460 POLICY OF CHANGE OF SYSTEM. 
I do not believe that there is any one practically 
acquainted with the present state of our relations 
with the Aborigines, and the system adopted towards 
them, its working, defects, and inaptitude to over- 
come opposing difficulties, who would conscien- 
tiously assert that there is the least prospect of any 
greater benefits resulting in future than have been 
realized up to the present time. 
There is another reason, independently of justice 
or humanity, one which, with some, may perhaps 
have more weight, as a motive for extending 
and amending our policy towards the natives. I 
mean self-interest. If our measures were calculated 
to afford them that protection which we claim for our- 
selves ; and in place of those resources we have de- 
prived them of, to offer to them a certain and regu- 
lar supply of food in their respective districts, their 
wandering habits would be partially restrained, and 
a degree of influence and authority acquired over 
the whole aboriginal population, in contact with 
Europeans, which would counteract their natural 
propensities. The flocks and herds of the settlers, 
and the lives of his family and servants, would be 
as unmolested and uninjured as among our own 
people. There would no longer occur those irri- 
tating aggressions, or bloody retaliations, which 
have too often taken place heretofore, between the 
black and the white man ; and the misfortune of 
always having the border districts in a state of ex- 
citement and alarm, would be avoided, whilst the 
