NOTES ON SOME NATIVE TRIBES OF AUSTRALIA. 103 
first sight as if a hunter’s own wife and children would 
receive scant attention, but the father and mother of the 
hunter, and those of his wife if present, see that his family 
get a proper supply of food. Owing to the native law that 
a man’s father’s brothers rank as his fathers, the hunter’s 
children will probably have more than one paternal grand 
father to look after their food supply. 
A white man, unacquainted with the native food regula- 
tions, on going through a camp at feeding time and seeing 
them dividing the day’s takings, would conclude that the 
animals were merely cut up and divided among all the 
people. What actually takes place is, that each hunter 
gives away all the choice pieces of his own catch and 
receives donations from his relatives. In the end the 
result is substantially the sameasif the game were divided 
equally in the first instance, but with the advantage that 
every person is taught to divide with his own kindred. 
An old or feeble person, although not a relation, would 
be given something out of the day’s catch; and if any of 
the party had been unsuccessful in the chase or in obtain- 
ing other food, some of the people would see that he did | 
not go hungry. I have often heard stockmen and other 
uneducated white people say how greedy a blackfellow is, 
and how he will sit and eat up food without giving his wife 
any. He is acting in accordance with custom, because he 
knows that it is the duty of certain persons among the 
woman’s friends to give her a portion. The yarns we 
sometimes read in books and newspapers regarding the 
holding capacity of a blackfellow’s stomach are equally 
baseless. 
In 1882 Mr. Hdward Palmer, when describing the cus- 
toms of certain Queensland tribes, said :—‘' Division of 
game takes place according to old established rules, in 
which the natiyes practice considerable self denial, the 
