{p. 26}

side by side with, blacks, but that they ate white flour and that this naturally affected the colour of their offspring. I have seen old natives in Central Australia accept, without question, their wives' half-caste children, making no difference whatever between them and the pure bred ones. On the other hand, it is, of course, naturally, a belief that is one of the first to become modified when the natives, have been for some time in contact with white men.

In regard to sacred objects there is considerable difference amongst the tribes. The churinga may be said to be distinctive of the Arunta and Kaitish, and to dwindle in importance as we pass northward until, amongst the coastal tribes, they are used only during initiation. On Melville and Bathurst I could find no trace of them. The most interesting new sacred objects that I came across were those called Muraian amongst the Kakadu, to which reference has already been made. There are no Nurtunjas nor Waningas nor ground drawings, that figure so largely in the southern part of the Territory, but, through all tribes on the mainland, the belief is universal amongst the women and children that the sound made by the bull-roarer is the voice of a great spirit which comes to take the youth away during the initiation ceremony. In no case amongst these northern tribes did I find any indication of sacred rock drawings such as we meet with in the Arunta and Kaitish. This absence may be associated with that of any such spots as the Ertnatulunga, where churinga are stored and close by which the sacred drawings of the Arunta are typically found.

So far as the method of life of the northern tribes is concerned it is, with certain changes, due to difference of environment, closely similar to that of the southern tribes. There are favourite camping grounds belonging

{p. 27}

to certain local groups which form the nearest approach to anything like a permanent camp, but there is no continuous occupation and never the slightest attempt to cultivate any crop or to lay by a store of food other than such as may be required during the performance of some particular ceremony or series of ceremonies. For example, in the Alligator Rivers district there are very favourite camping grounds by the side of great billabongs. As long as they can get lily-seeds and roots in abundance, fish and wild fowl, there they stay, each family with its own mia mia or, in the dry months, with nothing more than a bough or two, slanted against a tree or shrub to obtain a little shelter from the sun. All day long the women and children wade up to their necks in the water gathering lily "tuck-out," while the men spear fish and catch wild fowl or climb the trees after flying-fox and honey-bag. But when they have thinned the lilies out, and the fish and fowl get hard to catch, and the honey-bags are scarce, then they move on to another camp where the same round is gone through day after day and month after month all the year round. The cooking of their food is carried on in two ways. Under common when they are in camp and making a hasty conditions, meal, they simply use an ordinary fire, placing the food, such as a lizard or a flying-fox, on the red-hot embers (Fig. 19). When the food is sufficiently cooked, or while it is in process of cooking, it may be torn up by the teeth of the cook and replaced on the fire for further cooking or handed round for consumption. When, however, the natives are camped in one place for any considerable length of time they cook much more carefully, using what the Kakadu call peindi, or earth ovens (Fig. 21), in which the food is placed on paper-bark, grass, or green leaves above heated stones in a hole in the ground. It

{p. 28}

is then covered with more paper-bark, grass, or leaves, and the earth piled over. So far as their food is concerned, it may be said that the natives eat anything that is edible, In the more northern parts of the Territory food is very abundant. The waterholes swarm with fish and wild fowl, and on the land they secure plenty of kangaroos, birds, such as native companion and jabiru, lizards and snakes. On the coast, dugongs and large turtles (Midas sp.) and turtle eggs, at the right time of the year, are easily obtained. I was much interested in watching the way in which, amongst the Kakadu, the natives kill snakes. There are two or three species of non-venomous ones, four feet and upwards in length, that they obtain in considerable numbers. They collect a few, put them into bags and either kill them on the spot or bring them alive into camp. When a man wishes to kill one, he catches hold of it just behind the head and puts the latter into his mouth, upside down. Holding the neck tightly in his teeth, immediately behind the head, he gives the body a sudden, strong, sharp jerk, dislocating the vertebral column and killing the animal (Fig. 20). I had heard of this method but scarcely thought it credible until, time after time, I had seen it done. In their camps they make various forms of shelters and mia mias. The simplest consists only of a few boughs, placed so as to protect them from the sun's rays or the prevailing wind. They are very fragile, but it is astonishing how cleverly, though simply, the native will lean a few boughs up against one another in such a way as to make them a shade against the sun or a fairly efficient protection against wind and rain. They seem to know, instinctively, the right angle at which to slant the boughs so as to make them able to withstand the pressure of a strong wind. In many parts, during the summer

{p. 29}

months, violent monsoonal deluges have to be endured. On Melville and Bathurst Islands great use is made of sheets of stringy bark, which the natives strip from the gum-trees with their tomahawks in lengths of from six to ten feet by two or three feet in width. With these they build, sometimes dome-shaped, at others tent-shaped, mia mias, usually not more than at most four feet high (Fig. 22). I was much struck on Melville Island with their very simple but effective contrivance of picking up and folding a sheet of bark in two and using it as an umbrella, slanting it in such a direction as to keep off the torrent of rain that fell at rapid intervals. I found this a most useful contrivance as a protection for my cameras. If they are overtaken with specially heavy rain out in the bush, away from the main camp, they often huddle close together, side by side, in a line under the shelter of a few slanting sheets of bark, with a trench, roughly-scooped out by their hands, in the best position to lead the stream of water away from them. As soon as the rain ceases they pick up their belongings and march on, quite cheerfully. I once saw some twenty natives, quite dry, during pelting rain, under a shelter of this kind that was not more than four feet high, and did not subtend more than two feet of ground. In parts where it is available, paper-bark, the bark of Melaleuca leucodendron, is used, and is in some respects even more efficient than stringy-bark, because it is very strong and tough and at the same time pliable. In addition to this it is very warm and can easily be wrapped round their bodies as they lie on the ground during the cold winter nights.

Over the greater part of the Territory there are, in addition to the rains that do not seriously inconvenience the aboriginal, two main sources of discomfort. The first of these is the cold at nights, during, at all events, three

{p. 30}

winter months. It is a remarkable thing that, except for a small apron or tassel, both men and women are stark naked. The only efficient covering of any kind is an apron made of a fold of paper-bark. This, however, is worn only on Melville and Bathurst Islands and is held in place by their arms, which the women always carry characteristically bent at the elbows, in such a way that the latter always hold the apron close against the side of the body, just above the hip. During the winter months in the upland interior districts, and along the Roper and other rivers flowing into the Gulf of Carpentaria, the temperature at night falls to 29� F., and it is a remarkable fact that the native, though he feels the cold keenly, has never realised the fact that the kangaroos, wallabies, and opossums that he catches and eats in plenty would provide him with a warm covering. This is due, probably, to the fact that he prefers to cook his animals in the skin so as to keep all the juices inside, and, therefore, the first thing that he does is to put the entire animal on the fire and singe the hair off. At night time the whole family huddles together along with the dogs, under its bough or bark shelter, with sheets of paper-bark under, above, and around them, if they can get any, and with two or three small fires close to them.

The second source of discomfort is the flies and mosquitos. The flies do not trouble the native so much as they do the white men; in fact you often see the former, especially the children, with their eyes encircled with a mass of crawling flies, of which, apparently, they take little notice. On the other hand, the mosquitos trouble the natives just as much as they do the white men, with, often, very serious results. They are no more immune from tropical diseases such as malarial fever than are the white men. I have a stick

{p. 31}

marked with more than ninety notches indicating so many deaths from what was supposed to be malarial fever on Melville Island in the course of two months. To protect themselves against mosquitos they construct special tent-like structures which vary in size to a very considerable degree. I came across the one represented (Figures 24 and 25) in a camp on the Roper River. It was fifteen feet long, between four and five feet broad, and four feet high. The framework was rather like that of a boat turned upside down. At either end there was a forked stick, and between these two ran a ridgepole, occupying the position of an upturned keel. A series of ribs arched over on either side. In some cases these ribs ran from the ground to the ridge-pole but, in others, a pliant stem formed a complete arch, fixed into the ground on each side and attached to the ridge-pole in the middle. When the framework was complete, sheets of paper-bark were very ingeniously laid on so as to form a wall impenetrable both to rain and mosquitos. When in use, a small opening is left at one end and, through this, the natives crawl until the hut can hold no more. The opening is closed, smoke fires are lighted, and here, almost hermetically sealed, they swelter and choke until the rain clears off, or the morning light drives the mosquitos away. If they cannot get bark their only hope is to make great smoke fires with green bushes and grass, but, in the real mosquito season, they have, at best, very uncomfortable and disturbed nights and have to make up for it by sleeping during the day. In hilly districts they are a little more fortunate, because if they can get up two or three hundred feet they are relatively free from mosquitos. Near to Oenpelli, for example, on the East Alligator River, there is an isolated hill about three hundred feet high. {p. 32} Straight up this, through the scrub, there runs a path that has been used for long years as a track to some rock shelters on the top. Every night, as soon as the sun sets, a long procession of natives winds up the hillside from the plains around the billabongs and river, the women carrying their piccaninnies and pitchis containing water and stores of lily-roots, yams, and other food, the men carrying their spears and clubs.

The overhanging rocks form caves with low-lying, shelving roofs, blackened with the smoke of years of fires, and walls decorated with quaint but often very realistic drawings of the animals on which they feed, all crudely drawn in red and yellow ochre, white pipe-clay and charcoal mixed with grease. Here they camp free from mosquitos, in comparative coolness, shifting from the northern to the southern face and vice versa according to the direction from which the monsoon storms are blowing.

When the time comes for the turtle to lay its eggs, they go to the laying ground on some sandy beach. When the lagoons and billagongs are alive with young geese the natives are there, camping close by and catching them by the score. When birds are scarce they go to the lily-pools and feed on roots, stems, and seeds. In the inland, drier parts they gather together on the larger and more permanent water holes where fish and shell fish, birds and vegetable food can be secured longer than elsewhere. The moment the rains fall, off they scatter to take advantage of supplies that do not exist during the dry season.

In camp, when they are not performing sacred ceremonies, the evenings are always occupied with corrobborees, which may be witnessed by everyone--men, women, and children alike. These ordinary corrobborees

{p. 33}

vary to a considerable extent in different parts. In the south they take the form of set dances each with its own "figures," and one of these corrobborees may occupy the evenings of two or three weeks. n the other hand, in the more northern tribes these long corrobborees seem to be absent, and, in their place, we have a series of short ones which may only occupy a very little time--it may be only a few minutes. These corrobborees deal with some particular incidents, such as a buffalo hunt, a crocodile securing its prey, or the putting out of a lugger to sea.

In some instances, as on Melville Island, the acting may be very realistic. The men gather together and come into camp in single file, in a long line; the main mass stands to one side, while, perhaps, two or three at a time perform. imitating the actions of pulling up the anchor and hoisting the sails. At others the men will stand round in a circle (Figs. 26 and 27), while, one after the other, the dancers come out into the open space and rush round and round, imitating the action of some animal such as a buffalo or crocodile. All the time the audience stands round, each man stamping the ground wildly with his right foot, while, in unison, they strike their buttocks with their open palms. When the performers show signs of flagging other men take their place, and so the dance goes on, until, finally, the audience closes in upon them, and, altogether, they form a dense mass of naked, howling savages, yelling wildly, e! e! ai! ai! with their arms waving in the air. These corrobborees are quite unlike any on the mainland, and are similar to those performed at the grave during the mourning ceremonies of these remarkable people.

One of the most striking features of the aboriginals is way in which they are divided into a large series of

{p. 34}

tribes, each of which speaks a distinct dialect and occupies, or is regarded as doing so, a tract of country the boundaries of which are well known to the natives, The existence of these dialects is one of the most puzzling and difficult things to understand amongst the aboriginals. In the first place, it is not at all easy in many cases to ascertain the native name of the tribe. As likely as not you will get a locality name, not the true tribal name, and when once a mistake has been made in pronunciation, or even in the actual word, and it has been repeated by white men, the aboriginals are so anxious to please, and also in some respects so indifferent, that the wrong pronunciation or even word may actually be adopted by them and pass into circulation. For example, the name Woolner, as it is commonly spelt, is a white man's name for a tribe that calls itself Punuurlu. It may be a native word but it has been mistakenly applied by the whites as a tribal name and has been tacitly accepted by the natives or by a large number of them.

What exactly constitutes an Australian tribe is somewhat difficult to say. It may conveniently be defined somewhat as follows:--A tribe is a group of individuals speaking a common dialect, differing in the nature of its words from that of other groups and regarded as owning a definite tract of country, the boundaries of which are known to them, and recognised by the members of other tribes. Each tribe may usually be divided into section and the real test of whether a native is or is not a member of any particular tribe is whether, under normal conditions, he may wander freely over the country owned by that tribe. He must not trespass on the land of any other tribe, entering upon this only after he has received permission of the owners to do so. In the case ever of

{p. 35}

natives belonging to different sections of a tribe there is a recognition of local ownership within the wider range of tribal ownership. No members of any one local group enter a camp of natives belonging to another local group until they have been formally invited to do so.

When important ceremonies are about to take place messengers are always sent out, often to distant tribes, and the etiquette observed illustrates well one aspect of aboriginal character. Each messenger is provided by some important member or recognised leader of the group that sends him out with an object, the possession of which at once indicates to all whom he meets that he is a messenger. In the southern parts of the Territory this will take the form of a sacred stick called a churinga, or, popularly, a bull-roarer. The bearer of this is absolutely safe anywhere. On approaching a camp he sits down waiting until the local men choose to take notice of him, which may not be until after an hour or two. They all go on meanwhile, quite unconcernedly, as if he did not exist, and then one or two of the older men will go over to him; he will show them his credentials and deliver his message, after which he is brought into camp, made free of the special men's camp and provided with food. This same thing goes on at every camp that he visits and exactly the same etiquette is observed when the visitors arrive at the camp from which the messenger was sent. In the northern parts, as, for example, in the Alligator River district, when boys are to be initiated, they are sent out on a journey to distant camps amongst strange tribes that often lasts for months. Each of them carries a small wand and under the protection of this they travel in perfect safety. When they come to a strange camp they stand close together, leaning on their

{p. 36}

wands and singing a special corrobboree song, which must be replied to by the women in camp.

It is interesting to find that the natives have also, as were, extended this feeling of sacredness of the persons of their own messengers to those of aboriginals who are carrying messages for white men. A letter is always spoken of as a "paper yabber" and is carried in a cleft stick so that it can be, seen easily. Last year a native carried a "paper yabber" for me 90 miles in this way, and they not infrequently traverse longer distances than this, the cleft stick acting as a safe passport. They look upon the "paper yabber" as a mysterious thing that is endowed with the capacity of seeing, as is well instanced by an aboriginal who abstracted a stick of tobacco from a parcel that he was carrying and was highly indignant with the "paper yabber" for telling the white man what he had done, because he had hidden it in a hollow log while committing the theft, so that it should not be able to see what he was doing.

They have very little idea of private property. If you give a man, say, a stick of tobacco there are certain individuals, such as men who might lawfully be his fathers-in-law, to whom he is obliged by custom to give some; and even if they are not on the spot, he will immediately share it with others. Give a man a shirt in return for work that he has done for you and the chances are that you will find a friend of his, who has done nothing except ask for it, wearing it next day. On many of the cattle stations the work is done by a few natives; but every one at hand shares in the proceeds, whether these be clothes, food, or tobacco; and it never occurs to them that the lazy loafer is living at the expense of his more industrious brother.

Still another point of very great importance which

{p. 37}

must always be borne in mind in dealing with the aboriginals, is their intense belief in evil magic In tribes inhabiting the country around the Alligator Rivers, a very favourite form of magic is to get hold of some excrement, it does not matter how small a piece, of a man or woman against whom you may have a grudge, and whom you wish to injure. All you have to do is to get two or three friends to help you perform a rather elaborate ceremony out in some quiet spot, where he cannot see you, and you can easily encompass his death. The belief has one beneficial result in that the camps of these natives are much better from a sanitary point of view than in most Australian tribes, because everything is carefully buried, lest some enemy should be lurking about.

The natives have no idea of disease or pain of any kind as being due to anything but evil magic, except that which is caused by an actual accident that they can see. If a man has a headache, it is evil magic that has got inside him and he will wear. in some tribes, his wife's head rings, so that the magic may pass into them, and be thrown away with them into the bush. If he has a pain in the back he will wear a curious short wand, made of paper bark, which he fixes in his waist girdle in the small of his back. The evil magic goes into this and can be thrown away.

Anything that they do not understand they associate with evil magic. One of the most striking and characteristic examples of this that I know of is the fact that when first they came across the track of a cart they thought it was a path along which evil magic was passing, and if they were obliged to cross it they jumped over it as high in the air as they could lest the magic should enter them.

Natives, also, are always most frightened of the magic of

{p. 38}

another tribe or distant part and will often fix upon some man who lives 50 or 100 miles away as guilty of causing the death by evil magic of a member of their own group.

The result of all this is that there is always a feeling of mutual suspicion and distrust between members of different tribes, each of which has its own peculiar forms of magic by means of which it may encompass the death of strangers. Often in our little camp, associated with the departmental office in Darwin, we had natives of various tribes together for a few days at a time, and it was very noticeable, not only how they kept apart from one another, but the mutual distrust with which they viewed each other. You have only to tell a native that he is the victim of evil magic and he succumbs at once and can only be cured by the exercise of counter magic, The feeling is so strong that on more than one occasion when a woman, strong in magic power, had given it out that she was using magic against some individual, it very seriously interfered with the treatment of that native under medical supervision in a hospital and, if this be so amongst natives who have been for long in contact with white men, it can easily be realised what an enormous part magic plays in the life of the primitive savage.

Even an aboriginal who has lived long with the whites and has lost most of his old beliefs, will still firmly retain his faith in evil magic, though he might be ashamed to own it in public.

The aboriginal is, indeed, a very curious mixture; mentally, about the level of a child who has little control over his feelings and is liable to give way to violent fits of temper, during which he may very likely behave with great cruelty. As a general rule he is very fond of and very good to his children. If the parents of a child die it is immediately taken charge of by a blood or tribal

{p. 39}

father and mother. The only exception that I have ever known to this was one case in Melville Island where we met with a little boy whose parents were dead and who had been left behind in camp when the natives moved on. (Fig. 23). We came across the poor little fellow sitting disconsolately on the top of a bark mia mia. He has no sense of responsibility and, except in rare cases, no initiative. His memory in many cases is wonderful so far as subjects are concerned that affect his life and mode of conduct. When once he has seen any place, or any particular natural object, he knows it for all time. If once he has heard a corrobboree he knows the words and music, and his memory in respect to native traditions is marvellous. It must be understood, however, that in proportion to the narrow sphere of their actions, there is as great a mental difference amongst aboriginals as amongst whites in their wider sphere. This is well recognised amongst the natives themselves. For instance, there is one man on the Alligator River whose management of the wooden trumpet used during their ceremonies is wonderfully superior to that of any one else and whose fame as a musician has spread even beyond the limits of his own tribe. Whenever he is in camp he is always requested to play. So, again, in the making of all their various weapons and utensils, there are always certain individuals who are noted for their ability--some in making shields, others in making knives. There was one man belonging to the Kakadu tribe, on the Alligator River, who was extraordinarily able in regard to remembering traditions, and was recognised as a great authority On the subject of the past history of the tribe. He was relating to us a tradition of the tribe, according to which in old ancestor sent out different individuals to populate various parts of the country. There were five groups of

{p. 40}

these individuals and he was able to tell us the names, so far as we could judge, of all of them. They included those of one hundred and twenty men and women, and not only did he know their names, but also the totemic group to which each belonged and their intermarriages. It was really a wonderful feat of memory and the information was evidently correct, because it fitted in with traditions that we were told by other natives and we tested him later and found him consistent. The possessor of any particular capacity does not, except in very rare cases, secure any very direct personal gain from its exercise beyond the fact that he has a reputation for ability. Everything is communistic and even if a man is provided with an extra supply of food, or, in recent years, tobacco, in return for something he has made or done, it is usually not long before it is divided amongst his friends. There is, amongst the aborigines, an equal distribution of profits quite irrespective of deserts.

Lastly, there is one feature that must not be omitted, and that is the aboriginal's fondness for fun and his sense of humour. Under normal conditions they are always cheerful and are constantly either corrobboreeing, or playing and laughing with one another. Nothing amuses them more than an accident that puts one of their number in an undignified or uncomfortable position. If a friend tumbles over a log and gives himself a good knock, they roar with laughter at him and the chances are that he joins in. If any one comes up who did not see it happen, he will be requested to do it again for the benefit of the new arrival and, as likely as not, will repeat the performance. Years after the event happened, the recital of how two of the old men of the Kakadu tribe had to run for their lives and just managed to keep ahead of two charging buffaloes and an imitation of how

{p. 41}

they ran, what they said, and what they looked like, were greeted with roars of laughter and kept a camp cheerful for an hour or two. They are wonderful at mimicking, anything that they think is funny and the acting of two natives, one of whom tried to show me how a former Government Resident of the Territory had behaved when he suddenly trod on a snake, and the other who, after posing a few natives for the purpose, imitated by means of three sticks for a tripod and a sheet of paper bark for a focussing cloth, the actions of a very excitable photographer whom he had watched, was wonderfully realistic.

There are said to be 20,000 aboriginals in the Territory, but on what authority this statement is made I do not know, as it is quite impossible to form any definite and reliable estimate, and the above number is a mere guess. There are great areas, as in Arafura Land, where practically no white man has been--at all events there is no settlement--and here there is an abundance of native food and the tribes wander unhampered in their native state. Judging by what I have seen and heard, I think it probable that a census would show more nearly 20,000 than 20,000. One thing is certain and that is that in all parts where they are in contact with outsiders, especially with Asiatics, they are dying out with great rapidity.

The more primitive a race is, the more rapidly does it lose, or modify, its old customs and beliefs, when it comes in contact with a higher civilisation, and there are very few parts of Australia now left in which it is possible to study the aboriginal in his natural state.

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