PRESIDENT’S ADDRESS. 511 
Another method of shooting wooden splinters is recorded 
from the Upper Normanby, in the middle eighties, and illus- 
trated in Pl. XXXIT., 9, 10, and 11. Mr. Robert Austen, 
the discoverer of the Kimberley (W.A.) Goldfields, tells me 
that, at Port Leschenhault, Koombana Bay (W.A.), in 1841- 
43, long before the advent of white settlement, this method 
of throwing the tips of the grass-tree leaves (about’3 inches 
' long) proved a source of amusement for the girls and little 
boys, who would send them sticking into the bodies of the 
blowflies. 
(b) Toy throwing-sticks are met with throughout North- 
West Queensland, and are of two kinds. The one is a thin, 
rounded, straight stick, usually “gidyea” (Acacia homa- 
lophylla), with an elongately-knobbed extremity (PI. 
XXXII., 12, 13), the whole varying from about 12 to 20 
inches in length; it reminds one somewhat of a fighting or 
hunting “nulla-nulla” (but very much attenuated), the 
larger varieties having even a similar name. Held at the 
thinner end, with the arm thrust well back from the 
shoulder, the smaller toy is thrown from a distance of 2 or 
3 yards up and against the fringe of some overhanging 
bushes or leafy branches, or even against some thick foliage 
held up by a companion. Immediately upon striking the 
obstacle so interposed, the stick shoots through the air, knob 
foremost, and with greater impetus to a distance quite half 
as much again than would otherwise be traversed. The 
larger toy is similarly employed, but is thrown downwards 
against a tussock or low-lying bush, whence it shoots along 
or close to the surface of the ground. 
The second kind of toy throwing-stick is known in the 
Boulia and Cloncurry districts as kandi-kandi. It is thick 
and rounded, from 18 to 12 inches long, but strongly bent 
(PL XXXIT., 14), approaching somewhat the shape of the 
Birdsville boomerang. On the other hand, unlike a boome- 
rang, it is held on the convex side forwards, clasped firmly 
in the hand, and, simultaneously pressed close against the 
extended fore-finger, it is thrown downwards against a log 
or thick branch lying on the ground, from which it rises 
into the air in a straight direction and revolves in its flight. 
While the fighting boomerang may be employed as a toy, 
the implement is often constructed solely and especially for 
purposes of sport and amusement. No sufficient evidence is 
as yet available as to which particular use it was primitively 
applied. It is noteworthy that on the (middle) Palmer 
River, about latitude 16 degrees—the most northerly limit 
at which the boomerang has so far been met with—it is em- 
