498
498
the subject. By the Act 5 Cfeo. IV. cap. 84, passed in U
it was provided (sec, 26) that while conditionally or incom- pletely pardoned felons resided where they were lawfully entitled to reside, they might '* maintain any action or suit for recovery of any property — ^real, personal, or mixed — acquired after conviction. They might do ao not only in the colony, hut throughout the King's dominions. If the defendant should plead or allege the plaintiff's or com- plainant's conviction of felony, and the plaintiff could prove a remission of sentence hy the Governor — and is residing in some place consistent therewith and with the provisions of this Act, a verdict shall paws, and judgment shall he given for the plaintiff or complainant/' The difficulty so prominent in the colony had been felt in the mother coimtry also. The 27th section enacted that in England, Wales, or Ireland such a verdict should carry ■ " treble costs/ '^ f Marsden had offended Macquarie hy refusing to associate himself on the magisterial bench with the ex-convicts whom Macquarie placed there. Mr. Bigge summed up the canseJ of difference between the chaplain and the Governor aal based on the characteristic firmness with which Marsdenl refused to lend himself to Macquarie' s schemes to mingle the convicted with the free. Macquarie was not content with alleging that convicts were fit to be his own associates. He would make others sit with them. Within three months of his arrival, without any previous communication with Marsden, he appointed (by a published Order) Bligh's ex-bailiffj Tliomson, and aiiotlier freedman, as co-trustees of a turnpike road with Marsden, Marsden declined the office, and assigned as a reason the notorious immorality of the lives of Macquarie's nominated freedmen. Macquarie declared that he would consider Marsden's refusal an act of hostility to his government, and personally disrespectful. The sturdy churchman still refused. His mind was fixed to accept no appointment which would degrade his office
- In Di Lang's ** History" he spealca of Biirron FielQ'a judgment in
favour of De Mestre'a applietttion aa a denial of i-omiiiou justice, and an '* outrage upon the common sense of mankind, He does not allude U> Bigge'a Report, to the leading case before the King's Bench in 1819 (Bui- lockv. Doada}, or to the law passed in 1824. If he had seen them he could hardly have commented llina on FkWa ^loudxict.