PICCANINNIES
People in wild Australia very seldom talk about babies. They call them
by a much longer name, and one not nearly so easy to spell,
piccaninnies. But whatever name we call them by--babies or
piccaninnies--the little black children are perfectly delightful, as all
children are.
I shall never forget the first little Australian piccaninny I ever saw.
It was not more than a few hours old, and so fat and jolly, with a
little twinkle in its eye as much as to say, "I know all about you and
you needn't come and look at me." Of course I expected to see a dear
little shiny black baby as black as coal, but very much to my surprise
it wasn't black at all. It was a very beautiful golden-brown, but as the
mother said to me, "him soon come along black piccaninny all right."
Under his eyes and on his arms and on other parts of his body were
little jet black lines, and these gradually widened and spread till in a
few weeks time he was a very deep chocolate colour, for though we call
them "the blacks" the people of wild Australia are not really black but
deep chocolate.
I am very sorry to tell you that many of the little piccaninnies who are
born in Australia, especially if they happen to be girls, are not
allowed to live at all. Perhaps the last little baby is still quite
young and unable to help itself at all and so still needs all it's
mother's care. Or perhaps there hasn't been any rain for many, many
months and the grass has all withered and the water-holes have very
nearly dried up, and there is very, very little food for anyone and the
natives are beginning to think that it is never going to rain any more.
In either of these cases the little baby is almost certain to be killed
almost as soon as it is born, and perhaps, so scarce has food become, it
may even be eaten by its parents and other members of the tribe.
There is another reason why babies are sometimes killed and eaten, and
to us it seems a very horrible one indeed. Perhaps it is fat and healthy
and there is some other and older child in the tribe who is weakly and
thin. The natives will then sometimes kill the healthy baby and feed the
weakly child on tiny portions of its flesh. It seems, as I said just
now, very awful and very horrible, but the idea is this, that the
strength and vigour of the younger child will be imparted to the weaker
one.
It is the father who always decides whether the baby shall live or die.
If it is allowed to live you must not imagine that it will be in any way
neglected or ill-treated. Quite the opposite is true. There is no
country in the world where babies and older children are spoiled quite
so much as they are in wild Australia. They are never corrected or
chastised by either father or mother, and they do just exactly as they
like. Sometimes, perhaps, when father and mother are both away their
maternal grandmother may happen to give them a good smack in the same
way and on the same part as is usual in civilized countries, but this is
certainly the only form of punishment they ever receive. They are
everyone's idol and everyone's playthings, and yet they are never
kissed, because no Australian aboriginal knows how to kiss. If a mother
wants to show her love for her little one she will place her lips to his
and then blow through them, and this is the nearest to kissing she ever
gets. But baby crows with delight whenever mother does this.
Australian mothers never carry their piccaninnies in their arms as
British mothers do, neither of course do they have any fine
perambulators or mail-carts to push them out in. The most usual way of
carrying them when they are quite tiny is in a bag of opossum skin or
plant fibre slung on the mother's back. At night baby will very likely
be put to sleep in a cradle made of a piece of bent bark perhaps sown up
at the ends and covered with an opossum skin or a few green leaves. This
is generally called a pitchi. As soon, however, as baby is able to hold
on it seems to prefer to sit astride its mother's shoulder or hip and
hang on by her hair.
Names are usually given according to the order of birth, but on the
sheep stations the babies usually receive a white child's name.
"Tommies" and "Maries" are of course almost as frequent as they are here
at home, but some babies get very fine names indeed, and some three or
four. In the wild parts, however, it would be considered unlucky to name
a child before it could walk. It is often called simply "child" or
"girl" until then. The name, when it is given, often depends on
something that happened at the time of its birth. A baby was once named
"kangaroo rat" because one of these little animals ran through the
_mia-mia_ (house or home) a few minutes after it was born. Another was
called "fire and water" because at the time of his birth the _mia_ had
caught fire and the fire had been put out with water. There is a similar
custom among the Bedouins to-day, which has been in existence ever since
the days of Jacob. You can see an instance of it in Genesis XXX. 10, 11.
"Zilpah, Leah's maid, bare Jacob a son. And Leah said, A troop cometh:
and she called his name Gad (_i.e._ a troop or company.)" Is it not
strange that we should find this old Hebrew custom still in use in wild
Australia?
But the name which is first given is frequently changed. Most boys and
girls are given a new name altogether as soon as they are regarded as
grown-up, _i.e._ about the age of fourteen. Again, should someone die
who happens to have the same name, the child's will at once be changed,
for the aboriginals, for reasons which will be explained in a later
chapter, never mention the names of their dead. Sometimes, again, as a
sign of very special friendship two black people will exchange names.
There is one very curious custom among the blacks the "why" and
"wherefore" no one has ever been quite able to explain. One of the
things that would strike you most if you could look into the face of an
aboriginal would be the great width of the nose. It sometimes extends
almost across the face. It looks, if I may put it that way, almost as
though it had been put on hot and before it had properly cooled had been
accidentally sat upon. The reason is that when babies are quite tiny
their mothers flatten their noses, but why they do this I cannot say.
Probably a very broad nose is part of their idea of beauty.
It is always pretty to watch children at their play. You will remember
how our Lord Jesus Christ Himself, like all child lovers, would often
stand in the market place and watch the children playing. Sometimes they
played weddings, sometimes funerals, and He once drew a lesson for the
Jews from the conduct of those disagreeable and sulky children who would
not join in. So it is a very pretty sight to see the little children of
wild Australia playing. Like all other children they are very fond of
games and grow very excited over them. Little girls may sometimes be
seen sitting down and playing with little wooden dolls which a kind
uncle or grandfather has made for them, whilst boys and girls alike will
often play "Cat's Cradle" for quite a long time, and very wonderful and
elaborate are the figures some of them contrive. Yet, like most other
children, they like noisier games best. A kind of football is very
popular, and they will often play it for hours at a time. Some one
chosen to begin the game will take a ball of fibre or opossum or
kangaroo skin and kick it into the air. The others all rush to get it
and the one who secures it kicks it again with his instep. They get very
excited over it and their fathers and big brothers sometimes get very
excited too and come and join in, and the shouts and laughter grow until
the very rocks begin to echo back their merriment.
At another time they will play "hide and seek" just as white children
do, or a sort of "I spy." Another time perhaps a mock kangaroo hunt will
engage them. One of them will be kangaroo and the others will hunt him.
For a long time he will elude them, but at last he has to own himself
captured and allow the hunters to dispatch him with their tiny spears.
So, in one way or another, the merry days roll on until childhood's days
are done and the education of the young savage, of which you will learn
in a later chapter, begins to be taken in hand.
Often when the writer has watched the little black children at their
play that beautiful promise in the prophets has come into his mind, "the
streets of the city shall be full of boys and girls playing in the
streets thereof." The prophet was thinking of the New Jerusalem and its
happiness, and a great longing has come into the writer's mind for more
men and women and children, too, to realize their duty to these
forgotten children of the wild, and to take their part in bringing them
into that heavenly city. Perhaps all those who read this little book
will try what they can do.