The Oven-mounds of the Aborigines in Victoria. 
By the Rev. Peter MacPuerson, M.A. 
[Read before the Royal Society of N.S.W.,2 July, 1884] 
In the district of Meredith, midway between Geelong and Ballarat, 
there is a considerable number of mounds, locally known as Black- 
fellows’ ovens. In the landscape they appear as ordinary irre 
larities on the surface of the ground, and in many cases sain be 
passed by without arresting the least attention. At times, how- 
were ploughed up, and the ground was planted with potatoes. 
The luxuriance of the growth which took place clearly marked out 
the position of the ovens. The growth, however, was too 
was an oven-mound, was was ploug ed up and sown with oats. There 
was a vigorous growth of stalk, but the grain came to nothing. 
On the uncultivated country so oven-mounds, in ordinary seasons, 
are not easily di hed from irregularities of the surface of the 
earth. 
patches of the oven-mounds y ble from the 
il generally. Numbers of the mounds could 
be distinguished from the carriage windows of the Geelong and 
way, at Bruce’s Creek, near Lethbridge, and also on 
the slopes of the eee at the upper part of Cowie’s Creek. The 
tr aes cena of the primitive hearths and cooking-ovens of 
oo 
of the ploughshare has been at work. Still it is Oy a only a 
yuestion of time will disa 
Mo. Bot. Garder 
1897. 
