62 IN AUSTRALIAN WILDS 



of them are nearly white, some pale-brown, and 

 others so dark-skinned that they would pass for pure- 

 blooded blacks. A few white people live on Cape 

 Barren Island. There is also a school, and the young 

 Islanders are educated. Many of them read and 

 write well. They can sketch, too, on slates, and a boy 

 showed me a spirited drawing of a Mutton-Bird. The 

 drum and fife band is a popular institution. One need 

 not be dull at Cape Barren. 



The Islanders live in small huts clustered around 

 the harbour. The men are boat-builders and navi- 

 gators, and make voyages in small craft across the 

 stormy Strait to the Mutton-Bird islands. Their 

 principal industry is gathering nestlings of the 

 Short-tailed Petrel, which form their staple food 

 during the greater part of the year. A little sealing 

 is done, but it is upon Mutton-Birds that the Islanders 

 depend for sustenance and trading. On Babel and 

 other islands, where large rookeries exist, they have 

 built rude huts, which are inhabited during the periods 

 of harvesting chicks. An exodus from Cape Barren 

 to the bird-isles takes place when the time for "busi- 

 ness" arrives. Young birds are killed by dislocation 

 of the neck; the bodies are plucked and scalded, and 

 the feet removed. Subsequently, when they have been 

 decapitated and cleaned, the birds are pickled in 

 barrels. Birds preserved in this manner are market- 

 able. 



Though the Islanders have been engaged in the 

 Mutton-Bird industry for many years, the rookeries 

 still give abundant yields. It is impossible to esti- 

 mate the numbers of these Petrels that nest on Bass 

 Strait islands. In summer they appear in great 

 flocks, which darken the sky or extend for miles over 

 the sea, forming a dusky carpet, that rises and falls 

 with the ocean swell. Matthew Flinders records 

 having seen a flight of Mutton-Birds in the Straits in 

 December, 1798. On the lowest computation, he 



