-U| - |u-|u-u
-u| - |u-|u-u
"This may, however, be accidental."
I have not thought it worth while to give any specimens of the songs I
have collected myself, because I could not be quite certain that I should
give the original words with strict accuracy, neither could I be
satisfied about the translations.
The assemblage of several tribes at one place for any of the objects I
have described, rarely continues uninterrupted for any great length of
time, for even where it has taken place for the most pacific purposes, it
seldom terminates as it began; and the greater the number of natives
present, the less likelihood is there that they will remain very long in
a state of quiescence.
If not soon compelled to separate by the scarcity of food, or a desire to
follow some favourite pursuit, for which the season of the year is
favourable, they are generally driven to it by discord and disagreements
amongst themselves, which their habits and superstitions are calculated
to foment.
Chapter III.
FOOD - HOW PROCURED - HOW PREPARED - LIMITATION AS TO AGE, ETC., ETC.
The food of the Aborigines of Australia embraces an endless variety of
articles, derived both from the animal and vegetable kingdom. The
different kinds in use depend in a great measure upon the season of the
year and local circumstances. Every district has in it something peculiar
to itself. The soil and climate of the continent vary greatly in their
character and afford a corresponding variety of productions to the
Aborigines. As far as it is yet known there are no localities on its
coast, no recesses in its interior, however sterile and inhospitable they
may appear to the traveller, that do not hold out some inducements to the
bordering savage to visit them, or at proper seasons of the year provide
him with the means of sustenance. Captain Grey remarks, in volume 2, of
his travels, page 261 -
"Generally speaking, the natives live well; in some districts there may
at particular seasons of the year be a deficiency of food, but if such is
the case, these tracts are, at those times, deserted. It is, however,
utterly impossible for a traveller or even for a strange native to judge
whether a district affords an abundance of food, or the contrary; for in
traversing extensive parts of Australia, I have found the sorts of food
vary from latitude to latitude, so that the vegetable productions used by
the Aborigines in one are totally different to those in another; if,
therefore, a stranger has no one to point out to him the vegetable
productions, the soil beneath his feet may teem with food, whilst he
starves. The same rule holds good with regard to animal productions; for
example, in the southern parts of the continent the Xanthorrea affords an
inexhaustible supply of fragrant grubs, which an epicure would delight
in, when once he has so far conquered his prejudices as to taste them;
whilst in proceeding to the northward, these trees decline in health and
growth, until about the parallel of Gantheaume Bay they totally
disappear, and even a native finds himself cut off from his ordinary
supplies of insects; the same circumstances taking place with regard to
the roots and other kinds of food at the same time, the traveller
necessarily finds himself reduced to cruel extremities. A native from the
plains, taken into an elevated mountainous district near his own country,
for the first time, is equally at fault.
"But in his own district a native is very differently situated; he knows
exactly what it produces, the proper time at which the several articles
are in season, and the readiest means of procuring them. According to
these circumstances he regulates his visits to the different portions of
his hunting ground; and I can only state that I have always found the
greatest abundance in their huts."
It is evident therefore that a European or even a stranger native would
perish in a district capable of supplying the necessaries of life, simply
because he had not the experience necessary to direct him where to search
for food, or judgment to inform him what article might be in season at
the particular time of his visit. It is equally the same with respect to
procuring water. The native inhabiting a scrubby and an arid district
has, from his knowledge of the country and from a long residence and
practical experience in the desert, many resources at command to supply
his wants, where the white man would faint or perish from thirst.
The very densest brushes, which to the latter are so formidable and
forbidding, hold out to the former advantages and inducements to resort
to them of more than ordinary temptation. Abounding in wild animals of
various kinds, they offer to the natives who frequent them an unlimited
supply of food: a facility for obtaining firewood, a grateful shade from
the heat, an effectual screen from the cold, and it has already been
shewn that they afford the means of satisfying their thirst by a process
but little known, and which from a difference in habits and temperament
would be but little available to the European.[Note 67 at end of para.]
In judging, therefore, of the character of any country, from the mere
fact of natives being seen there, or even of their being numerous, we must
take all these circumstances into consideration; and, in estimating the
facility with which a native can remain for a long time in a country,
apparently arid and inhospitable, we must not omit to take into account
his education and experience, and the general nature of his habits. The
two former have accustomed him from infancy to feel at home and at ease,
where a European sees only dread and danger:
