r their daily sustenance. Still further, the scattered
and diseased remnants [Note 101 at end of para.], of once powerful,
but now decayed tribes are seen interspersed throughout the country,
until at last upon arriving at the more remote regions, where the
blighting and annihilating effects of colonization have not yet
overtaken them, tribes are yet found flourishing in their natural state,
free from that misery and diminution which its presence always brings
upon them.

[Note 100: "In the first year of the settlement of New South Wales, 1788,
Governor Phillip caused the amount of the population of Port Jackson to be
ascertained, by every cove in it being visited by different inspectors at
the same time. The number of natives found in this single harbour was
130, and they had 67 boats. At the same time it was known that many were
in the woods making new canoes. From this and other data, Governor Phillip
estimated the population between Botany Bay and Broken Bay inclusive,
at 1500."--Aboriginal Protection Society's Report, May 1839, p. 13.

In Report of the same Society for July 1839, page 71, Mr. Threlkeld
says--"Of one large tribe in the interior four years ago there were 164
persons--there are now only three individuals alive!!"]

[Note 101: "The whole eastern country, once thickly peopled, may now be
said to be entirely abandoned to the whites, with the exception of some
scattered families in one part, and of a few straggling individuals in
another; and these once so high spirited, so jealous of their independence
and liberty, now treated with contempt and ridicule even by the lowest of
the Europeans; degraded, subdued, confused, awkward, and distrustful, ill
concealing emotions of anger, scorn, and revenge--emaciated and covered
with filthy rags;--these native lords of the soil, more like spectres of
the past than living men, are dragging on a melancholy existence to a yet
more melancholy doom."--STRZELECHI'S N. S. WALES, p.350.]

It is here that the native should be seen to be appreciated, in his
native wilds, where he alone is lord of all around him. To those who have
thus come into communication with the Aborigines, and have witnessed the
fearless courage and proud demeanour which a life of independence and
freedom always inspires, it cannot but be a matter of deep regret to see
them gradually dwindling away and disappearing before the presence of
Europeans. As the ravages of a flood destroy the country throug