216 WILSON’S JOURNEY IN NORTH-WEST AUSTRALIA. [May 10, 1858. 
emigrants. I think there has been a great mistake regarding the Chinese 
emigrants who have gone to Australia. They were represented to me a little 
time ago by a member of the House of Peers to be rebellious, troublesome, 
and mutinous, and that at Melbourne the authorities had been compelled to 
restrict the entrance of the Chinese on account of the trouble they gave. How, 
I think, the wants of the Chinese emigrants should be borne in mind. In 
their own country they are fond of domestic relations. All of them have 
wives and children, and of all the Asiatics they are the most domestic. When 
they go to Australia they are left alone, and they are obliged to seek for ex- 
citement in gambling and drinking : hence they become troublesome and dis- 
orderly persons. When there are so many Chinese emigrants in Australia, 
some 60,000, I think it would be desirable to offer an inducement to Chinese 
women to go down there and be married to the emigrants ; and also to give a 
bonus to the Chinese who brought their wives and families with them. I 
think this would go far to promote quiet and good conduct among the Chinese, 
and to extend our dominion into the interior. 
The Chairman. — I will crave permission just to make one remark in reply 
to my esteemed and valued friend Mr. Crawfurd. He seems in his gallantry, 
which quality I highly commend, to have attributed to the female sex in 
India a degree of innocence and gentleness which I do not think they entirely 
merit. If we have heard of Thugs, we have also heard of Thugnees, who 
are the female Thugs. Although the humane order of Sir Archdale Wilson 
preparatory to the storming of Delhi, which we all unite in thinking cannot 
be too highly applauded, forbade the destruction of women and children, yet 
there is much cause to believe that the women were in many instances as 
cruel as the men.* 
* With the approval of the President, the following note from the Author of 
the Paper is given : — 
To the Secretary of the Royal Geographical Society . 
Brunswick Square, 6th July, 1858. 
Sir, — I am sorry that illness prevented my attending the Meeting of the Royal 
Geographical Society the evening my paper on the “ Physical Geography of 
North-West Australia” was read, as I should have been glad of having an oppor- 
tunity of replying to some of the remarks of Mr. Crawfurd. 
A country may possess sufficient water without possessing great rivers ; and 
high mountains in the Tropics do not everywhere produce large rivers, as for 
instance, the Andes of Western Peru send no large rivers to the west coast. 
Though Tropical Australia possesses no high mountains, it is well watered on its 
seaward slope. Mr. Crawfurd makes it appear that wool on sheep would turn to 
something like hair in the Tropics; but he does not seem to be aware that wool 
produced in Tropical Australia has already been sent to the English market. 
This district lies between lat. 18° and 24° south, and in being exposed to the pro- 
longed influence of the sun during the solstice, is as hot as though situated under 
the Equator. Sheep-farmers in Australia say that they can prevent deterioration 
(if necessary) by introductions of fine woolled rams from the south. 
Wool and gold were not anticipated by the first settlers in Southern Australia, 
and should not therefore be looked for as an inducement to settle in the North. 
Cotton, which is equally in demand with wool, may be produced to any required " 
extent, and experiments in its cultivation on the poor soil at Port Essington were 
highly satisfactory. Mr. Crawfurd admits that North Australia would produce 
abundance of oxen, and then asks what would they do with them ? The Aus- 
tralian stock-owner would say, “ boil them down.” And I would add that if boil- 
ing down carried on at Moreton Bay pays better than driving the cattle to the 
gold fields, the same process should pay still better in North Australia : hides, 
horns, and tallow would also pay well for breeding cattle there. From the spread 
