138 Proceedings of the Royal Society of Victoria. 



The legend that Mount Leura is tlie heap of material thrown 

 out of the two adjacent lake hasins, would be so incorrect as a 

 matter of fact, that it tells against the idea that the story was 

 based on observation. The form of the two basins suggests that 

 they were formed by subsidence and not by explosion ; but it was 

 only natural for the aborigines to regard them as excavated, and 

 to attribute the nearest hill to the material obtained therefrom. 



VTII.— Traditions of Geographical Changes. 



•Suggestions of the antiquity of man in Victoria, based on 

 aboriginal knowledge of geographical changes, are equally uncer- 

 tain. The former occurrence of sharks in the Mitchell River,^ or 

 the former full connection of Lake Tyers with the sea, and other 

 similar reports, only indicate comparatively slight changes, and 

 no long lapse of time. The strongest evidence derived from geo- 

 graphical changes is that adduced by Mr. Howitt in his argu- 

 ment that man crossed from Victoria to Tasmania before the 

 formatiuii of Bass Strait'^ ; but his general arguments, though 

 weighty, are themselves indirect, and do not seem adequate to 

 counterbalance the overwhelming geological evidence in favour of 

 the separation of Tasmania long before the possible arrival of 

 man. 



IX. — The Possible Occupation of Victoria by a 

 Pre-Aboriginal Race. 



The weakness of the traditional evidence would not, however, 

 alone be conclusive against the Buninyong implement having 

 been cut and buried by aboriginal man ; for the traditions of the 

 late Victoi-ian aborigines is only evidence of the condition of 

 Victoria since their entry. There may have been an earlier race, 

 whose legends and place-names died with them. The possible 

 occupation of Victoria by a pre-aboriginal race, which may have 

 been contemporary with the volcanoes, has one consideration in 

 its favour. The theory of the origin of the Australasian abori- 

 gines which appears to be now generally accepted, is that they 



1 Howitt, A. W. : " Notes on the Geology of Part of the Mitchell River Division of the 

 Gippslaiid Miiiin';- District." Prog. Rep. Geol. Surv. Vict., No. 2, 1874, p. 70. 



•2 Howitt, A. W. : Add. Austral. Assoc. Adv. Sci., vol. vii., Sydney, 1898, p. 755. 



