of making Natives equal to Europeans in the eye of the law, is a mere mockery, and cannot by any possibility exist in reality." And, as Lord Goderich remarked, "they are brought into acquaintance with civilized life, not to partake its blessings, but only to feel the severity of its penal sanctions." Count Strzelecki affirms of their naturalization, that it "excludes them from sitting on a jury, or appearing as witnesses, and entails a meet confused form of judicial proceedings; all which, taken together, has made of the Aborigines of Australia a nondescript caste, who, to use their own phraseology, are neither white nor black."
Mr. Bannister, once Attorney-General of New South Wales, sought to further the ends of justice when he said, "We ought forthwith to begin, at least, to reduce the laws and usages of the aboriginal tribes to language, print them, and direct the courts of justice to respect those laws in proper cases." We have paid that respect to written codes of the conquered in India, while the unwritten laws of the hunters of Tasmania were definite in object, binding in obligation, and suitable to their condition. Our own modes of thought and action are so different to theirs, that some respect to their tribal customs would have been as humane as politic.
New South Wales stands forth proudly as the only one of our southern colonies seeking to do tardy justice to the Native. An Act was passed by the Sydney Legislature, October 8, 1839, allowing the Dark subjects, under certain circumstances, to be admitted as witnesses in court. But the majesty of England could not sanction the innovation. Governor Grey tells us, "I have been a personal witness to a case in which a Native was most undeservedly punished, from the circumstance of the Natives, who were the only persons who could speak as to certain exculpatory facts, not being permitted to give their evidence." Mr. Powlett, P.M. of Victoria, would have native evidence received for what it is worth. Mr. Protector Robinson always maintained that the legal disqualification to give evidence was not only the cause of many outrages, but accelerated the destruction of Blacks by the Whites; adding, "They consider any injury they can inflict upon white men as an act of duty and patriotism; and, however much they dread the punishment which our laws inflict upon them, they consider the sufferers under those punishments as martyrs in the cause of their country."
