There is scarcely any point connected with the subject of the Aborigines
of New Holland, upon which it is more difficult to found an opinion, even
approximating to the truth, than that of the aggregate population of the
continent, or the average number of persons to be found in any given
space. Nor will this appear at all surprising, when the character and
habits of the people are taken into consideration. Destitute of any fixed
place of residence, neither cultivating the soil, nor domesticating
animals, they have no pursuits to confine them to any particular
locality, or to cause them to congregate permanently in the same
district. On the contrary, all their habits have an opposite tendency.
The necessity of seeking daily their food as they require it, the fact of
that food not being procurable for any great length of time together in
the same place, and the circumstance that its quality, and abundance, or
the facility of obtaining it, are contingent upon the season of the year,
at which they may visit any particular district, have given to their mode
of life, an unsettled and wandering character.
The casual observer, or the passing traveller, has but little, therefore,
to guide him in his estimate of the population of the country he may be
in. A district that may at one time be thinly inhabited, or even
altogether untenanted, may at another be teeming with population. The
wanderer may at one time be surrounded by hundreds of savages, and at
another, in the same place he may pass on alone and unheeded.
At Lake Victoria, on the Murray, I have seen congregated upwards of six
hundred natives at once, again I have passed through that neighbourhood
and have scarcely seen a single individual; nor does this alone
constitute the difficulty and uncertainty involved in estimating the
numbers of the Aborigines. Such are the silence and stealth with which
all their movements are conducted, so slight a trace is left to indicate
their line of march, and so small a clue by which to detect their
presence, that the stranger finds it impossible to tell from any thing
that he sees, whether he is in their vicinity or not. I have myself often
when travelling, as I imagined in the most retired and solitary recesses
of the forest, been suddenly surprised by the unexpected appearance of
large bodies of natives, without being in the least able to conjecture
whence they had come, or how they obtained the necessaries of life, in
what appeared to me an arid and foodless desert.
Captain Grey has observed in other parts of Australia, the same ingenuity
and stealth manifested by them in either cloaking their movements, or
concealing their presence, until circumstances rendered it in their
opinion no longer necessary to preserve this concealment, vol. i. p. 147,
he says: "Immediately numbers of other natives burst upon my sight, each
tree, each rock, seemed to give forth its black denizen as if by
enchantment; a moment before the most solemn silence pervaded these
woods, we deemed that not a human being moved within miles of us, and now
they rang with savage and ferocious yells, and fierce armed men crowded
around us on every side, bent on our destruction."
Nor is it less difficult to arrive at the number of the population in
those districts which are occupied by Europeans. In some, the native
tribes rarely frequent the stations, in others, portions only of the
different tribes are to be found; some belong to the district and others
not. In all there is a difficulty in ascertaining the exact number of any
tribe, or the precise limits to which their territory extends in every
direction around. Even could these particulars be accurately obtained in
a few localities, they would afford no data for estimating the population
of the whole, as the average number of inhabitants to the square mile,
would always vary according to the character of the country and the
abundance of food.
Upon this subject Captain Grey remarks, vol. ii. p. 246, "I have found the
number of inhabitants to a square mile to vary so much from district to
district, from season to season, and to depend upon so great a variety of
local circumstances, that I am unable to give any computation which I
believe would even nearly approach to truth."
Mr. Moorhouse, who has also paid much attention to this subject, in the
neighbourhood of Adelaide, has arrived at the conclusion, that, in 1843,
there were about sixteen hundred aborigines, in regular or irregular
contact with the Europeans, in the province of South Australia; these he
has classed as follows, viz.: -
In regular contact with Europeans,
Adelaide district 300
Encounter Bay 230
Moorunde 300
Port Lincoln 60
Hutt River 30
- -
920
In irregular contact with Europeans,
Adelaide -
Encounter Bay 100
Moorunde 200
Port Lincoln 340
Hutt River 40
- -
680
or together about 1600.
Taking in the southern districts of South Australia 120 miles from
Adelaide, the northern ones 160, and the eastern one 200. Mr. Moorhouse
estimates that there are altogether only about 3000 natives. This
however, appears to me to be a considerably under-rated number, and I
should rather incline to the opinion, that there are twice as many, if
the Port Lincoln peninsula be added to the limits already mentioned. In
the Port Lincoln district, Mr. Schurman conjectures there are about 400.
On the Murray River, which is, perhaps, the most densely populated part
of the country, I imagine there are, from Moorunde, about three to four
natives to every mile of river, which as it winds very considerably in
its course, would give a large population to the square mile, if only the
valley of the Murray was taken into account.
There are other tribes also frequenting the river occasionally, from the
back scrubs on either side; but as these range through a great extent of
country beyond the valley, and only sometimes come down there on a visit;
I do not include them in the estimate.
