15 



almost polished by the long action of driven sand. No human 

 bones, however, were visible, though a hammer- and an anvil- 

 stone and a few quartzite flakes and chips were found. 



Mr. Bott told me that when, some years ago, he saw the 

 recently exposed skeletons they were lying in a row side by 

 side . 



The Alleged Pandemic. 



From what has been said the actual manner of disposal 

 of the bodies at Swanport affords no conclusive evidence of 

 the incidence of some sudden and great mortality among the 

 natives, of such a catastrophic character as would cause 

 them to substitute a more hurried method of burial for their 

 ordinary mode of interment, and although the facts that two 

 bodies were sometimes found buried together, and that others 

 seemed to have been thrown in without care, may be taken 

 to show that sometimes all may not have been quite in order, 

 there was, at least, no sign of such promiscuous and collective 

 burial as occurred in the "plague pits" of the mediaeval 

 epidemics of Europe. The number of bodies represented by 

 the remains, apart from the fact that it does not constitute 

 a record (3, 1., 217), is not of itself conclusive, for the accu- 

 mulation in this one place may be explained equally well on 

 the assumption that it may have been, and probably was, 

 used as a burying-ground for a very long period of years ; 

 and, moreover, if some sudden and great mortality did actually 

 occur in the district there is no evidence to show that Swan- 

 port, more than any other of the numerous burying-grounds 

 along the river, was a special place of sepulture for the victims 

 of the supposed malady. In any case Swanport was, no doubt, 

 only one of many which would have been put to a similar 

 use in a great emergency. 



Nevertheless there is such an accumulation of evidence 

 that not only the Narrinyeri, but many other of the native 

 tribes were at some time, and possibly on more than one 

 occasion, smitten with an epidemic disease of great virulence 

 and destructiveness that it may be of some interest to pre- 

 sent the available information bearing on the subject. In 

 the inquiry it will be necessary to investigate the origin and 

 nature of the disease and the course taken by it in its spread 

 throughout, as we shall see, a large part of Australia. 



Unfortunately for such an inquiry, the living persons 

 who are old enough to have spoken with natives who were 

 themselves alive at the time of the occurrence of the sup- 

 posed epidemic are few in number. Most of the old pioneers 

 are dead, and so are most of the aboriginals who, though they 

 might not be old enough to have lived at the time of its 

 supposed occurrence, might yet have heard of it from eye- 

 witnesses. 



