AUSTRALIAN BLACKS--THROWING THE BOOMERANG.
"Those giant gums are not easy to climb," Ned remarked, as the gentleman
paused.
"Not by any means," was the reply; "at least, not for a white man, but
the black fellow will climb one of them, or any other tree, with very
little trouble."
"Why, how does he do it?"
"He cuts notches in the trunk of the tree where he can place his feet,
and he goes on cutting notch after notch as he ascends, making a broad
spiral around the tree until he reaches the limbs. Sometimes he passes a
piece of rope, made out of twisted bark, around the body of the tree to
steady himself, but he is just as likely to take no rope along, and
trust entirely to keeping his balance with his feet in the notches."
"Those black fellows are very accomplished in their way," remarked one
of the youths.
"They are, indeed," was the reply; "and they do certain things that no
white man can ever do. For example, a black fellow employed on a cattle
estate will ride at full gallop and follow the track of a runaway cow or
steer without making a single mistake. A white man would be obliged to
go at a walk, or a very little better, and quite frequently would find
it necessary to dismount and examine the ground carefully. The black
fellows are fully equal to your American Indians in following a trail;
they can track men almost as well as bloodhounds can. In parts of
Australia we have a police force of blacks, and they perform splendid
service in hunting highwaymen and others who have committed crimes and
fled into the bush for concealment and safety."
Harry asked if the blacks were honest in their dealings with white
people.
"I regret to say that their reputation is not by any means the best in
the world," was the reply. "Like savages everywhere when brought into
contact with civilization, they seem to adopt its vices and reject its
virtues. They are generally faithful to those by whom they are employed,
and in this respect their characters are commendable. When it comes to
ordinary lying and stealing, they are very skillful. They resemble other
savages in their fondness for intoxicating drinks, and when they get a
little money their desire to go on a spree is very apt to be
uncontrollable. They will leave their work and go to the nearest place
where intoxicants can be bought, and they keep on buying and drinking
until their money is gone. Generally speaking, you cannot keep them in
your employ very long. As soon as one learns his business so that he is
really useful, he either quits or behaves in such a manner that he has
to be sent away."
Just as this last remark was made, the train halted at a station, and as
our young friends looked through the window they saw a group of blacks.
They had seen a few black fellows on the wheat farm that they visited,
and some had come under their observation in the streets of Adelaide.
These, however, were dressed in civilized garments, and the group at the
station was the first they had seen in aboriginal dress.
Harry noted the scantiness of their costume, which consisted chiefly of
a strip of cloth about the waist, and another strip thrown over the
shoulder or disposed of in some fantastic way. Their skins were black,
though not of the inky, coal-like color of the pure-blooded African
negro. Their hair was curly, but did not have a woolly crispness. The
features seemed to be more like those of the Malay than of the Negro
race, and Ned observed that the hair of the women hung down in wavy
plaits, which is not the case with the hair of the negro of the Congo or
the Nile. Every man in the party carried a spear, and Ned wondered why
they were not armed with bows and arrows.
"That is for the very simple reason," said their informant, "that the
Australian aborigines have never used the bow and arrow; their only
weapons are the spear, club, knife, and boomerang. Their principal
weapon for fighting is the waddy or club, and each tribe has a peculiar
shape for its waddies. This weapon is made of hard wood, and is somewhat
suggestive of the night stick of a New York policeman, with the
difference that it has a knob on the end to enable it to be grasped with
greater security. There is a rule in fighting with the waddy, that you
must hit your antagonist on the head. It is not fair to strike him in
any other part of the body with these weapons, and the man who would do
so would not be regarded as a gentleman in aboriginal society. The
difference in the waddies is such that you can very often tell what
tribe a party belongs to by examining one of their clubs.
"They are accustomed to spears from their childhood, and can throw them
very accurately for a distance of thirty or forty yards. I once saw a
considerable number of blacks together, and several white men of us got
up a competition in spear throwing. We chalked out the figure of a man
on the side of a building, and then paced off forty yards from it. We
offered a prize of one shilling to every black who would hit this figure
with the spear three times out of five at the distance indicated. We had
them take turns in succession, and when the competition was over we
found that we were obliged to give a shilling to every one of the
competitors, as all had hit it three times. Half of them did so four
times, and the other half the entire five times."
Ned asked what the spears were made of. He learned, in reply, that
sometimes they were single shafts of wood tipped with stone, bone, or
iron. Others had heads of hard wood, while the shafts consisted of light
reeds which grow on the banks of the rivers and lakes. The spears are
usually from six to ten feet long, at least the fighting spears are.
Some of the tribes living along the rivers have spears fifteen or
eighteen feet long, intended for fishing purposes and not for war.
Harry wanted to know what was the religious belief of the blacks, and
what were their ideas about the creation.
"As to religion," the gentleman answered, "they don't seem to have much,
and the little they do have is of a very mixed character. Like all
savages, they believe in good and bad spirits, and they treat the bad
spirits with much more ceremony than they do the good ones; on the
ground, I presume, that it is necessary to propitiate the bad spirits to
save themselves from injury, while the good ones can be relied upon not
to do any harm. Some of the tribes believe in a Great Spirit or Supreme
Being, while others have no idea of the kind. They have a good many
superstitions, and, though not a people of much imagination, they have
quite a variety of mythical stories that originated a long time ago, and
have been handed down by tradition. It is a curious circumstance that
some of these myths repeat quite closely the story of the creation, the
fall, and the deluge, but where they came from nobody can tell."
"Is there any book where we can find any of these traditions?" Harry
asked.
"Oh, certainly; they have been collected and published, but I can give
you the principal ones from memory."
"The story about the creation is, that one of the spirits that ruled the
world created two men out of the dust of the earth, and gave these two
men a very rich country to live in. Another spirit created two women and
gave one of them to each man. Then he gave spears to each of the men,
and told them to kill kangaroos with their weapons, and gave sticks to
the women, with which to dig roots out of the ground. Thus it came about
that men carry spears and clubs as weapons, while the women perform most
of the menial work. The men and women were commanded to live together,
and in this way the world in time became full of people. They grew so
numerous in the region where they were, that the great spirits caused
storms to arise and high winds to blow in order to scatter the people
over the globe.
"The tradition about the first sin is, that the first man and woman were
ordered by the spirits not to go near a certain tree, as a bat lived
there which must not be disturbed. One of the women went too near the
tree, her curiosity having got the better of her, and the bat became
alarmed and flew away. After that death came into the world, having
before been unknown.
"They have another tradition that at one time all the water in the earth
was contained in the body of an immense frog, where nobody could reach
it. The spirits held an investigation, and ascertained that if the frog
could be made to laugh the water would run out of his mouth when he
opened it, and the drought then prevailing would be broken. All the
animals of the world gathered together and danced and capered before the
frog in order to make him laugh, but all to no purpose. Then they called
up the fishes to see if they could accomplish anything, but the frog
preserved a solemn face until the eel began to wriggle.
"The wriggling of the eel was too much for the frog and he laughed
outright. Immediately the waters flowed from his mouth and the earth was
covered with water. Many people were drowned, and all who could do so
sought the highest land. The pelican undertook to save the black people;
he made a great canoe and went around picking up the people, wherever he
could find them, and thus saved a great many.
"They have a theory about the sun," the gentleman continued, "that is
certainly a very practical one. They say that as it gives out a great
deal of light during the daytime, it needs a supply of fuel, and it goes
at night to a place where it takes in fuel enough for its next day's
work. They say that it used to take in wood exclusively before white
people came to Australia, but since the arrival of the whites, and the
opening of coal mines, they think the sun takes in both coal and wood at
the place where it renews its supply.
"They believe in dragons, great serpents, and other wonders, and if you
are inclined to laugh at them for their beliefs, you must remember that
all the rest of the world shared in them two or three hundred years ago.
The creature in which they have the greatest faith is the bun-yip, which
is supposed to haunt rivers, lakes, and other bodies of water, and
possesses remarkable powers. According to their description, he is like
a dragon; he devours black and white people indiscriminately, and can
cause all sorts of misfortune. Many natives, and also quite a number of
white men, claim to have seen him, and they certainly give some very
graphic accounts of his appearance and actions. Not long ago an account
appeared in one of the Australian newspapers, written by a white man and
certified to by another white man, who claim to have actually seen the
bun-yip in a small lake, and described him very minutely."
"And was the story really true?" Harry asked.
"Well, yes, I suppose it was. That is to say, I believe, as do many
others, that there is an amphibious animal living in some of the
Australian lakes and rivers of which no specimen has yet been taken. The
description of the bun-yip by those who claim to have seen him, and are
not carried away by their imaginations, is very much like that of a
Newfoundland dog or a seal. The seal exists in Australian waters, and I
think that is what the bun-yip will turn out to be if one ever allows
himself to be taken."
At the station at the end of the line of railway there was an encampment
of blacks, about half a mile away, and our young friends were quite
curious to see it.
Their curiosity was soon satisfied, as there was nothing particularly
attractive about the spot. The blacks were civilized enough to live in
tents, or, rather, they accepted the bounty of the government which
supplied them with tents, though it was evident that they did not intend
to give up their old way of living, inasmuch as they had two or three
bark shelters of the old-fashioned sort, in addition to the canvas house
supplied by the government. And we may remark here that the various
colonial governments provide for the support of all the aboriginals
living within their territory. Government officials take care of them,
supply them with food, clothing, and medical comforts, and assign
reservations of land to them, just as the Indian Department of the
United States assigns reservations to the red men. But with all the care
they receive, their number is steadily diminishing, and the day is not
far distant when the last of them will cease to exist.
A man who could speak the language of the aboriginals accompanied our
young friends in their visit to the encampment. At Harry's request, he
arranged with the men to give an exhibition of their skill in throwing
the spear, and after that was over he asked them to throw the boomerang.
While they were getting ready for their performance the interpreter
explained that the boomerang was a great deal of a mystery. He said that
no white man, even after years of practise, had ever been able to throw
this weapon with any degree of accuracy, and that no Australian black
could explain how the weapon was handled. If you ask one of them to
explain about throwing the boomerang, he usually says, "You throw him,
that all"; and that seems to be all there is to it.
Ned and Harry watched the performance with the greatest care, and they
afterwards said that they knew as much about it before they witnessed it
as they did afterwards, with the exception that they had seen with their
own eyes what could be done.
"First, you must understand," said Ned afterwards, "that there are
several kinds of boomerangs, the difference being in size, weight, and
shape. The variations in shape are so slight that they are not readily
perceived by the stranger, though a black would have no difficulty in
determining them. The lightest of the boomerangs weigh from four to five
ounces, while the heaviest are double that weight. Harry happened to
have his spring letter-balance in his pocket, and we weighed one of the
boomerangs that we saw used. Its weight was about six ounces and our
interpreter said that he considered it rather a light one."
"The heaviest boomerangs are used for fighting purposes and for killing
kangaroos, emus, and other large game.
"The boomerang is a queerly shaped weapon. It is made of hard wood and
curved like a bow, the curve from point to point being about a quarter
of a circle. The piece of wood that forms the boomerang is about half an
inch thick, and in the middle it is two and one half inches wide,
narrowing steadily towards the end. I took it in my hand and made a
motion as if to throw it, whereupon the owner laughed, and indicated by
signs that I had seized it by the wrong end.
"When he made ready to throw the weapon, the interpreter told us to
stand perfectly still, lest we might be injured. I asked how it could
happen, and he said that the performer always selected the spot to which
the boomerang returned, and by changing our positions, especially after
the weapon had been thrown, we might be struck by it when it came back.
"Both before and after taking his position the performer carefully
observed the force and direction of the wind, as it has a great deal to
do with the flight of the boomerang. When he was quite ready he flung
the weapon almost straight into the air, where it circled about a few
times, and skimmed along near the ground until it was about three
hundred feet distant; then it turned, made a slight upward motion
through the air, and finally fell within an arm's length of where the
performer stood. The interpreter explained that this weapon was called
the return-boomerang.
"The man repeated several times the performance with the weapon,
bringing it close to his feet on every occasion. Then a coin was placed
in the end of a split stick forty or fifty yards distant, at the
suggestion of the performer, who stipulated that he would knock the coin
out without disturbing the stick, on condition that he should have the
coin, a one-shilling piece, in case he succeeded.
"He balanced the boomerang with great care and then threw it. It made
several gyrations in the air, and when it reached its destination it
knocked the coin from its place as neatly as one could have removed it
with his fingers. All who stood by applauded the performer, and he was
given the opportunity to win several more shillings in the same way.
"I ought to mention that each time when he threw the boomerang he varied
his manner of throwing it. Sometimes he sent the weapon straight into
the air; next he skimmed it along the ground, and next he launched at an
angle of from forty to sixty degrees. Every time he threw it, it came
back to his feet, but when he threw it at the coins in the stick it did
not return.
"The interpreter explained to us that the return-boomerang was more of a
toy than a weapon, as the regular boomerang cannot return when it has
hit something in its course. Wonderful stories have been told of the use
of this weapon in war,--how the black fellow will launch it two or three
hundred yards, and have it kill one or more of his enemies, and then
come back to his feet. A moment's thought will convince any one that the
two things together are impossible. In order to return to the place
whence it started, the boomerang must not encounter or even touch
anything in its way. When it is used for killing men, or wild animals,
it does not come back to the ground of its thrower.
"From all accounts that I am able to obtain, the boomerang as a weapon
in the hands of a good thrower is very dangerous. It can be made to hit
a man concealed behind a tree, rock, or house, where a gun or a spear
could not possibly reach him. As a hunting weapon it is of great
utility, and many a kangaroo has fallen before it. The skillful thrower,
within reaching distance of a kangaroo or an emu, is as sure of his prey
as a white man would be with a Winchester rifle."
Ned and Harry tried to learn from the performer when and by whom the
boomerang was invented, and all they could get from him was, "Long time
ago; who knows?" He threw a little light upon the subject by picking up
a leaf of the gum tree, holding it at arm's length, and then letting it
fall to the ground. It gyrated and changed its course as it descended.
Then he picked it up and threw it straight from him, when it gyrated
again and returned towards him. It is probable that the idea of the
boomerang may have been taken from the motions of a falling leaf, and
especially a leaf of the gum tree. As the weapon is known through all
the tribes of Australian blacks, it is not likely to have been a recent
invention.
"I have read somewhere," said Harry, "that a weapon similar to the
boomerang was known to the ancient Egyptians, and that there is also
something of the same sort in use among a tribe of Indians in Arizona.
If it is true that the Egyptians of old times had this weapon, we may
well repeat the oft-quoted saying, 'There is nothing new under the sun,'
but it seems, at any rate, that the Australian boomerang is greatly
superior to the Arizona one, as it can be projected very much further
and with far more deadly effect."
The performer with the boomerang was evidently very well satisfied with
his morning's work, and he was certainly very liberally paid for his
performances. He invited our friends to take dinner with him, at least,
so the interpreter said, though the youths were suspicious that the
invitation was all a joke. Anyhow, they did not accept it, as they
thought that the meal, with the surroundings which were visible, would
have no temptation either for the eye or the appetite.
Harry heard the following story, which he duly entered in his
notebook:--
"Once a lawyer undertook the defense of a black fellow who had been
arrested for stealing a gold watch. The evidence was wholly
circumstantial, as the stolen property had not been found, and the
lawyer handled the case so well that the alleged thief was acquitted. A
few hours after the trial, the lawyer was seated on the verandah of the
principal hotel in the place, engaged in conversation with the
magistrate before whom the case was tried, when along came the black
fellow.
"'Can I wear the watch now?' said the black, at the same time drawing it
forth from an inner pocket.
"The magistrate burst into a loud and hearty laugh. The lawyer laughed,
too, but his laughter had a very hollow sound, and then he shouted an
emphatic 'No!' to the confiding aboriginal."
Quite a little town had sprung up at the terminus of the railway, and
Dr. Whitney said it reminded him of the towns along the Pacific
railways of the United States during the course of their construction.
The comparison, he said, was favorable to the Australian town, as the
inhabitants seemed far more orderly than did those of the transitory
American settlements. During the time of their stay there was not a
single fight, and the coroner was not called upon to perform his usual
official duties.
The terminus of the railway was in a valley which was dignified with the
name of a creek, but no creek was visible. Water was supplied by an
artesian well, driven to a depth of eight hundred feet. The water was
slightly brackish but quite drinkable, and when it was made into tea or
coffee the brackish flavor disappeared.
Our friends returned to Adelaide by the way they had gone from it, and
after a day or two more in the capital of South Australia, they took the
train for Melbourne. Ned made note of the fact that had been mentioned
to him, that of all the money raised by taxation in South Australia, one
fifth of it is used for educational purposes. He further added that the
same was the case in all the colonies, and he thought it greatly to
their credit. Harry said he did not believe there was a State or city in
the whole American Union where such a large proportion of the public
money was spent for educational matters.
The youths learned, in addition, that the schools throughout the
colonies are, generally speaking, of excellent quality and the
opportunities for higher education in academies, colleges, universities,
medical and scientific institutions, and similar seats of learning, are
of the best class. Ned made the following summary from the Education
Act of South Australia:--
"Schools will be established where there is a certain number of children
of school age, who will pay a moderate fee to the teachers; four pence
for children under seven, and six pence for older children, per child,
per week. In addition to the fees, the teachers will be paid by the
government from seventy-five pounds to two hundred pounds per annum.
Schoolhouses will be provided, and all the necessary educational
material. Four and one half hours constitute the school day. All
children of school age are required to be under instruction until a
certain standard is reached."
Provision is made for the free instruction of children whose parents can
show that they are unable to pay for it, but fees can be enforced in all
cases where inability to pay them has not been proved. Large grants have
been made by the legislature for school buildings, teachers' salaries,
etc., in order to efficiently aid in the development of a thorough and
comprehensive system of education for the young.
South Australia has a goodly number of schools for higher education, and
it also has a university which is well attended. The majority of those
who can afford it send their children to private schools rather than to
the government ones, believing, and no doubt correctly, that the
educational facilities are greater in the private institutions than in
the public ones.