294 THE NATIVE BLACKFELLOW 



are most characteristically aboriginal are shark's teeth, 

 and those of kangaroos and other terrestrial animals. 

 Bits of coloured coral are also used for this purpose, and 

 individual instances have come under my notice of a great 

 variety of natural objects being utilised for hair ornamenta- 

 tion, such as small, vividly coloured shells, fruit-stones, 

 and the tips of animals tails and feathers. All these are 

 firmly glued to the hair with a kind of bitumen, obtained 

 in some instances, in the inland marshes. 



A very curious article is the hunger-belt. I have 

 never heard of any such contrivance being used among 

 the savages of other countries ; and its invention is 

 another proof of the unusual intelligence of the Australian 

 black. It is usually made of the skin of an animal such as 

 the wallaby or kangaroo, and is frequently highly orna- 

 mented. It is tied tightly round the stomach when the 

 savage has to go on short commons, and the more 

 hungry he becomes the tighter he braces his belt ; and 

 this compression of the empty stomach is said to afford him 

 much relief from the pangs of starvation. 



Many of the old fashions and beliefs, however, have 

 died out. The blackfellow and his wife now ornament 

 themselves with the tawdry finery of the colonist, which 

 is always to be had for the asking from the squatter's wife 

 and daughters. The black is no longer shot on presenting 

 himself at the lonely station — there is rather a tendency 

 to make a pet of him ; and instead of putting on his 

 hunger-belt in times of scarcity, he betakes himself to the 

 nearest station, where he is always sure of obtaining food. 

 Indeed, many tribes reside habitually on the outskirts of the 

 stations, where they live on the entrails and ofTal of the 

 slaughtered sheep and cattle, and such broken victuals as 

 the " hands " and the squatter's wife is sure to give them 

 willingly. In addition to this, their claim to assistance, 

 and to be considered something better than wild beasts, is 

 acknowledged in a very different way by modern colonial 

 governments from that which distinguished, and too often 

 disgraced, the regimes of the first governors. The black- 

 fellow is now, to some extent at least, cared for ; and 



