142 Proceedings of the Royal Society of Victoria. 



distinct tribes before their arrival in Victoria. They probably 

 came from the north, but some entered Victoria by western, and 

 others by eastern routes, and these two trains of immigrants met 

 in Central Australia. There is no doubt, the authority of 

 E. M. Curr for the view that some of the tribal divisions in 

 Gippsland developed in Victoria ; for he says that the Gippsland 

 tribes were the last offshoot of the Australian race, and they had 

 existed long enough to have developed considerable differences in 

 language. But he gives no proof that the common ancestor of 

 the Gippsland tribes lived in Gippsland. He supports his 

 position by reference to the mussel shells on the banks of the 

 Murray, buried a foot or two, or perhaps more, by silt.^ But a 

 single flood may deposit a couple of feet of silt. 



The tribal distinctions only prove the antiquity of the tribes, 

 and not their long residence in Victoria. That they have nob 

 been here for a great length of time is suggested by their 

 comparatively small number, moreover, is consistent with 

 their not having been here for a great length of time. No 

 accurate census was ever made of them, but Brough Smyth, 

 discussing the various estimates that had been previously 

 made, concludes that the total number of aborigines in 

 Victoria, at the first discovery of the country, was only about 

 3000 f Mitchell's estimate was lower, and Thomas's, the 

 highest official estimate considered by Smyth, was 6000. 

 E. S. Parker,^ the head of the aboriginal station at Mount 

 Franklin, calculated the number in Victoria at 7500. These 

 •estimates may be too low, but I have heard of assemblies, in the 

 Loddon district, attended by over 3000 aborigines, but the 

 memory of my informant probably led him to exaggerate the 

 number. When we remember that Thomas's census'* of the 

 aborigines of Western Port (the Bunurong) and the Yarra tribe 

 (the Warurong) in 1839 amounted only to 207 individuals; that 

 Gray's census for the Portland Bay district, extending from the 

 Glenelg to Colac, was only 599 ; that C. J. Tyers* estimated the 



1 Curr, B. M.: " The Australian Race," vol. i., 1886, pp. 206-7. 



2 Smyth, Brough : "The Aborigines of Victoria," vol. i., London, 1878, p. 35. 



3 Parker, E. S.: "The Aborigines of Australia." A Lecture, Melbourne, 1854, p. 14. 



4 Archer, W. H.: "Statistical Register of Victoria, ' 1854, p. 230. 



i> " Letters from Victorian Pioneers," edited by T. F. Bride, Melbourne, 1899, p. 79. 



