SECTION I.. [1643.] At the Era of Discovery by Tasman, Van Diemen's Land Was

One year before, Captain Marian, a Frenchman, according to the authors of his country, visited this island. The intercourse was hostile and left traces of blood; and to this may be attributed the absence of the natives when Furneaux appeared on the coast.

A dead calm retarded the departure of the vessels next day, and the parties sent ashore, were accompanied by Cook. About twenty natives soon joined them: one, who was conspicuously deformed, amused them by the drollery of his gestures, and the seeming humour of his speeches. Some, wore three or four folds round the neck, made of fur; and round the ancles a slip of the skin of kangaroo. Captain Cook returned to the vessel, leaving Lieutenant King in charge: soon after, the women and children arrived: they were introduced by the men to the English. The children were thought pretty; of the beauty of the women the account was not equally favorable. They rejected with disdain the presents and freedoms of the officers, and were ordered by an elderly man to retire--a command, to which they submitted with reluctance.

Dr. Anderson, the surgeon of the Resolution, describes the natives as a mild, cheerful race, with an appearance less wild than is common to savages. He considered them devoid of activity, genius, and intelligence; their countenance, he delineates as plump and pleasing.

Labillardiere having landed, with several companions, proceeded towards a lake; hearing human voices, they followed the direction of the sound; the sudden cry of the natives induced them to return for their arms. Then proceeding towards the woods, they met the tribe--the men and boys in a semicircle, with the women and children behind. Labillardiere offered a piece of biscuit, and held out his hand, which a savage chief accepted, and smiling drew back one foot, and bowed with admirable grace. He gave to the French a necklace, which he called cantaride, formed of wilk shells, in exchange for articles of dress, a poll-axe, and knives.

The proportions are worth remarking: in a party of forty, there were eight men and seven women; of forty-eight, there were ten men and fourteen women. Thus the females were most numerous, and the rising generation nearly one-third more than the adults. They were generally healthy; one only suffered from cutaneous disease, one from a defect of vision, and several from slight wounds. It will be told, that a sad reverse was afterwards their fate. The French, supposing they subsisted on fish, expected to find leprosy, and concluded, not that other food was procured, but that the doctors were mistaken. The women and girls were the fishers: they plunged amidst sea weed, and raised the shell fish from rocks by the spatula. They killed the cray fish before landing. They could endure the water twice as long as Europeans. In the intervals of diving they roasted their spoil, and warmed themselves between two fires; sometimes feeding their children, or themselves. Thus they continued alternately fishing and cooking, until all were satisfied.

The men seemed indolent; nothing could persuade them to dive: they sauntered about, with the right hand passed behind, and holding the left fore-arm in its grasp. As the elders moved with gravity on the beach, the girls romped and raced with the seamen--repelling, without resenting, their rudeness. They were sprightly and voluble, and chatted on without intermission. On one occasion they were missed, when, turning to a tree, they were seen perched naked in the branches, about nine feet from the ground: an interesting group, remarks the naturalist.

In the incidents of their social life, he saw their character. The children cried! their mothers soothed them with those maternal caresses, which art has not improved. They held them to be decorated by the French, and placed them in their arms. A father corrected a little boy for the ancient diversion of throwing stones at another, and the culprit wept! A lad concealed a basket from a seaman, to amuse by his perplexity and its dexterous replacement! The clothes given by the French they hung on the bushes, but they valued the tin ware, the axes and saws. The liberality of their visitors induced them to take more than was given; but they seemed unconscious of offence, and whatever was required they restored without reluctance. A girl, refusing the French a skin they desired to possess, retreated to the woods: her friends were distressed at her ill-nature. She, at last, complied. A pair of trousers were given in exchange; she stood between two Frenchmen, leaning on the shoulder of each, while they guided her errant legs into these novelties of Europe.

Their refusal of food, for themselves and children, was from distaste rather than distrust; and they only discovered suspicion, when the French penetrated the country. They posted a guard, to give notice of any movement, and when an attempt was made, it was interrupted by the loud screams of the women, and the entreaties of the men. They resisted the intrusion with displeasure, and even menace.

On other occasions, they tended on the French with great kindness, removing fallen branches from their path; and when the ground was sloping and slippery, they walked beside them, and held them up. They rested every half mile, saying medi, "sit down;" then rising again, after a few minutes' rest.

They themselves first saw the French: who, having travelled several miles, lay down for the night near a brook: their fires betrayed them. A native, next morning, pointed to their resting place: laid his head on his hand, and closed his eyes. The good-nature of these people never languished: twice, when the French lost their way, they directed them to their ships. They welcomed their visits by raising their hands over their heads, shouting and stamping on the ground. They greeted them as often as their wanderings brought them in sight of the vessels, and with the same friendly sounds bade them adieu.

Mr. Bass made several expeditions into the country, attended only by his dogs, and meeting no inhabitants he concluded that their numbers were inconsiderable.

The accounts descriptive of native customs, by these authorities, are full of errors; but they are the errors of inference, not of observation: it is useless to repeat, in order to correct them. The colonists have possessed better opportunities, and their acquaintance with aboriginal habits supplies more accurate information, than could be expected in the volumes of navigators.

Such as we have given, is their testimony to the social aspect of the native character: nothing unfavorable is omitted. In a people so gentle and affable, it is difficult to recognise the race afterwards covered with sores, wasted by want and vice, or animated with revenge; and who filled the colony with disgust and terror.

FOOTNOTES:

But the moment he landed, he resumed all the customs of his countrymen, and employed his knowledge of arms to destroy them. This was the only trace of his civilisation which survived the voyage: he had seen regal grandeur and mercantile power, but he retained his preference for the habits of his then heathen race.]