108 A HISTORY OF THE COLONY OF VICTORIA 



my object was, I purchased two large tracts of land from them, 

 about 600,000 acres more or less, and delivered over to them 

 blankets, knives, looking-glasses, tomahawks, beads, scissors, flour, 

 etc., as payment for the land, and also agreed to give them a 

 tribute or rent yearly. The parchment the eight chiefs signed this 

 afternoon, delivering to me some of the soil of each of them, as 

 giving me full possession of the tracts of land." 



The celebrated deeds, so closely associated with the idea of 

 burlesque which evidenced the historical treaty, were formally 

 engrossed on two separate parchments and each drawn up in 

 triplicate. It would be very interesting to learn in what archives 

 the natives deposited the copies they were privileged to retain, 

 and what they thought of their value. One was endorsed, 

 " Grant of the territory called Dutigalla, with livery of seisin en- 

 dorsed, dated 6th June, 1835 " ; the other, " Grant of the territory 

 called Geelong, with livery of seisin endorsed, dated 6th June, 

 1835 " ; and to-day they repose in a glass case in the Melbourne 

 Public Library, where the curious may see the cabalistic marks 

 which did duty for the hands and seals of Jagajaga, Cooloolock, 

 Bungarie, Yanyan and the other sable potentates who bartered 

 away their own, and probably several other people's, birthrights for 

 the blankets, shirts and glittering gewgaws with which the white 

 man dazzled their astonished eyes. 



It will probably never be known what they supposed they were 

 selling when they executed the grand conveyance in triplicate ; 

 but one deed purported to convey unto John Batman, his heirs 

 and assigns, " All that tract of country situate and being at Port 

 Phillip, running from the branch of the river at the top of the 

 port about seven miles from the mouth of the river, forty miles 

 north-east, and from thence west forty miles across Iramoo Downs 

 or Plains, and from thence south-south-west across Mount Villan- 

 marnartar to Geelong Harbour, at the head of the same, and 

 containing about five hundred thousand more or less acres, as the 

 same hath been before the execution of these presents, delineated 

 and marked out by us, according to the custom of our Tribe, by 

 certain marks made upon the trees growing along the boundaries 

 of the said tract of land ". 



