XIX CORROBERY OR NATIVE DANCE 479 



One day I accompanied Captain Fitz Roy to Bald Head, 

 the place mentioned by so many navigators, where some 

 imagined that they saw corals, and others that they saw 

 petrified trees, standing in the position in which they had 

 grown. According to our view, the beds have been formed by 

 the wind having heaped up fine sand, composed of minute 

 rounded particles ot shells and corals, during which process 

 branches and roots of trees, together with many land-shells, 

 became enclosed. The whole then became consolidated by the 

 percolation of calcareous matter ; and the cylindrical cavities 

 left by the decaying of the wood were thus also filled up with 

 a hard pseudo-stalactitical stone. The weather is now wearing 

 away the softer parts, and in consequence the hard casts of the 

 roots and branches of the trees project above the surface, and 

 in a singularly deceptive manner, resemble the stumps of a 

 dead thicket. 



A large tribe of natives, called the White Cockatoo men 

 happened to pay the settlement a visit while we were there. 

 These men, as well as those of the tribe belonging to King 

 George's Sound, being tempted by the offer of some tubs of 

 rice and sugar, were persuaded to hold a " corrobery," or great 

 dancing party. As soon as it grew dark, small fires were 

 lighted, and the men commenced their toilet, which consisted 

 in painting themselves white in spots and lines. As soon as 

 all was ready, large fires were kept blazing, round which the 

 women and children were collected as spectators ; the Cockatoo 

 and King George's men formed two distinct parties, and 

 generally danced in answer to each other. The dancing 

 consisted in their running either sideways or in Indian file into 

 an open space, and stamping the ground with great force as 

 they marched together. Their heavy footsteps were accom- 

 panied by a kind of grunt, by beating their clubs and spears 

 together, and by various other gesticulations, such as extending 

 their arms and wriggling their bodies. It was a most rude, 

 barbarous scene, and, to our ideas, without any sort of meaning ; 

 but we observed that the black women and children watched 

 it with the greatest pleasure. Perhaps these dances originally 

 represented actions, such as wars and victories ; there was one 

 called the Emu dance, in which each man extended his arm in 

 a bent manner, like the neck of that bird. In another dance. 



