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younger one, who is eitlier his son or younger brother. We 

 endeavoured to get information out of them, but failed to do so 

 on account of want of knowledge of their language. The youngei' 

 fellow left again during the afternoon. 



%th June. — I gave the blackfellow a piece of a mirror, which 

 caused great fun. He had evidently not seen anything like it 

 before, and looked into it very sedately and witli surprise, viewing 

 himself from difterent sides, and ultimately looked at the back of 

 it, like a monkey would do. 



1th June. — Three more blacks made their appearance at the camp 

 this morning, who, as well as our former friend, followed us all day, 

 and now camp near by. The three newcomers are young fellows 

 of fine physique, and probably from 18 to 20 year.s old. Two of 

 these, like the old one, had the right front incisor knocked out. 

 They are all circumcised and have tattoo scars on breast and 

 back. One of them has fresh scars on his chest, which are not 

 yet quite healed up. A dingo came near the camp and was 

 nearly shot by Mr. Streicli, but one of the young blacks pointed 

 his finger to his chest, said " puringa" and looked rather excited; 

 this was acknowledged, and saved the animal's life. The 

 dingo allows himself to be handled quite freely by the blacks, but 

 will not allow the whites to come near him. During the day we 

 met a number of native camps. 



%th June. — The blacks had gathered some native tobacco plants 

 which they call " okiri." They use it for chewing or rather 

 sucking, placing it on the lower lip after preparation, which is 

 as follows : — They rake the cinders of the tire aside, and spread 

 the green leaves on the heated sand until they are nearly dry; 

 after that, the leaves are rolled into little balls, which they 

 knead with the teeth, the spittle sticking the leaves together. 

 When thus made up and rolled between the hands into a cylin- 

 drical roll of nearly the size of a thumb, they are dried again, 

 and kept for use. Nearly the whole day long I noticed the 

 blacks carrying a roll on the lower lip, which during meals was 

 placed behind the ear. The juice of the tobacco stains their lips 

 and corners of the mouth, but this is easily removed. On our 

 way one of the young blacks dug out one of the banded ant- 

 eaters (Myrmecohius fascicUus) with his yam-stick and " Wera,"in 

 a remarkably short .space of time, although it neces.sitated the 

 removal of nearly a square yard of sand before the end of the 

 burrow was reached. They also occasionally dug at the roots of 

 some Mulga trees, and extracted from them the larva of some 

 Cossid moth, which they called " mako." This is eaten alive and 

 much relished. . . Number of enclosures of old bush fences, 

 formerly used by the natives for trapping game, were met with 

 during the day in several places. The blacks keep a fire on each 



