t76 Aboriginal Dialects, ^^c, of Tasmania. 



Assuming tliat the number of tribes and sub-tribes 

 throughout the territory was then about (20) twenty, and 

 that they each, mustered of men, women, and children 

 50 to 250 individuals, and allowing to them numbers 

 proportioned to the means of subsistence within the 

 limits of their respective hunting groiuids, it does not appear 

 probable that the aggregate aboriginal population did 

 materially if at all exceed 2000. For it is to be borne in mind 

 that all alons the western side of the island the face of the 

 country is thickly covered with dank and inhospitable 

 forests, and that other physical conditions most unfavorable 

 to a natural abundance of animal life prevail there, while our 

 traditionary knowledge of the tribes known to have existed 

 along the east and centre is sufficiently accurate to enable 

 us to form a close approximation to their actual strength. 

 The Estimates which fixed the native population at 5000 or 

 upwards wdien the colony was first settled are therefore ob- 

 viously in eiTor. 



The open grassy plains and thinly timbered forest gromid 

 along the eastern and central portions of the island were the 

 most eligible for the purposes of the early settlers, and were 

 therefore the portions of the territory first occupied ; but 

 these fine tracts of country were precisely those which 

 natui'ally yielded the means of subsistence in the greatest 

 profusion to the aborigines, and they were accordingly the 

 districts chiefly frequented by the natives at that time. The 

 first colonists were therefore unavoidably brought into con- 

 tact, and frequently into immediate and familiar intercourse 

 with the tribes belonging to the districts in which they had 

 located themselves ; they thus enjoyed peculiar facilities for 

 becoming acquainted with their disposition and habits, and 

 acquiring fi:om the more intelligent of them some laiowledge 

 of their history and traditions. Few comparatively of these 

 original settlers — the pioneers of colonization in Van Die- 

 men's Land, remain to communicate the information wliicli 



