y ^0°& 



A Waddy Fight. {See p. 168.) 



CHAPTER XL 



A Glance at the Aborigines. 



First Encounter with the Blacks— Misunderstandings— Narrative of a Pioneer— Climbing Trees-^ 

 The Blacks' Defence — Decay of the Race — Weapons— The Northern Tribes— A Northern En- 

 campment— Corroboree— Black Trackers— Burial — Mission Stations. 



FROM large portions of the continent the native has now been absolutely 

 swept away. The immigrant who intends to settle in the populated 

 parts of South Australia, Victoria, New South Wales, Tasmania and Queens- 

 land, will have no more to do with the natives than he would have to do 

 with the Redskins if he visited Ohio or Pennsylvania. The aborigines, unless 

 in the harmless guise of mission blacks, are not to be found except in the 

 far-off outlying parts where the pioneer squatter is prosecuting his labours, and 

 there the old sad tale of plunder and of murder by the tribes, and of revenge 

 by the white man — too often on guilty and innocent alike — is still repeated. 



The blacks of Australia differ in appearance and in size greatly, quite 

 as much as do the inhabitants of Europe. There are poorly fed tribes who 

 are correctly described by Dampier, while on the other hand men of a 

 splendid physique can be found amongst them It may be said at once that 

 the tales that deny their intelligence and which degrade them almost to the 

 level of brutes are unfounded. They live in their natural state, without care 



