REMINISCENCES OF THE AUSTRALIAN BLACKS.

Otago Witness, Issue 2375, 7 September 1899, Page 50

REMINISCENCES OF THE AUSTRALIAN BLACKS.

By Richard HBNRf. 111. I had always had the idea that there were no cocoanut trees in Australia, though the country runs through the latitudes of the islands where they flourish, and when the seeds can drift for great distances in the sea, ft seemed to me curiouafif the Fates stocked all the surrounding islands and refused to stock the biggest of them all. As the'natives were such flesh-eaters, I wonder what they fed their babiee on -to start with? Perhaps, however,, they were so differently constituted that they could have done well on underdone .possum like th^ir parents." ' '. ' ' I remember my father asking a lubra what became of her . baby, and she said, " Hint too much growl'm (which implied being sickly) " and I drown him in a bucket of water." The kind white mother's advice to the black one about the baby's food may have made it sickly, so that the tragedy should be credited as much to the white woman's ignorance as to the black woman's want of love, for it could hardly be called want of sense under such circumstances. I am curious to know if this new book on. the natives of Central Australia will deal with this subject, because it is strictly within the province of the scientist, and Qt more importance to him than all the ceremonies that book contains ; and it would be much, more easily observed and noted than those ceremonies that are claimed to be so mysterious. It would not be such an exciting subject for the book, and the authors would have had to »tay nearer and longer with the natives than the tastes of a professor, at least, would be likely to enjoy. Anyone who wishes to know the natives intimately must stay with them until their " visiting " manners are worn off, or go out hunting and camping and feasting and starving with them. That is why we know so little about them, and why errorß are so common and popular. When we know how easily they dispose of children, it follows that males were in. excess, and that every female had many suitors, and was highly valued when won. This i 3 self-evident, and requires no proof. Therefore, it can be seen that the lucky husband had to treat his mate kindly, or she would have inaugurated a simple divorce by taking up her rugs and disappearing iri the bush. If he claimed her by force, it can be as easily seen that he had to reckon not only with the man from whom she claimed protection, but also with every other man to whom she told her story; and thus, in a rude way, she often received more justice and consideration than many of the wives of civilisation. I knew one such divorce to happen in my small circle of acquaintances, and heard her mate lamenting with a long-drawn-out, pitiful cry in tho bush, something between a cooee and the howl of a dingo. I am not pretending to tell a story about their laws and customs, but merely drawing attention to what everyone can think out for himself when he knows the outlines of their conditions of life. There is a dear old error, which is very popular, about the young man spying out his intended bride as he would a kangaroo, and knocking her on the head to make her quiet while he carried her away. This implies that the young woman had no other suitors or friends to resist her treatment, and that the young man had no one who cared for him or his worth as a hunter, or would be likely to stay with him of her own free will, for there was nothing else to keep her. As for fear, I think it was oftenest on the man's side that she would go and leave him, because I sometimes heard her roundly scolding him, and saw him looking very humble under such circumstances, and I have seen him looking very proud of his feats of hunting or climbing when she condescended to give him a little praise. From such slender scraps I inferred that there was no woman m tho world that had a freer hand than the young Australian, and none less likely to De wooed with a knock on the head from a waddy; yet the yarn goes down, even witn. intelligent people. . In fact, if you don't know this sort of thing you are supposed to know nothing about tha Australians or their "laws and customs. Ip YOU W/OUIiD SH HRPPV. Be eofelal wfaat you eat and dPink. WoUtfjs Sefanapps i* tb« only spifit ifi*»*ii« xuotfld that i« entirely iff tß»tn lusel oil. A