instantly on the lungs, sent them to the grave by hundreds; and no wonder that Robinson found a whole tribe housed in a single hut, for whom a twelvemonth before six or seven were necessary; and I quite believe that the original cause of their decay lay in their own imprudence, generating fatal catarrhal complaints, from which an European, by proper remedial measures, resorted to early, would easily have recovered. These imprudences were, of course, practised only by a few tribes inhabiting the settled districts, but the consequences, which are of course epidemic, infected all before long.
Many of the tribes, particularly of the Western and South Western Coast districts, which were known to be very strong in numbers, long after the first colonisation of the country, were not exposed to contact with the whites, and yet when taken, they hardly ever consisted of 20 persons, and when larger numbers were brought in at any one time they were always of more than one family.
Of their rapid mortality when under the immediate observation of the protector at Bruny, Flinders, and Hunter's Islands, I have said something elsewhere. But it may not be improper to add that at the last-named asylum, sickness was sometimes induced by the neglect of the Government, which persisted for some months in supplying them with salt provisions (in spite of the repeated and strenuous remonstrances of Robinson), which they hated the very name of, and only ate from necessity, but to which they were too long restricted. The little game there was left on the island, after the incursions of the sealers were prohibited, was speedily demolished by the natives. Of shell-fish, there were few or none hereabouts, and no other fish would any native of Tasmania ever touch; whether it was natural aversion or superstition is not known, but scale-fish of any kind was as much an abomination to the entire race as swine's flesh to the Jew or Mussulman; and they would literally rather starve than eat it. In this respect they quite differed from the New Holland savages, by whom it is greatly relished. From some not very satisfactory explained cause, the sheep on the island were not touched. Robinson says they were too young and too small for killing; but the consequence of restricting the natives to salt provisions was to bring on scorbutic complaints, which terminated fatally in some instances.
TREATMENT OF THE DEAD.
In one of the protector's earliest reports, 12th June, 1829, he gives some lengthy, but very interesting, particulars of their mode of disposing of the bodies of their dead. He relates
