316 THE DISCOVERY OF AUSTRALIA 



The only trees they could recognise were the " dragon 

 trees," which were " about the bigness of our large apple 

 trees, and about the same height. The rind is blackish 

 and somewhat rough ; the leaves are of a dark colour ; 

 the gum distils out of the knots or cracks that are in the 

 bodies of the trees." The other trees " were not known 

 to any of us," and none " bore fruit or berries." There 

 was nothing to eat except turtle and manatee, very little 

 to drink, and nothing whatever to carry away. 



And the people were worthy of their land. They are, 

 writes Dampier, "the miserablest people in the world. 

 The Hodmadods of Monomatapa, though a nasty people, 

 yet for wealth are as gentlemen to these ; who have no 

 houses and skin garments, sheep, poultry and fruits of the 

 earth, ostrich eggs, etc., as the Hodmadods have ; and 

 " The setting aside their human shape, they differ but little 



people in S from brutes. They are tall, straitbodied, and thin, with 

 the world." small long limbs. They have great heads, round fore- 

 heads, and great brows. Their eyelids are always half- 

 closed, to keep the flies out of their eyes ; they being so 

 troublesome here, that no fanning will keep them from 

 coming to one's face ; and, without the assistance of both 

 hands to keep them off, they will creep into one's nostrils, 

 and mouth too, if the lips are not shut very close. . . . They 

 have great bottle noses, pretty full lips, and wide mouths. 

 The two fore-teeth of their upper jaw are wanting in all 

 of them. . . . Neither have they any beards. They are 

 long visaged and of a very unpleasing aspect, having 

 not one graceful feature in their faces. Their hair is black 

 short and curled, like that of the negroes ; and not long 

 and lank like the common Indians. The colour of their 

 skins, both of their faces and the rest of their body, is 

 coal black, like that of the negroes of Guinea. Their 

 costume consisted of a piece of the rind of a tree, and a 

 handful of grass or bough." l 



1 Cf. picture of " natives of Western Australia " in Stokes's Discoveries 

 in Australia, 1846. Stokes describes, in vol. i. pp. 88, 89, the natives 

 of the districts visited by Dampier. Cf. Martin's " Journal of Explora- 

 tion in N.W. Australia " in Journal of Royal Geographical Society, 

 vol. 35, p. 284. When Banks examined the natives on the Eastern 



