Wild Island

by Jennifer Livett

  She also thought it admirable that while he had started life as a gardener like his father, Gould had mastered Latin and rudimentary French so that he could use the Linnaeus system of classification. She often looked through the books he had brought with him, his Forsfield and Vigors, his Sparmann, Cuvier’s The Animal Kingdom, and Temminck’s Manuel d’ornithologie, ou Tableau Systématique des Oiseaux qui se trouvent en Europe. These were kept in the workroom assigned to the Goulds, which soon became known as the Bird Room.

  In reality it was two rooms, a disused brick kitchen dating from the earliest years of the colony, and a low-ceilinged chamber connected to it, once a small servants’ hall, probably. This had plenty of south light from old-fashioned windows looking out onto the laundry yard. It contained a long scrubbed table at which Eliza and I worked, and shelving for birds, cages, and other necessaries. Stray cats attracted by the birds used to prowl the area at night, leaving the smell of toms rank against the doorway in the morning—which may be the reason why I have never since been able to like the scent of lavender. It retains for me an association with cat urine and bird slaughter, lavender oil being used to protect the bird-skins against infestation by insects. Thyme and rosemary were employed for the same purpose, the dried herbs packed between the feathered skins as they were layered into boxes.

  Like any alchemist, Gould closely guarded the recipes he used in his taxidermy, but I know they included alum, boracic powder and carbolic acid, with naptha, strychnine, and many forms of arsenic. On the shelves he kept jars of Fowler’s solution, one percent of arsenic, and liquor arsenii and hydrargyri rodidi, white arsenic; and there was ‘Paris green’, and ‘King’s yellow’, or orpiment, which I had used for making Tom’s colours. The skinning had to be carried out in the most precise fashion, and John Gould went at this delicate work in the old kitchen with the care of a surgeon and the avidity of a butcher.

  He prepared only a handful of stuffed, mounted birds while he was in Hobart, most of them gifts for the Franklins. Among them was a little goshawk everyone declared wonderfully lifelike—and it was, but I had become fond of it while it was alive, caged, and privately thought it perverse to kill any creature to give it a spurious semblance of life. What had disappeared with its life was its character, as I explained to Bergman, who called in one day when I was alone there. It had been an intelligent bird, quick to recognise certain voices and people. Bergman’s brown face tilted slightly to one side, considering.

  ‘That’s hard for you,’ he said. ‘But we’re back to the old subject, time. Taxidermy, embalming—they’re some of the ways in which humans try to defy death. Art is the same, isn’t it? Sculpture, your drawings, portraiture—all ways of countering mortality.’

  He was at Government House to attend a meeting in preparation for the voyage to the South Cape and Port Davey. Surveyors and hydrographers would carry out further coastal mapping, John Gould would capture birds, Lady Franklin would observe. Bergman had called to say he had suddenly wondered whether George Fairfax’s presence at the Bridge Meeting meant he owned land in the area. On searching the records he had discovered this was so.

  ‘A property across the river from the town at New Norfolk was owned in the name of George Fairfax from the year ’twenty-seven, but resumed to the Crown in mid-’thirty-five, six months before the quarrel at the Eagle.’

  ‘Why would it be resumed to the Government?’

  ‘Several reasons: neglect is the most common. Failure to improve the land in some stipulated way over a period of years, or non-payment of rates or dues—or because the Government wants the land back for its own purposes—something like the bridge.’

  ‘I wonder if there’s any record of Fairfax objecting to the process? We might discover an address through those papers.’

  ‘I thought of that. There’s nothing—which is interesting in itself. It suggests that he certainly wasn’t living in the area. Perhaps not in Hobart, or even in the island.’

  We talked for a time about what this might mean, but came to no conclusions, and soon drifted back to the more interesting topic of art and mortality. We were still talking half an hour later when Eliza came in.

  Louisa and St John returned from Port Arthur in September and were among many who came to the Bird Room to meet the Goulds and exclaim over the doomed creatures in the cages, the skins, eggs and nests; to see the delicate skeletons soaking in spirits of salts or laid out to dry, to admire drawings in progress. Louisa’s condition was now very apparent.

  ‘December,’ she replied tonelessly in answer to my question, and looking directly at me, grimaced. I was puzzled. She had said she wanted a child. St John had news, he said, and we walked down through the shrubbery to a seat near the water. It was early spring, still cool but pleasant in the sunshine.

  St John had had several conversations with ‘Mick’ Walker, but the convict refused to say anything about New Norfolk. Walker was an extraordinary man, added St John; of uncommon personal attractiveness. His face had what one could only call nobility, a pure, classical form of beauty rare in men, like the head on a Greek or Roman coin—miraculously unmarred by the bad life he had lived. The man’s physique was no less striking. He was strong and well formed, a natural athlete—like the Adam of some new and better race, fresh from the hand of God.

  St John seemed unaware of the extraordinary emphasis into which his enthusiasm had led him, but Louisa was looking at me with a peculiar little smile.

  The convict could read and write, but little else, St John continued—unless he was concealing it. The man was willing to learn, but hesitant in case he should be made to look foolish in front of the other convicts, for whom he was a natural leader. One of these was an unfortunate named John Thomas, known as ‘Dido’. He had a club foot and a partially cleft palate which made him unable to speak clearly. In spite of his afflictions, Dido was immensely strong in the arms and shoulders, an able rower like Walker, one of the Commandant’s number two crew. Walker seemed to be Dido’s protector and spokesman. His dealings with these men, St John said, had convinced him that many prisoners could be made into useful Christian citizens. With the right teaching they could then train others, as recommended in Lancaster’s monitorial system.

  Louisa continued to stare at me during this with the same small sour smile, raising her eyebrows from time to time. She pulled some eucalytpus leaves from a tree and twisted them in her gloved hands, sniffing their pungent scent.

  ‘You see how it is,’ she said when her husband stopped. ‘My husband has found a lost sheep—a whole flock—and makes it his business to bring them back into the fold. In two days’ time he goes down to Port Arthur again for another month. I am to go to the Chesneys.’

  They were again staying with Archdeacon Hutchins but must hastily find other quarters now. The Archdeacon had been obliged to offer refuge to Mr Palmer, the Rural Dean, and Palmer’s wife Harriet, and Harriet’s sister Miss Rachel Owen. The Church house they had been occupying in Argyle Street had burned down the night before.

  Eleanor Franklin made no great progress at drawing but toiled breathily, more patient when her stepmother was not present, which was most of the time, since Jane Franklin frequently joined John Gould’s party on his excursions. Eleanor had the same plump, round face and light-brown hair as her father. She was also like him in being immensely devout. When she was nine she had decided to marry a clergyman, she told me, and was now waiting for a suitable one to appear. She did not care for landscapes, only pictures of animals and scenes of moral or religious sentiment.

  ‘What shall I do with this part?’ she would cry. ‘Oh, do fill it for me, Mrs Gould, Mrs Adair.’

  Pleased by the smallest encouragement but confident without it, she announced with satisfaction at the end of each morning, ‘I am vastly improved, am I not? Is this not very lifelike?’

  ‘If it is, it’s because Eliza or Harriet has made it so,’ said Sophy.

  ‘I shall show Papa. He will like it.’

 
; Sophy’s drawings were not conventional but they were lively and frequently captured the subject in a few naive lines. This did not satisfy her, she was determined to do ‘proper’ watercolours. Mary Maconochie, the wife of Sir John’s secretary, and her eldest daughter, Mary-Ann, also came to draw at first, but music was their real passion, Mrs Maconochie said. Their attendance soon lapsed. Sophy was indulgent. The Maconochies were in straitened circumstances; they employed only one servant and had little leisure.

  On the first morning, when I prepared to leave at noon, Sophy objected. I must take luncheon with them as Eliza did. It had been understood. And Eliza wished to spend the afternoon with her son—but perhaps Sophy and I might walk? This soon became the pattern of the days I spent at the Bird Room, our afternoons being frequently a scramble up the hill to the Government Gardens on the ‘Domain’ about two miles away.

  The gardens were on the hillside facing away from the town, looking down to the Derwent River, their entrance being through an arch in a handsome high brick wall of considerable length, which faced north. Governor Arthur had had this built for the growing of grapes, espaliered apricots and peaches. Fireplaces had been made at regular intervals so the wall could be warmed in cold seasons. Almonds and apricots did particularly well there. The blossom was out that September and this was a sight Sophy craved, a reminder of Home. Occasionally we had the use of a carriage and Eliza and little Henry came too, especially if we were gathering herbs for the Bird Room or flowers for Government House. When there were horses to spare we rode with Eleanor and two grooms. I had not ridden since I was at school in Ireland, but the distance was not great, and I soon began to enjoy it again. Miss Williamson was too old to ride.

  Sophy was a little bored, a little lonely. After eighteen months in the island she could not wait to return to England. Jane Franklin had offered to pay her passage to travel home with some suitable family, but Sophy would not go without Aunt and Nuncle. In the meantime she wanted company other than Eleanor and Miss Williamson. The local ladies? Sophy clicked her tongue with annoyance. If she or Aunt appeared to favour the womenfolk of one official over another there were cries of ‘faction’, and in any case the military wives were dull, dull, dull. A respectable chaperone increased her freedom. I was a temporary visitor, not part of any quarrelsome little clique, with no aristocratic relations or pretentions to ton to make me dangerous. (Sophy could be as blunt as her aunt.)

  As for Mary Maconochie and her daughter, they were delightful, said Sophy carefully. She and Aunt were very fond of them, but . . . In close quarters on the Fairlie they had revealed an alarming tendency to question everything, even religion, and they were encouraged in this by Captain Maconochie, who was half genius—and one had to admit—half mad. Sophy’s mother and father would not like her to be too intimate with such radicals.

  Plunged into all this new activity, I deliberately pushed Rowland Rochester to the back of my mind. I could not forget him, but my congenial work with Eliza was now the vital, pleasurable centre of my life. Until I could discover what Knopwood had found, I would simply enjoy each day, I decided.

  At the end of September, however, a crisis erupted which had the Maconochies at its centre—and on the heels of this came news of Knopwood’s death.

  During the ‘Maconochie Affair’, as it became known, signs of a household in distress were everywhere at Government House, as they had been at ‘Thornfield’ in those days which now seemed so distant. Lady Franklin shut herself in her room, and Marie the French maid went up and down with vinegar-water, gruel and camomile tea. The housekeeper, Mrs Childs, was aggrieved because she could elicit no instructions about meals or any other household matter. Sophy was flustered, indignant, and refused to take it upon herself to give orders. Dead flowers lingered for days in the great hall vase as a sign of Mrs Childs’ dissatisfaction. They were taken out at last, but not replaced.

  Mary Maconochie had demanded entry to Jane’s room, reported Eleanor, and when refused, hammered on the door with her fists and then rushed away, weeping, down the stairs. Eleanor and Miss Williamson were sent to stay at the Government Farm at New Norfolk. Urgent male voices rose behind closed doors. For a few days the commotion was a mystery, and then John Gould explained the trouble to Eliza and me. I remember that day because of the swallows, which had just returned for spring. Gould had been out before dawn to hunt them. Eliza and I were already working when he came in carrying two small, feathered corpses and set about measuring them with calipers. Eliza was in the middle of an intricate drawing so I took notes for him while she continued.

  ‘This is Hirundo javanica . . . total length six inches. Bill, half an inch. Wing, four and five-eighths. Tail, three inches. Tarsi, half an inch. Bye the bye, I have discovered the cause of the commotion is Captain Maconochie. Wait, this is odd. This bird is javanica, I suppose? But look at this, Eliza! The tail . . . Here in Sparmann, javanica is pictured with the square tail, do you see? Now look again at this one I have got today; the tail is rounded. The question is, has Sparmann’s been correctly drawn? You see why I insist on accuracy? Let me compare it with Temminck’s description. Where is Planches Coloriées?’

  I went into the next room to fetch the book while he continued, ‘What? Oh, Maconochie . . . Well, it seems that Lady Franklin, reading a London newspaper just arrived, came across an article about the Assignment System in Van Diemen’s Land. It carries Sir John’s name as author, but was not writ by him at all—voices opinions quite contrary to his. Maconochie is the culprit. He has written the thing and sent it to England—but he claims the papers were clearly marked as his own and must therefore have been deliberately misrepresented by those in Whitehall with an axe to grind. Which is probably true. Anti-transportation and anti-slavery sentiment is used by Whigs and Tories alike these days, most of them wholly ignorant of the real circumstances here. Ah, thank you, Hetty.

  ‘Well, Temminck calls it Hirondelle orientale, but it is identical to Sparmann’s javanicus; the same square tail. The one I have here appears to be distinct from both.’

  There was triumph in his voice, but he was cautious, and never permitted himself to assume a success until his insights were confirmed, as this one later was. He did show his excitement by shutting the large book with a whump of satisfaction. This was the bird he later called neoxena, one of thirty new species he exhibited in England four years later.

  Sophy came to the Bird Room to vent her outrage. Sir John had received a reprimand from London. Maconochie had sent his report in the Government bag, and therefore it was assumed to contain Sir John’s opinions. It had been tabled in Parliament in London without due process through the Colonial Office. Nuncle was deeply angry with Maconochie, but his Christian principles required forgiveness, and his nature inclined the same way. He had been hesitant about bringing Maconochie to the colony, but Sir John Barrow, Nuncle’s old friend in the Admiralty, had recommended the Scotchman, and Aunt Jane had urged it too. She thought it would be valuable to have with them a man who had studied penal systems, as Maconochie had.

  But even on the Fairlie it was not only Sophy who began to have doubts. Maconochie had explained to Lady Franklin his idea that all human beings were once black-skinned. Increased civilisation wrought internal changes, which gradually lightened the skin. He allowed his children to read anything except the Bible. One of his lectures on the ship, on human physical types, had been so indelicate it scattered the ladies into blushing flight.

  Jane Franklin was now conscience-stricken at her part in employing Maconochie. She agreed he was culpable and must be dismissed . . . but he had no private income, and Mary and the children must not be allowed to suffer. Four months of intimacy on the Fairlie could not be set aside. How could they be left penniless? The Home Government must be persuaded to give Maconochie some other post here. It might take a year, but . . .

  In Bergman’s opinion the Maconochie Affair had only hastened changes already on the way. The Assignment System had been under attack in England fo
r some time. His was by no means a lone voice, but newspaper editors, settlers, and above all John Montagu, were determined to vilify Maconochie as a traitor and a fool.

  ‘Montagu hates Maconochie,’ explained Bergman, ‘and will add fuel to the flames if he can. And it’s true that Maconochie’s report will give the Molesworth Committee in London exactly the excuse they’ve been looking for to abolish assignment—perhaps even transportation altogether. If they do, the island will suffer. How can properties and businesses be worked without convict labour? There are no free labourers to speak of. Settlers come here to work for themselves, not labour for others.’

  He told us that there were not nearly enough ticket-of-leave-men and free labourers to fill the need here. And even if there were, they’d have to be paid, which would bring profits down to nothing.

  ‘What will happen to the convicts if they are not to be assigned?’

  ‘That is the great question. England seems to favour keeping them in prison for the whole length of their sentences. That would be very bad policy. At present about nine-tenths of convict arrivals are immediately assigned to households, and thus are fed, clothed and sheltered by their masters. If the decision is made to introduce the kind of “probation prisons” the reformers want, all the prisoners’ keep becomes an expense on the public purse. Settlers will have to be taxed to provide the revenue, and will have their servants withdrawn at the same time! A double blow. Worse still—we are refused any representation on the Government councils because it’s a penal settlement. Gregson, Fenn Kemp and others have been complaining about that for years.

  ‘And where will the prisoners be housed? There are not enough buildings now. The irony is that Maconochie is not in favour of probation prisons himself. He argues that keeping hundreds of offenders penned together is the worst answer, and any man who’s been in the Army would say he’s right.’