feel myself to conclude the dull detail of the last chapter. If they please they may turn from the subtle intricacies of the law to contemplate the simple undisguised workings of nature in her most artless colouring.
I have already said we had been but very few days at Port Jackson when an alteration in the behaviour of the natives was perceptible; and I wish I could add that a longer residence in their neighbourhood had introduced a greater degree of cordiality and intermixture between the old and new lords of the soil than, at the day on which this publication is dated, subsists.
From their easy reception of us in the beginning, many were induced to call in question the accounts which Mr Cook had given of this people. That celebrated navigator, we were willing to believe, had somehow by his conduct offended them, which prevented the intercourse that would otherwise have taken place. The result, however, of our repeated endeavours to induce them to come among us has been such as to confirm me in an opinion that they either fear or despise us too much to be anxious for a closer connection. And I beg leave at once to apprise the reader that all I can here, or in any future part of this work, relate with fidelity of the natives of New South Wales must be made up of detached observations, taken at different times, and not from a regular series of knowledge of the customs and manners of a people with whom opportunities of communication are so scarce as to have been seldom obtained.
In their persons, they are far from being a stout race of men, though nimble, sprightly, and vigorous. The deficiency of one of the fore teeth of the upper jaw, mentioned by Dampier, we have seen in almost the whole of the men. But their organs of sight, so far from being defective, as that author mentions those of the inhabitants of the western side of the continent to be, are remarkably quick and piercing. Their colour Mr Cook is inclined to think rather a deep chocolate than an absolute black, though he confesses they have the appearance of the latter, which he attributes to the greasy filth their skins are loaded with. Of their want of cleanliness we have had sufficient proofs but, I am of opinion, all the washing in the world would not render them two degrees less black than an African Negro. At some of our first interviews we had several droll instances of their mistaking the Africans we brought with us for their own countrymen.
Notwithstanding the disregard they have invariably shown for all the finery we could deck them with, they are fond of adorning themselves with scars, which increase their natural hideousness. It is hardly possible to see anything in human shape more ugly than one of these savages thus scarified, and farther ornamented with a fish bone struck through the gristle of the nose. The custom of daubing themselves with white earth is also frequent among both sexes, but unlike the inhabitants of the islands in the Pacific Ocean they reject the beautiful feathers which the birds of their country afford.
Exclusive of their weapons of offence and a few stone hatchets very rudely fashioned, their ingenuity is confined to manufacturing small nets in which they put the fish they catch, and to fish-hooks made of bone, neither of which are unskilfully executed. On many of the rocks are also to be found delineations of the figures of men and birds, very poorly cut.
Of the use or benefit of clothing these people appear to have no comprehension, though their sufferings from the climate they live in strongly point out the necessity of a covering from the rigour of the seasons. Both sexes, and those of all ages, are invariably found naked. But it must not be inferred from this that custom so inures them to the changes of the elements as to make them bear with indifference the extremes of heat and cold, for we have had visible and repeated proofs that the latter affects them severely, when they are seen shivering and huddling themselves up
I have already said we had been but very few days at Port Jackson when an alteration in the behaviour of the natives was perceptible; and I wish I could add that a longer residence in their neighbourhood had introduced a greater degree of cordiality and intermixture between the old and new lords of the soil than, at the day on which this publication is dated, subsists.
From their easy reception of us in the beginning, many were induced to call in question the accounts which Mr Cook had given of this people. That celebrated navigator, we were willing to believe, had somehow by his conduct offended them, which prevented the intercourse that would otherwise have taken place. The result, however, of our repeated endeavours to induce them to come among us has been such as to confirm me in an opinion that they either fear or despise us too much to be anxious for a closer connection. And I beg leave at once to apprise the reader that all I can here, or in any future part of this work, relate with fidelity of the natives of New South Wales must be made up of detached observations, taken at different times, and not from a regular series of knowledge of the customs and manners of a people with whom opportunities of communication are so scarce as to have been seldom obtained.
In their persons, they are far from being a stout race of men, though nimble, sprightly, and vigorous. The deficiency of one of the fore teeth of the upper jaw, mentioned by Dampier, we have seen in almost the whole of the men. But their organs of sight, so far from being defective, as that author mentions those of the inhabitants of the western side of the continent to be, are remarkably quick and piercing. Their colour Mr Cook is inclined to think rather a deep chocolate than an absolute black, though he confesses they have the appearance of the latter, which he attributes to the greasy filth their skins are loaded with. Of their want of cleanliness we have had sufficient proofs but, I am of opinion, all the washing in the world would not render them two degrees less black than an African Negro. At some of our first interviews we had several droll instances of their mistaking the Africans we brought with us for their own countrymen.
Notwithstanding the disregard they have invariably shown for all the finery we could deck them with, they are fond of adorning themselves with scars, which increase their natural hideousness. It is hardly possible to see anything in human shape more ugly than one of these savages thus scarified, and farther ornamented with a fish bone struck through the gristle of the nose. The custom of daubing themselves with white earth is also frequent among both sexes, but unlike the inhabitants of the islands in the Pacific Ocean they reject the beautiful feathers which the birds of their country afford.
Exclusive of their weapons of offence and a few stone hatchets very rudely fashioned, their ingenuity is confined to manufacturing small nets in which they put the fish they catch, and to fish-hooks made of bone, neither of which are unskilfully executed. On many of the rocks are also to be found delineations of the figures of men and birds, very poorly cut.
Of the use or benefit of clothing these people appear to have no comprehension, though their sufferings from the climate they live in strongly point out the necessity of a covering from the rigour of the seasons. Both sexes, and those of all ages, are invariably found naked. But it must not be inferred from this that custom so inures them to the changes of the elements as to make them bear with indifference the extremes of heat and cold, for we have had visible and repeated proofs that the latter affects them severely, when they are seen shivering and huddling themselves up
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