of the treachery of his predecessor, had to pay the penalty. As a striking contrast to the bloody reputation of the Queensland natives, how is that we learn such amicable and pleasing accounts of the blacks at Port Essington, where from 1838 to 1849 they not only lived on friendly terms with the garrison, but twenty years after it had been abandoned by the whites two gentlemen from Adelaide were able to occupy the peninsula as a run, and have been most kindly received by the aborigines, who show a reverence and respect for the memory of the early whites.
Crawford Pasco, Commander R. N.
Queenscliff, Victoria, June 13.
—Queenslander, June 26, 1880.
Sir,—If the editorial fiat, "This correspondence must now cease," has not gone forth, I would like to enter a protest against the somewhat calumnious articles directed against the pioneers of the colonies in general, and those of Northern Queensland in particular, which appeared in two successive issues of the Queenslander under the headings "The Way we Civilise," and "Black and White." To quote Macaulay:—"We know no spectacle so ridiculous as the British public in one of its periodical fits of morality. We read the scandal, talk about it for a day, and forget it. But once in six or seven years our virtue becomes outrageous. We cannot suffer the laws of religion and decency to be violated. We must make a stand against vice." We now appear about to suffer one of these "periodical fits," and, casting about for a scapegoat, fix upon the person of the pioneer—the settler of the interior; the key of the inland terra incognita we might call him—to bear the brunt of our virtuous indignation. But we should bear in mind that it is possible to be virtuous and yet unjust at the one time, and this appears to me to be the position the Queenslander has assumed. When it seriously states that "on occupying new territory the aboriginal inhabitants are treated in exactly the same way as the wild beasts or birds the settler may find there," its virtuous indignation—if it honestly believes in such wholesale vilification—is highly commendable, while at the same time the injustice of such a sweeping accusation, levelled against a body of men who form one of our most useful and enterprising of colonists, is greatly to be deplored. Let us take retrospect to a date some 238 years antecedent to the present era. We find, referring to New Zealand, "Tasman did not land on any part of the island, but having had a boat's crew cut off by the natives in what he then called Massacre Bay he was content to sail along the west coast of the North Island." And again, on 8th October, 127 years subsequent to Tasman's visit, we find Captain Cook defending himself from an unprovoked attack from the same people, and glad to make good his retreat from so "unfortunate and inhospitable a place." Here we are furnished with two authentic records of instances in which it is quite plain the white man could not have been the aggressor, for in the first instance they had not even landed on the aboriginal's soil, and in the second had done so in the hope of being able to open up friendly negotiations with the natives; and it was, finally, in pursuance of this laudable project that the gallant commander referred to fell a victim to ferocious barbarism. I have selected these two remote instances, first, because they stand amongst the first instances on record wherein the aboriginals of the southern hemisphere and the European have come into collision. Secondly, because, being a matter of history, they are more likely to gain credence than those instances which have occurred contemporaneous with our own experience, in our own colony; and, to be more explicit, in the districts of Burke and Cook. I could recount many instances where the pioneer, having selected his blocks and formed a comfortable homestead, has allowed the aboriginals—free from any previous intercourse with Europeans—to form a camp near the station. How they had been generously supplied with food that could be ill spared. How the virtues of a "Friday" appeared to be intensified in each sable warrior. How they had been presented with sundry articles of clothing, implements, &c., until the increasing cry for more could
not possibly be complied with; and then, how the settler returned home after a hard day's ride to find his late companions murdered and mutilated beyond recognition, his homestead and stores in smouldering ruins, and the ground littered with broken spears. This was no unfrequent experience in the early days of settlement, and the same thing will continue to occur while the progress of colonisation is to be carried on in outlying districts inhabited by the blacks. Where this sort of thing is likely to
