196 Australian Life 



North- Western Australia, there are large tribes 

 of blacks still living in their primitive condition 

 of wildness, but the laws existing for their pro- 

 tection are not so carefully drawn as in Queens- 

 land. The opportunities for obtaining drink and 

 opium are too many, and too frequent, and these 

 tribes are also diminishing in number. 



This rapid decay of an interesting race, unfor- 

 tunate as it is, would appear to be inevitable. 

 The unvarying testimony of all the authorities 

 upon the subject goes to prove that contact with 

 civilisation is fatal to the Australian black. His 

 rapid extermination may have been hastened in 

 the past by carelessness and cruelty of treatment 

 that was grossly selfish on the part of the white 

 man, but even the most intelligent and best- 

 intentioned efforts to civilise this people have 

 proved abortive and injurious to them. The 

 only elements of civilised existence they seem 

 able to assimilate are those calculated to prove 

 destructive to them. "In their wild state, they 

 get along all right," wrote one of their official 

 protectors, " but when they are educated, what 

 can we do with them ? ' ' 



It is, indeed, only of late years that any 

 organised attempt has been made to obtain 

 accurate and scientific knowledge of their real 

 and natural life, and of the curious and interest- 

 ing tribal customs which survive among them. 

 The task has been one of considerable difficulty, 

 since the sources of information most readily 



