3 8 Voyage of the Novara. 



A few days before our departure some of the scientific staff 

 had further opportunity of communicating'with the '' blacks." 

 It was important to extend our collection of craniological speci- 

 mens for that branch of study, by comparing the various races 

 of men with each other, so as to enlarge our knowledge of the 

 physiological peculiarities of either sex and every race ; and 

 as we had been told that numbers of skulls could be procured 

 among the Gunyahs^ or sand-stone cavities of Cook-River Bay, 

 which had been a favourite burial-place of the aborigines, we 

 made an excursion thither, still accompanied by our staunch 

 friend, Mr. Hill. 



Our light vehicle rattled merrily through the suburbs of New 

 Town, a sort of suburb of Sydney, thence over the Cool- River 

 Dam, 1000 feet wide by 200 feet in length, to Coggera Cove, 

 where several of the aborigines had pitched a temporary camp. 

 These were two Mestiza women with their children, and 

 Johnny, the last of the Sydney blacks, who might be about 

 40, and was a cripple in consequence of an injury sustained 

 in childhood. In 1836 there were 58 still alive; now 

 Johnny is the last remaining survivor ! 



We set off from Coggera Cove in a small, but safe, and well- 

 built boat, rowed by Johnny and some white colonists, bound 

 for Cool-River Bay, but our search in the sandstone caverns 

 was unfortunately fruitless. Johnny then conducted us to a 

 spot where Tom Weiry, one of the last of the chiefs, wlio 

 lived at the mouth of Cool River, and died about twelve 

 years previous, had been buried. Tom Weiry, or Tom Ugly, 



