NATIVE SHOOTING. 191 



shoot at all within the boundaries of the town ; and 

 there is a fine for shooting on a Sunday, which is 

 strictly enforced in the neighbourhood of town, but has 

 hardly found its way yet far into the bush. 



I should much like to know whether the aborigines of 

 this country originally possessed any particular breed of 

 dog for the chase before the stranger landed on these 

 shores, or whether the domestic dog was introduced into 

 this country by the white man. Unlike other savages, 

 I do not believe that the Australian natives depended at 

 all upon the dog for their success in the chase. Their 

 original methods of hunting prove this ; for although 

 they certainly now do prefer a gun to a spear when 

 they can get it, and their dogs assist them much in 

 killing kangaroo and opossum, they still stick to their 

 primitive habits of the chase, especially in the wild dis- 

 tricts. For instance, they will encircle a mob of kan- 

 garoo, and kill them with a spear or a waddy ; they will 

 stalk the wild turkeys on the plains under cover of a 

 bush, which they carry before them, and snare them with 

 a noose on the end of a long pole ; they will watch a 

 creek for hours, hidden in the rushes, and when a mob 

 of ducks pass by, will knock down two or three with a 

 waddy or bomerang ; and they can also spear the ducks ; 

 they will sit by a water-hole on a summer evening as 

 motionless as statues, and snare the pigeons that come 

 down to drink. They have peculiar methods of catching 

 quail. They can tell, by examining a tree, whether an 

 opossum is at home ; and they soon run up, by cutting 



