Jonathan Swift - "The Journal to Stella"

Thomas H. Huxley - "The Darwinian Hypothesis"

ARNOLD BENNETT - "LITERARY TASTE"

James Monroe - "State of the Union Addresses of James Monroe"

Journals Of Expeditions Of Discovery Into Central

E >> Edward John Eyre >> Journals Of Expeditions Of Discovery Into Central




"Several instances have occurred during my residence in this district, in
which natives have been arraigned before the administrators of the law,
although I was morally convinced of their innocence; in other cases, they
have sought redress through me, for wanton attacks on their person and
lives, without being listened to.

"Only a few weeks ago a native was very nearly being taken up, on the
charge of having thrown a spear at Mr. Smith's shepherd, without,
however, any felonious intent, the distance being too great. This
circumstance saved the man, or else he would, no doubt, have been tried
and found guilty on the shepherd's evidence, who would not allow that he
could be mistaken in the individual, although the accused native came
boldly into town and court (a circumstance that has never before occurred
since I have known these natives), although he was an intimate friend of
the shepherd and his wife; and although all the other natives could prove
where he had been at the time of the attack on the flock, and state who
were the guilty parties.

"For those who have had an opportunity of observing the Aborigines in
their original state, it is not very difficult to distinguish the guilty
from the innocent, for they are a simple-minded race, little skilled in
the arts of dissimulation.

"It is bad enough that a great part of the colonists are inimical to the
natives; it is worse that the law, as it stands at present, does not
extend its protection to them; but it is too bad when the press lends its
influence to their destruction. Such, however, is undoubtedly the case.
When Messrs. Biddle and Brown were murdered, the newspapers entertained
their readers week after week with the details of the bloody massacre,
heaping a profusion of vile epithets upon the perpetrators. But of the
slaughter by the soldiers, (who killed no less than four innocent
natives, while they captured not one guilty party), among the tribes who
had had nothing to do with the murders--of the treachery of attacking in
the darkness of the night, a tribe who had the day before been hunting
kangaroo with their informers, when one of the former guides to the
magistrates' pursuing party was killed amongst others; of the wanton
outrage on the mutilated body of one of the victims;--of these things the
press was as silent as the grave."


Without attempting to enlarge more fully upon the subjects entered upon
in the preceding pages, I trust that I have sufficiently shewn that the
character of the Australian natives has been greatly misrepresented and
maligned, that they are not naturally more irreclaimably vicious,
revengeful, or treacherous than other nations, but on the contrary, that
their position with regard to Europeans, places them under so many
disadvantages, subjects them to so many injuries, irritates them with so
many annoyances, and tempts them with so many provocations, that it is a
matter of surprise, not that they sometimes are guilty of crime, but that
they commit it so rarely.

If I have in the least degree succeeded in establishing that such is the
case, it must be evident that it is incumbent upon us not only to make
allowances when pronouncing an opinion on the character or the crimes of
the Aborigines; but what is of far greater and more vital importance, as
far as they are concerned, to endeavour to revise and improve such parts
of our system and policy towards them as are defective, and by better
adapting these to the peculiar circumstances of this people, at once
place them upon juster and more equal terms, and thus excite a reasonable
hope that some eventual amelioration may be produced, both in their moral
and physical condition.

[Note 56: "We say distinctly and deliberately that nothing comparatively
has yet been done--that the natives have hitherto acquired nothing of
European civilization, but European vices and diseases, and that the
speedy extinction of the whole race is inevitable, save by the
introduction of means for their civilization on a scale much more
comprehensive and effectual than any yet adopted."--Leading Article in
South Australian Register, 1st August, 1840.]

I shall now proceed to give an account of the appearance, habits, mode of
life, means of subsistance, social relations, government, ceremonies,
superstitions, numbers, languages, etc. etc. of the natives of Australia,
so as to afford some insight into the character and circumstances of this
peculiar race, to exhibit the means hitherto adopted for, and the
progress made in attempting, their civilization, and to shew the effects
produced upon them by a contact with Europeans.




Chapter II.



PHYSICAL APPEARANCE--DRESS--CHARACTER--HABITS OF LIFE--MEETINGS OF
TRIBES--WARS--DANCES--SONGS.


The Aborigines of Australia, with whom Europeans have come in contact,
present a striking similarity to each other in physical appearance and
structure; and also in their general character, habits, and pursuits. Any
difference that is found to exist is only the consequence of local
circumstances or influences, and such as might naturally be expected to
be met with among a people spread over such an immense extent of country.
Compared with other aboriginal races, scattered over the face of the
globe, the New Hollander appears to stand alone.

The male is well built and muscular, averaging from five to six feet in
height, with proportionate upper and lower extremities. The anterior
lobes of the brain are fairly developed, so as to give a facial angle,
far from being one of the most acute to be found amongst the black races.
The eyes are sunk, the nose is flattened, and the mouth wide. The lips
are rather thick, and the teeth generally very perfect and beautiful,
though the dental arrangement is sometimes singular, as no difference
exists in many between the incisor and canine teeth. The neck is short,
and sometimes thick, and the heel resembles that of Europeans. The ankles
and wrists are frequently small, as are also the hands and feet. The
latter are well formed and expanded, but the calves of the legs are
generally deficient. Some of the natives in the upper districts of the
Murray, are, however, well formed in this respect. In a few instances,
natives attain to a considerable corpulency. The men have fine broad and
deep chests, indicating great bodily strength, and are remarkably erect
and upright in their carriage, with much natural grace and dignity of
demeanour. The eye is generally large, black, and expressive, with the
eye-lashes long.

When met with for the first time in his native wilds there is frequently
a fearless intrepidity of manner, an ingenuous openness of look, and a
propriety of behaviour about the aboriginal inhabitant of Australia,
which makes his appearance peculiarly prepossessing.

In the female the average height is about five feet, or perhaps a little
under. The anterior part of the brain is more limited than in the male;
the apex of the head is carried further back; the facial angle is more
acute; and the extremities are more attenuated. The latter circumstance
may probably be accounted for from the fact, that the females have to
endure, from a very early age, a great degree of hardship, privation, and
ill-treatment. Like most other savages the Australian looks upon his wife
as a slave. To her belongs the duty of collecting and preparing the daily
food, of making the camp or hut for the night, of gathering and bringing
in firewood, and of procuring water. She must also attend to the
children; and in travelling carry all the moveable property and
frequently the weapons of her husband. In wet weather she attends to all
the outside work, whilst her lord and master is snugly seated at the
fire. If there is a scarcity of food she has to endure the pangs of
hunger, often, perhaps, in addition to ill-treatment or abuse. No wonder,
then, that the females, and especially the younger ones, (for it is then
they are exposed to the greatest hardships,) are not so fully or so
roundly developed in person as the men. Yet under all these disadvantages
this deficiency does not always exist. Occasionally, though rarely, I
have met with females in the bloom of youth, whose well-proportioned
limbs and symmetry of figure might have formed a model for the sculptor's
chisel. In personal appearance the females are, except in early youth,
very far inferior to the men. When young, however, they are not
uninteresting. The jet-black eyes, shaded by their long, dark lashes, and
the delicate and scarcely-formed features of incipient womanhood give a
soft and pleasing expression to a countenance that might often be called
good-looking--occasionally even pretty.

The colour of the skin, both in the male and female, is generally black,
or very darkly tinged. The hair is either straight or curly, but never
approaching to the woolliness of the negro. It is usually worn short by
both sexes, and is variously ornamented at different periods of life.
Sometimes it is smeared with red ochre and grease; at other times adorned
with tufts of feathers, the tail of the native dog, kangaroo teeth, and
bandages or nets of different kinds.

[Note 57: The same fondness for red paint, ornaments of skins, tufts of
feathers, etc., is noticed by Catlin as prevalent among the American
Indians, and by Dieffenbach as existing among the New Zealanders.]

When the head of the native is washed clean, and purified from the odour
of the filthy pigment with which it is bedaubed, the crop of hair is very
abundant, and the appearance of it beautiful, being a silken, glossy, and
curly black. Great pains are, however, used to destroy or mar this
striking ornament of nature.

Without the slightest pride of appearance, so far as neatness or
cleanliness is concerned, the natives are yet very vain of their own rude
decorations, which are all worn for EFFECT. A few feathers or teeth, a
belt or band, a necklace made of the hollow stem of some plant, with a
few coarse daubs of red or white paint, and a smearing of grease,
complete the toilette of the boudoir or the ball-room. Like the scenery
of a panorama, they are then seen to most advantage at a distance; for if
approached too closely, they forcibly remind us of the truth of the
expression of the poet, that "nature unadorned is adorned the most."

The body dress is simple; consisting of the skins of the opossum, the
kangaroo, or the wallabie, when they can be procured. A single garment
only is used, made in the form of an oblong cloak, or coverlet; by the
skins being stretched out and dried in the sun, and then sewn together
with the sinews of the emu, etc. The size of the cloak varies according to
the industry of the maker, or the season of the year. The largest sized
ones are about six feet square, but the natives frequently content
themselves with one not half this size, and in many cases are without it
altogether. The cloak is worn with the fur side outwards, and is thrown
over the back and left shoulder, and pinned on in front with a little
wooden peg; the open part is opposite the right side, so as to leave the
right arm and shoulder quite unconfined, in the male; the female throws
it over the back and left shoulder, and brings it round under the right
arm-pit, and when tied in front by a string passing round the cloak and
the back, a pouch is formed behind, in which the child is always
carried. [Note 58 at end of para.] In either if the skin be a handsome
one, the dress is very pretty and becoming.

[Note 58: A similar custom prevails among the women of the American
Indians.--CATLIN. vol. ii. p. 132.]

On the sea coast, where the country is barren, and the skins of animals
cannot readily be procured, sea-weed or rushes are manufactured into
garments, with considerable ingenuity. In all cases the garments worn by
day constitute the only covering at night, as the luxury of variety in
dress is not known to, or appreciated by, the Aborigines.

No covering is worn upon the head, although they are continually exposed
to the rays of an almost tropical sun. In extreme seasons of heat, and
'when they are travelling, they sometimes gather a few green bunches or
wet weeds and place upon their heads; but this does not frequently occur.

The character of the Australian natives is frank, open, and confiding. In
a short intercourse they are easily made friends, and when such terms are
once established, they associate with strangers with a freedom and
fearlessness, that would give little countenance to the impression so
generally entertained of their treachery. On many occasions where I have
met these wanderers in the wild, far removed from the abodes of
civilization, and when I have been accompanied only by a single native
boy, I have been received by them in the kindest and most friendly
manner, had presents made to me of fish, kangaroo, or fruit, had them
accompany me for miles to point out where water was to be procured, and
been assisted by them in getting at it, if from the nature of the soil
and my own inexperience. I had any difficulty in doing so myself.

I have ever found them of a lively, cheerful disposition [Note 59 at end
of para.], patiently putting up with inconveniences and privations, and
never losing that natural good temper which so strongly characterizes
them. On the occasion of my second visit from Moorunde, to the Rufus
natives in 1841, when I had so far overcome the ill-feelings and dread,
engendered by the transactions in that quarter, in 1840, as to induce
a large body of them to accompany me back to the station, they had to
walk a distance of 150 miles, making daily the same stages that the
horses did, and unprovided with any food but what they could procure
along the road as they passed, and this from the rapidity with which
they had to travel, and the distance they had to go in a day, was
necessarily limited in quantity, and very far from sufficient to
appease even the cravings of hunger, yet tired, foot-sore, and hungry
as they were, and in company with strangers, whose countrymen had slain
them in scores, but a few months before, they were always merry at
their camps at nights, and kept singing, laughing, and joking, to a
late hour.

[Note 59: Such appears usually to be the characteristic of Nature's
children, than whom no race appears more thoroughly to enjoy life.--Vide
character of the American Indians, by Catlin, vol. 1. p. 84.]

On falling in with them in larger numbers, when I have been travelling in
the interior with my party, I have still found the same disposition to
meet me on terms of amity and kindness. Nor can a more interesting sight
well be imagined, than that of a hundred or two hundred natives advancing
in line to meet you, unarmed, shouting and waving green boughs in both
hands, men, women, and children, the old and the young, all joining in
expressing their good feelings and pacific intentions. On such occasions
I have been often astonished at the facility with which large bodies,
have by a little kindness and forbearance been managed, and kept from
being troublesome or annoying, by a party of only six or seven Europeans.
I have occasionally had upwards of 150 natives sitting in a long line,
where I placed them, and as orderly and obedient almost as a file of
soldiers.

At other times, when riding with only a native boy over the plains of the
interior, I have seen the blue smoke of the native fires, curling up
through the distant line of trees, which marked some yet unvisited
watercourse, and upon making towards it, have come suddenly upon a party
encamped in the hollow, beneath the banks upon which I stood. Here I have
remained, observing them for a few moments, unseen and unthought of. A
single call would arouse their attention, and as they looked up, would
draw from them a wild exclamation of dismay, accompanied by a look of
indescribable horror and affright, at beholding the strange, and to them
incomprehensible beings who stood before them. Weapons would hastily be
seized, baggage gathered up, and the party so lately buried in repose and
security, would at once be ready either to fight or to evacuate their
camps, as circumstances might seem to render most expedient. A few
friendly gestures and a peaceable demeanour would however soon dissipate
their terror, and in a few moments their weapons would be thrown aside,
and both invaders and invaded be upon intimate and confiding terms.

I have always found the natives ready to barter their nets, weapons, or
other implements, for European articles, and sometimes they will give
them unsolicited, and without any equivalent; amongst themselves they
constantly do this.

In their intercourse with each other, natives of different tribes are
exceedingly punctilious and polite, the most endearing epithets are
passed between those who never met before; almost every thing that is
said is prefaced by the appellation of father, son, brother, mother,
sister, or some other similar term, corresponding to that degree of
relationship which would have been most in accordance with their relative
ages and circumstances. In many instances, too, these titles are even
accompanied by the still more insinuating addition of "dear," to say
nothing of the hugs and embraces which they mutually give and receive.

The natives are very fond of the children they rear, and often play with,
and fondle them; but husbands rarely shew much affection for their wives.
After a long absence, I have seen natives, upon their return, go to their
camp, exhibiting the most stoical indifference, never take the least
notice of their wives, but sit down, and act, and look, as if they had
never been out of the encampment; in fact, if any thing, they are more
taciturn and reserved than usual, and some little time elapses before
they enter into conversation with freedom, or in their ordinary manner.

[Note 60: For the existence of similar customs amongst the American
Indians, vide Catlin, vol. i. p. 56.]

Upon meeting children after a long absence, I have seen parents "fall
upon their necks, and weep" bitterly. It is a mistaken idea, as well as
an unjust one, that supposes the natives to be without sensibility of
feeling. It may often be repressed from pride or policy, but it will
sometimes break forth uncontrolled, and reveal, that the best and genuine
feelings of the heart are participated in by savage in common with
civilized man. The following is an instance in point:--A fine intelligent
young boy, was, by his father's consent, living with me at the Murray for
many weeks; but upon the old man's going into Adelaide, he took his son
away to accompany him. Whilst there, the boy died, and for nearly a year
I never saw any thing more of the father, although he occasionally had
been within a few miles of my neighbourhood. One day, however, I was out
shooting about three miles from home, and accidentally fell in with him.
Upon seeing me he immediately burst into tears, and was unable to speak.
It was the first time he had met me since his son's death, and my
presence forcibly reminded him of his loss. The same circumstance
occurred when he accompanied me to the house, where every thing he saw
recalled the memory of his child.

Innate propriety of behaviour is also frequently exhibited by the
Aborigines in their natural state, in the modest unassuming manner in
which they take their positions to observe what is going on, and in a
total absence of any thing that is rude or offensive. It is true that the
reverse of this is also often to be met with; but I think it will usually
be found that it is among natives who have before been in contact with
Europeans, or where familiarities have been used with them first, or an
injudicious system of treatment has been adopted towards them.

DELICACY of feeling is not often laid to the charge of the Aborigines,
and yet I was witness to a singular instance of it at King George's
Sound. I was looking one evening at the natives dancing, and who were, as
they always are on these occasions, in a state of complete nudity. In the
midst of the performance, one of the natives standing by a spectator,
mentioned that a white woman was passing up the road; and although this
was some little distance away, and the night was tolerably dark, they all
with one accord crossed over to the bushes where their cloaks were, put
them on, and resumed their amusement.

It has been said, and is generally believed, that the natives are not
courageous. There could not be a greater mistake, at least as far as they
are themselves concerned, nor do I hold it to be any proof that they are
cowards, because they dread or give way before Europeans and their
fire-arms. So unequal a match is no criterion of bravery, and yet even
thus, among natives, who were labouring under the feelings, naturally
produced by seeing a race they were unacquainted with, and weapons that
dealt death as if by magic, I have seen many instances of an open manly
intrepidity of manner and bearing, and a proud unquailing glance of eye,
which instinctively stamped upon my mind the conviction that the
individuals before me were very brave men.

In travelling about from one place to another, I have always made it a
point, if possible, to be accompanied by one or more natives, and I have
often found great advantage from it. Attached to an exploring party they
are frequently invaluable, as their perceptive powers are very great, and
enable them both to see and hear anything at a much greater distance than
a European. In tracking stray animals, and keeping on indistinct paths,
they display a degree of perseverance and skill that is really wonderful.
They are useful also in cutting bark canoes to cross a river, should such
impede the progress of the party, and in diving for anything that may be
lost in the water, etc. etc. The Aborigines generally, and almost always
those living near large bodies of water, are admirable swimmers and
divers, and are almost as much at home in the water as on dry land. I
have known them even saw a small log or root at the bottom of a deep
river. In a locality, however, which is badly watered, it sometimes
happens that they cannot swim. At Meerkap, in Western Australia, while
crossing with some friends, from the Sound to Swan River, we met with
some who were in this predicament, and who seemed a good deal astonished
at our venturing into the small ponds at that place. I have been told
that the natives at the Sound could not swim before that settlement was
occupied by Europeans--this seems hardly probable, however, upon the
sea-coast; at all events, be this as it may, they all swim now.

In habit they are truly nomadic, seldom remaining many weeks in one
locality, and frequently not many days. The number travelling together
depends, in a great measure, upon the period of the year, and the
description of food that may be in season. If there is any particular
variety more abundant than another, or procurable only in certain
localities, the whole tribe generally congregate to partake of it. Should
this not be the case, then they are probably scattered over their
district in detached groups, or separate families.

At certain seasons of the year, usually in the spring or summer, when
food is most abundant, several tribes meet together in each other's
territory for the purpose of festivity or war, or to barter and exchange
such food, clothing, implements, weapons, or other commodities as they
respectively possess; or to assist in the initiatory ceremonies by which
young persons enter into the different grades of distinction amongst
them. The manner and formalities of meeting depend upon the cause for
which they assemble. If the tribes have been long apart, many deaths may
have occurred in the interim; and as the natives do not often admit that
the young or the strong can die from natural causes, they ascribe the
event to the agency of sorcery, employed by individuals of neighbouring
tribes. This must of course be expiated in some way when they meet, but
the satisfaction required is regulated by the desire of the injured tribe
to preserve amicable relations with the other, or the reverse.

The following is an account of a meeting which I witnessed, between the
natives of Moorunde (comprising portions of several of the neighbouring
tribes) and the Nar-wij-jerook, or Lake Bonney tribe, accompanied also by
many of their friends. This meeting had been pre-arranged, as meetings of
large bodies of natives never take place accidentally, for even when a
distant tribe approaches the territory of another unexpectedly,
messengers are always sent on in advance, to give the necessary warning.
The object of the meeting in question was to perform the initiatory
ceremonies upon a number of young men belonging to both of the tribes. In
the Murray district, when one tribe desires another to come from a
distance to perform these ceremonies, young men are sent off with
messages of invitation, carrying with them as their credentials, long
narrow news, made of string manufactured from the rush. These nets are
left with the tribe they are sent to, and brought back again when the
invitation is responded to.

Copyright (c) 2007. topbookz.net. All rights reserved.