598 PROCEEDINGS OF SECTION G. 
disqualified from deriving a full share of benefits therefrom. Now, 
must it be supposed that this race of our fellow-creatures—the 
original lords of the soil—have not as a general rule been duly 
cared for since their enclosure within the pale of civilised life? 
So far, however, from there being reason to suppose that there 
has been any culpable neglect, it is believed that the most 
humane sympathy and consideration have been constantly evinced 
on the part of successive Governments, and that whatever was 
likely to render the condition of these “children of nature” 
happy and comfortable have been freely bestowed; nor has this 
been confined to physical enjoyments alone, to the bestowal of 
mere clothing, food, shelter, and amusements. Education, to the 
extent of which their faculties are susceptible, has been attempted, 
but with varying degrees of success. 
Conflicts between the intruders on a territory and its original 
possessors become inevitable until the supremacy of the invader 
has been once established ; and in the case of the Tasmanian race 
this state of things has been largely aggravated by the influx of 
Britain’s criminals—the outcasts of society—in days gone by, 
resulting in many a deed of violence and cruelty towards the 
poor natives, causing much bloodshed and leading to heavy 
reprisals. This forms a very painful episode in the annals of 
Tasmania, which it is beyond the proper scope of this paper to 
enlarge upon. 
With these preliminary observations I pass on to a general 
description of the physical and other characteristics of the 
aborigines of Tasmania, and shall then enter into details under 
distinct sectional headings, of the several particulars concerning 
the race. 
In stature some of the natives were tall, and a few were robust, 
but most of them were slimly built, wiry, and very agile. Their 
colour was bluish-black, less black than African negroes, but 
slightly more so than Lascars. The features of neither sex were 
prepossessing, especially after passing middle age. Their noses 
were broad, and their mouths generally protruded. In youth, 
some of the women were passably good-looking, but not so the 
most of them. The women had a fashion of shaving the head 
quite closely, which, in their wild state, was done with flints and 
shells, and subsequently with glass when they could get it. The 
men, on the contrary, allowed their hair, which was black and 
woolly, to grow very long and plastered it all over very thickly 
with red ochre and grease, and when it dried a little their locks 
resembled a bundle of painted ropes, the red powder from which 
gave the native savage a most repulsive look. The shoulders and 
breasts were marked by short raised scars, caused by cutting 
through the skin and rubbing in charcoal, somewhat resembling 
the marks made by a cupping instrument, but much larger and 
wider apart. 
