Journals Of Expeditions Of Discovery Into Central Australia And Overland From Adelaide To King George's Sound In The Years 1840-1: Sent By The Colonists Of South Australia By Eyre, Edward John
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Large Bodies Of
Natives Depend Upon These Weirs For Their Sole Subsistence, For Some Time
After The Waters Have Commenced To Recede.
Another very favourite article of food, and equally abundant at a
particular season of the year, in the eastern portion of the continent,
is a species of moth which the natives procure from the cavities and
hollows of the mountains in certain localities.
This, when roasted, has
something of the appearance and flavour of an almond badly peeled. It is
called in the dialect of the district, where I met with it, Booguon. The
natives are never so well conditioned in that part of the country, as at
the season of the year when they return from feasting upon this moth; and
their dogs partake equally of the general improvement.
The tops, leaves, and stalks of a kind of cress, gathered at the proper
season of the year, tied up in bunches, and afterwards steamed in an
oven, furnish a favourite, and inexhaustible supply of food for an
unlimited number of natives. When prepared, this food has a savoury and
an agreeable smell, and in taste is not unlike a boiled cabbage. In some
of its varieties it is in season for a great length of time, and is
procured in the flats of rivers, on the borders of lagoons, at the
Murray, and in many other parts of New Holland.
There are many other articles of food among the natives, equally abundant
and valuable as those I have enumerated: such as various kinds of
berries, or fruits, the bulbous roots of a reed called the belillah,
certain kinds of fungi dug out of the ground, fresh-water muscles, and
roots of several kinds, etc. Indeed, were I to go through the list of
articles seriatim, and enter upon the varieties and subdivisions of each
class, with the seasons of the year at which they were procurable, it
would at once be apparent that the natives of Australia, in their natural
state, are not subject to much inconvenience for want of the necessaries
of life. In almost every part of the continent which I have visited,
where the presence of Europeans, or their stock, has not limited, or
destroyed their original means of subsistence, I have found that the
natives could usually, in three or four hours, procure as much food as
would last for the day, and that without fatigue or labour. They are not
provident in their provision for the future, but a sufficiency of food is
commonly laid by at the camp for the morning meal. In travelling, they
sometimes husband, with great care and abstinence, the stock they have
prepared for the journey; and though both fatigued and hungry, they will
eat sparingly, and share their morsel with their friends, without
encroaching too much upon their store, until some reasonable prospect
appears of getting it replenished.
In wet weather the natives suffer the most, as they are then indisposed
to leave their camps to look for food, and experience the inconveniences
both of cold and hunger.
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