sealers, but are now at the settlement (Flinders), we cannot regard the situation of the aboriginal females amongst that class of men as differing materially from slavery, unless the circumstance of one man having only one woman and living with her in a state of concubinage, and holding himself at liberty to abandon her when it may suit his own convenience, constitute the difference. The object of these men in retaining the women, most of whom, it is asserted, were originally kidnapped, is obviously for the gratification of their lust, and for the sake of the labour they can exact from them. In resorting to coercion in order to extort the services of these poor defenceless women, great cruelty appears to have been used by their unfeeling masters, with a few exceptions.
"At our request, a woman, named Boatswain by the sealers, with whom she lived some years, gave us some particulars relative to the treatment of the women amongst them. This she did partly by words, and partly by expressive signs, that could not be misunderstood; and her statements were fully confirmed by other women who were present, and who had been similarly dealt with. She was requested to show in what manner they beat them. She then made signs of being stripped, stretched her hands up against the wall, in the attitude of a prisoner tied up to be flogged, making at the same time a doleful cry, and personating a flagellator in the exercise of his duty. After this she described a different scene. She represented a person striking another over the back and legs, and then herself as sinking down on the ground, while she repeatedly exclaimed, in a piteous tone, 'Oh, I will clean the mutton-birds better,' until at last her voice seemed to fail through exhaustion. She said the men beat them with great sticks. When asked if certain men beat their women, she excepted four, the woman of one of whom was weakly, and would have died if he had beaten her. On her observing of one of the men that 'he beat his woman,' it was remarked, with surprise, that she had an infant. To this she replied, 'Yes, he beat her when the child was in her.' On inquiry being made, if she would go back to the sealers, she replied, in strong terms, that she would not, and the other women joined with her in making the same declaration.
"They appear to have made little or no progress in civilization, or in anything but what contributed to the pecuniary
