Burke Manuscript

Burke Manuscript: Page 260

Transcript

to keep him from feeling lonely. Couldn’t the old Mitre tell a tale. Or the Canterbury, Robin Hood or Heaphy’s? Don’t the walls still echo with the merry making of Bully White and Babot and Wransdowne[?] and many more kindred spirits of earlier or later years. Couldn’t the Beaches and the ripple of the waves tell a nice little story of the manipulation of tobacco, spirits and other duty paying articles, which by their midnight travelling have in some cases so materially aided to wealth and greatness some highly respectable individuals. Aye, and couldn’t the old Immigration barracks and other places add a spice to the revelry of olden times. Many a staid old matron now, could contribute her quota of the memories of those days. Wouldn’t it be a valuable document to have pigeonholed in a Government Department, a true record of the doings of immigration officers and other so interested parties in the good old times of some years ago. There was then a fine freedom from interference by the outside world, the press was still without the prying reporter and a fatherly Government with money at command, by selling the people’s lands, despised such a singular thing as economy. Medical comforts – do you comprehend – were in abundance, and there were so many sick and invalids wanting reviving. Now, don’t go and insinuate that officials or their friends drank the