that they broke down under it. Whilst this was going on they were 

 rapidly dying off. The name of the catechist, Mr. Robert Clark, 

 deserved most honourable mention for his loving labours among them, 

 and he was held by them in the greatest veneration. In 1847 the 

 number at the settlement was reduced from over 100 to 44 souls, 

 including 22 women and 12 children, and some of these children were 

 half-castes. In the face of much opposition tbey were then removed 

 to Oyster Cove, which saw the last of them, excepting Fanny Coch- 

 rane, who still lived on a farm at Port Cygnet, and waH the sole sur- 

 vivor of that Flinders Island native settlement. In 1854 there were at 

 Oyster Cove a remnant of three men, eleven women and two children. 

 In 1865 Billy Lanny and two women remained, and Trugannini was the 

 last of her royal race. There were four tribes of Tasmanian abori- 

 ginals, and four different languages or dialects. The greater part of 

 the island was too densely timbered and ecrubby for even them to live. 

 They existed around the coast lines, chiefly where they got a good supply 

 of shell fish, having no hooks to catch other kinds of rish. The West 

 Coast contained four small tribes, numbering about 100. Then there 

 was a tribe at Recherche and the Huon. There was the Ben Lomond 

 tribe in the North, another about Campbell Town and Ross, and a 

 number about the Tamar, and about the Middlesex Plains. Then 

 there were the East Coast tribes, Their tribal organisations, however, 

 were rapidly broken up when settlement began. The Big River tribe 

 came down from the Ouse to the Der»vent. They were rather smaller 

 people than the English, generally walked very erect, and in all their 

 movements evinced remarkable ease and agility. Their complexions 

 were not quite black, a few approaching the colour of copper, with 

 thick lips, flat nostrils, and many of their countenances were certainly 

 pleasing. They made great guys of themselves with red ochre in 

 their hair, oil smeared on their bodies to resist the influences of the 

 weather, and incisions into their flesh made with sharp flints. They 

 had no idea of a Supreme Being, but had an evil spirit, to whom they 

 attributed all fatalities and misfortunes. Some of them seemed to have 

 an idea of a future state. Some nominal authority of a patriarchal 

 kind seemed to have been exercised by their chiefs. Their food included 

 every animal they could catch, from the kaugaroo to the kangaroo rat ; 

 birds when they could get them, mutton birds and penguins they could 

 catch, but seemed to have no special means of catching other bird?. 

 They ate fern roots, various fungous growth?, and many things that a 

 civilised individual would think harmful. Their mode of cooking was 

 to throw the animal killed on to the fire. All were very expert divers, 

 the women especially so, as it waj their duty to procure the fi3h. They 

 had native canoes, which they got along the water by swimming along- 

 side of the craft. The Western tribes generally burnt their dead with 

 logs of wood built up in a conical structure, and they besmeared their 

 faces with the ashes, 



Votes of thanks to the readers of the papers terminated the meeting. 



