THE DESCENT OR ORIGIN OF MAN 245 



survived. The infertility of the women is even a more 

 remarkable fact than the liability of all to ill- health and 

 death. At 'the time when only nine women were left at 

 Oyster Cove, they told Mr. Bonwick (p. 886) that only two 

 had ever borne children : and these two had together pro- 

 duced only three children ! 



WTth respect to the cause of this extraordinary state of 

 things, Dr. Story remarks that death followed the attempts 

 to civilize the natives. "If left to themselves to roam as 

 they were wont and undisturbed, they would have reared 

 more children, and there would have been less mortality." 

 Another careful observer of the natives, Mr. Davis, remarks: 

 "The births have been few, and the deaths numerous. This 

 may have been in a great measure owing to their change of 

 Kving and food; but more so to their banishment from the 

 mainland of Van Diemen's Land, and consequent depression 

 of spirits" (Bonwick, pp. 888, 890). 



Similar facts have been observed in two widely different 

 parts of Australia. The celebrated explorer, Mr. Gregory, 

 told Mr. Bonwick that in Queensland "the want of repro- 

 duction was being already felt with the blacks, even in the 

 most recently settled parts, and that decay would set in." 

 Of thirteen aborigines from Shark's Bay who visited Mur- 

 chison Eiver, twelve died of consumption within three 

 months." 



The decrease of the Maories of N"ew Zealand has been 

 carefully investigated by Mr. Fenton, in an admirable Ee- 

 port, from which all the following statements, with one 

 exception, are taken." The decrease in number since 1830 

 is admitted by every one, including the natives themselves, 

 and is still steadily progressing. Although it has hitherto 

 been found impossible to take an actual census of the na- 

 tives, their numbers were carefully estimated by residents 



89 For these cases, see Bonwick's "Daily Life of the Tasmanians," 1870, 

 p. 90; and "The Last of the Tasmanians," 1870, p. 386. 



*• "Observations on the Aboriginal Inhabitants of Kew Zealand," published 

 by the Government, 1859. 



