In May, the blessings of vaccination were introduced into the
settlement, and all the young children were inoculated with
success; but unfortunately, by some means as yet unaccounted for,
the virtue has been lost, and the colony has been once more left
without a protection from that most dreadful of all disorders,
the small-pox; of the fatal consequences of which the natives
have more than once afforded the most dreadful evidence, their
loathsome carcases having been found, while this disorder was
prevalent amongst them, lying about the beach, and on the rocks.
In fact, such is the terror of this disorder amongst these
untutored sons of nature, that, on its appearance, they forsake
those who are infected with it, leaving them to die, without a
friend at hand, or assistance to smooth the aspect of death, and
fly into the thickest of the woods. Their superstition leads them
to consider it as an infernal visitation; and its effects are
such as to justify this idea, in some degree, for it seldom fails
to desolate and depopulate whole districts, and strews the
surface of the country with the unburied carcases of its wretched
and deserted victims.

In September, the limits of Northumberland, and of Cornwall
and Buckinghamshire, on Van Diemen's Land, where a settlement had
been made during the last year, were defined; and the lines of
demarkation were fixed as follow:--The line of demarkation
between Cumberland and Northumberland is the parallel of 33. 2.
south latitude; and the line of demarkation between
Buckinghamshire and Cornwall, on Van Diemen's Land, is the
parallel of 42. south latitude. On the 15th of the following
month, Lieutenant-Governor Paterson sailed to make and command a
settlement at Port Dalrymple; and, in the course of a short