CHAP IX.] FOR THE NATIVES ? 147 



supplied with the capital resulting from the sales of 

 their ,town allotments, so as to become proprietors 

 of live-stock. The cutting and squaring of timber, 

 and the preparation of flax, are not contrary to their 

 disposition, and I include these employments among 

 the resources of a peasant. 



I have always observed that the natives who 

 hover about the settlements of Europeans are far 

 inferior to those in the country : they are not only 

 more unhealthy, but also become an ill-conditioned 

 compound of the dandy, beggar, and labourer. 



Distilled spirits, being in most extensive use in all 

 the Australian colonies, and being, in fact, the chief 

 source of the public revenue, have not failed to cor- 

 rupt, mentally and bodily, the natives, as well as the 

 European settler. 



With regard to the above-mentioned arrangement, 

 of reserving to the natives the tenth or eleventh 

 part of the country lands, 1 do not mean to assert 

 that that quantity of land is insufficient ; on the 

 contrary, it is more than is in any respect required 

 for the present or for future generations. The 

 point upon which I would insist is this, that they 

 will not occupy the reserved land. They have 

 their favourite places, generally not very avail- 

 able to Europeans. What an injustice would be 

 committed if we were to take from them the land 

 which they occupy, and which they have cleared, 

 and were to restrict them to that portion which has 

 fallen to them by a lottery in London, and thus 



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