B 505: Lecture on the Aborigines of Australia and papers on Wirradhurrei dialect, 1837-1840

to it to join the rest. [Inserted above: They rule by no distinct or precise laws but by custom & precedents.] Kings or chiefs who rule the rest they have not, [Inserted above:Europeans have erroneously attributed such titles to them] they have [indecipherable] a proper term to signify a chieftain or ruler. though some famous warrior or a man of much shrewdness & ability, [Inserted above: especially one of their doctors] may often obtain a preponderating influence and may be called Ginnemai, in a battle or a leader, but his influence will be chiefly excercised on the young men. In fact the young men are under great subjection to the elderly ones. This is one of the chief hindrances to civilize or christianize them. The old men are obstinately adhering to their own habits & customs & use various means to deter the young men from abandoning their old ways whilst the women old & young are in slavish subjection to the will of the old men as I shall on a future occasion if desired more fully explain. I have yet materials of some of the most interesting customs & proceedings amongst the Aborigines such as the condition of the women, certain customs as to marriage their fictious relationship, certain war-scenes & combats that take place amongst them, the curious ceremony of making young men their funeral ceremonies their corroborrees and above all the peculiarities of their language with their various dialects, should the audience and the committee wish me to take up the subject again in another [word crossed out] lecture, I shall if spared be prepared

Second Part of a Lecture on the Australian Aboriginees

Mr Chairman, Ladies & Gentlemen,

In resuming my lecture on the Aboriginees of this Country, I deem it desirable to recapitulate the outlines of my former lecture with the view of giving those who may not have been present on that occasion an idea of the various subjects that [inserted above: have been referred to] may be of interest in reference to these wild sons of the forest whom we are accustomed to look upon as so inferior and degraded a race as scarecely belonging to the human species who yet may afford proof that they have more similarity than dissimilarity to other human races. In the first place I endeavour to show their possible or probable origin from some parts of Asia and how they might have come to this country by the

various chains of islands almos connecting [word crossed out] Australia with parts of Asia. I have further tried to account for the fact of there being such a mixed race being a resemblance both to Asiatics & Africans. I then described their characteristic features & complexion, and accounted as far as I could for certain inferiorities in their bodily appearances partly by their rude mode of living and the irregularity of their means of subsistence sometimes seeming to excess in eating sometimes obliged to fast an unusual length of time. Yet in most faculties I stated they are scarcely inferior to the generality of human tribes. I also related some of their ideas as to a supernatural order of being believing in evil spirits whom they call Wandong & how certain so called doctors among them or sorcerors profess to have these evil spirits at their command for evil & for good and perform certain supposed

wonderful cures, by various means and maneuvers. I then stated that I had fully ascertained another faith viz: that they believe in a superior being called Baiamai to whom they in their simple way attribute the idea of an eternal existence of goodness and of great, if not omnipotent person, with whom they also suppose some superior beings to reside, he being supposed to reside towards the rising of the sun. I have further intimated that the notion of a future state is not quite foreign to them whatever [written above: errors] absurdities they may mix up with the same. These ideas existing among them are to my mind at least as I intimated a confirmation of the argument used in natural theologyfor the existence of the Deity that every nation & tribe however ignorant & degraded had some impression left of a Supreme Being. I [word crossed out]then made various statements as to their general character some of their

natural propensities, their indolence, want of fo thought, their various kinds of foods, their few acquirements as to netting spearing sewing [word crossed out] [word crossed out] their better art of making weapons and other implements their fishing hunting [word crossed out] ornaments & c I [word crossed out] concluded by describing their form of government, the elderly men and more or less all who had attained to the full age of manhood ruling the rest not by any fixed laws but by traditional custom, no one being properly speaking a chief among them by right, though some by superior attributes or exploits in war might obtain a preponderating influence. And here I would add in continuance of my subject that this peculiar form of government admitting of no distinction in rank, but allowingeach man a share in their circustances & decisions as to any questions arising among them stamps a feeling of