22 LOOK-OUT STATIONS FOE TURTLE. 



approached from behind as noiselessly as possible, — 

 when within reach, a man in the bow carrying the 

 end of a small rope jumps out, and, getting upon 

 the animal's back, with a hand on each shoulder, 

 generally contrives to turn it before it has got far 

 and secure it with the rope. This operation requires 

 considerable strength and courage, in addition to 

 the remarkable dexterity in diving and swimming 

 possessed by all the blacks of the north-east coast 

 and Torres Strait. There are some favourite look- 

 out stations for turtle where the tide runs strongly 

 off a high rocky point. At many such places, 

 distinguished by large cairns* of stones, bones of 

 turtle, dugongs, &c., watch is kept during the sea- 

 son, and, when a turtle is perceived drifting past 

 ^Y^ith. the tide, the canoe is manned and sent in 

 chase. 



With their usual improvidence, the Australians, 

 when they take a turtle, feast upon it until aU has 

 been consumed and the cravings of hunger induce 

 them to look out for another ; but the Torres Strait 



* One of these on Albany Kock is a pile of stones, five feet 

 high and seven wide, mixed up with turtle's and human bones, 

 and, when I last saw it, it was covered with long trailing shoots 

 of Flagellaria Indica placed there by a turtling party to ensure 

 success, as I was told, but how, was not explained. The human 

 bones were the remains of a man killed there many years ago by 

 a party of Kowraregas who took his head away with them. The 

 mounds described and figured in Jukes' Voyage of the Fly (Vol. i. 

 pp. 137, 138) and considered by us at the time to be graves, are 

 merely the usual cairns at a look-out place for turtle. 



