would have answered very well, for a time at any rate, and there was no actual hurry, so long as we were employed and earning a living, but it was not to be.