THE BIRDS OF COOL,ABAH AND BREWAKKINA — NORTH. 129 



" One of the first thiugs that struck them on landiug was the 

 magnitude of the native fish-traps. These are precisely of the 

 same description as those of the natives of the islands of Torres 

 Straits. They formed, in reality, a succession of walled-in 

 paddocks of many acres in extent. At high tide the fish come 

 in, and as the tide recedes they are left high and dry." 



Dr. Walter E. Roth, late Northern Protector of Aborigines, 

 Queensland, thus refers to these stone fish-traps : — "On Swears, 

 Bentinck, Mornington, etc. Islands, [Gulf of Carpentaria] stone 

 dams are erected along the coast-line in the shape of more or 

 less of a half circle, the extreme of the convexity reaching 

 sometimes to as much as 300 yards from the shore. The 

 majority of these dams are contiguous, and built of pieces of 

 stone (subsequently locked togethei- by oyster-growths) to a 

 height of from 18 inches to upwards of 3 feet, the general 

 contour of the rocky beach being everywhere taken advantage 

 ot ; they are covered at high water. The fish are thus blocked 

 from going out to sea with each receding tide." 



Mr. E. J. Baufield, in a paper on " Blacks as Fishermen," 

 read before the Royal Society of Queensland, on the 24th 

 June, 1909, remarks : — " Many years have elapsed — peradven- 

 ture centuries — since the blacks of Missionary Bay, Hinchin- 

 brook island, built a weir of blocks and boulders of granite 

 which oysters cemented here and there. On the fulness of 

 spring tides fish frolicked over anu)ng the boulders. Those 

 which delayed their exit found themselves in an enclosed pool 

 which at certain seasons of the year runs diy. To this day 

 the sea continues to pay tribute ! though the blacks of the 

 locality have passed away, and there is none but the red- 

 backed sea eagle or the heavy flighted os})rey and a rare and 

 casual white man to receive it. Among the few emblems of 

 the vanishing race, this persistent weir taking toll of the fish 

 month after month, year after year, for the benefit of succes- 

 sive generations of eagles and ospre3's, appeals vividly to the 

 imagination."^ 



* Koth— North Qiieensld. Ethn., Bull. No. H. m)l, p. 2:5. 

 ■' BautieUl — (jueeusld. (Jeogr. Juurii., xxiv., litoit, p. 54. 



