LETTERS TO THE EDITOR.

THE ALLEGED POISONING OF NATIVES IN QUEE.NSLAND.

[TO THE EDITOR OF THE "SPECTATOR."]

Sin,—As in your opinion, the English public are entirely in- credulous about the wanton shooting and poisoning of the North- Australian aborigines, and as Mr. Chesson, of the Aborigines Protection Society, has come forward officially to deny the recent existence of such practices, you will, perhaps, allow me to adduce evidence which, if not conclusive, is sufficient to show that I have made no random statements.

My attention was first drawn to this matter by viva vote accounts received from a gentleman, since dead, who had recently returned from the wild life of the gold diggings and the new districts of Queensland. He described to me one case of extensive strychnine-poisoning, and gave me to understand that the shooting of " Diggers " was an ordinary and understood thing. His state- ments have lain heavy on my mind, but I cannot undertake to produce them as evidence, and I, therefore, turn to printed statements.

I may express some surprise that the Aborigines Protection Society should derive their information about Queensland from Dr. Lang's book, written in 1861. The colony was only consti- tuted in 1859, and the greater part of it was in 1861 a terra in- cognita. I beg to refer Mr. Chesson, in the first place, to a work called, "The Queen of the Colonies ; or, Queensland as I Knew It; by an Eight-years Resident," published by Messrs. Sampson Low and Co. a few months ago. On pp. 340-343 we read as follows :—

" Any notice of the black fellows would be incomplete that said nothing as to their treatment by the whites. Here one would willingly draw a veil over the sad picture. But truth compels us to say that all the treachery and, murder has not been on the side of the blacks. . . . . .

As a rule, at the present day, the natives are not ill-treated

But this was not always the case Before the era of sopandion, when the whites wore very few, and the native tribes were in a great measure intact, there were deeds so black and diabolical committed as one almost shrinks from recounting On a run ' in the Moreton- Bay district, a squatter found his cattle constantly speared, and often killed by the natives From time to time, some of them were shot when caught on the ' run', but still the evil was unabated. At length, altering his procedure, the squatter established friendly relations with the blacks, and finally gave them a 200-1b. bag of flour, in which ho had

mixed a quantity of arsenic or strychnine The poor creatures soon divided the flour, and one and all, making cakes of their portions, ate them without any suspicion. A dreadful scene followed. Some accounts say forty, others twice that number, soon lay dead

in their camp For many years, on offering a present of flour to any black-fellow, one was met with the inquiry, Mackenzie sit down?' tho name by which poison became universally known among them for many miles. The man who' thus acted was never called in question for his conduct, the real facts being perhaps known to no one but himself, or through the reports of the blacks, who can give no evidence."

The writer then proceeds to give the stories of an old squatter, whose theory was that the blacks were to be destroyed, like native dogs or vermin. He described the shooting of a black "much in the same way one would speak of firing at a brace of partridges." The same squatter, being troubled by the depredations of two station blacks, resolved to punish them by strychnine, mixed with sugar :— "Calling them by name, he said, Here, you eatem sugar,' and gave first one and then the other his portion, which the poor follows took and ate unsuspiciously. He then told them to go and fetch up the horses, and have a drink at the water-bolo on their way. By. and-by he went out to have a look round, and near the water-hole lay one of the blacks, who, on seeing him approaching, cried out, 'Here, Missa —, you see em me. Cabona [very much] me directly buck-jump!' referring to the convulsions caused by the poison, and which he called 'buck-jumping.' Soon another paroxysm came on, in which he died."

The writer goes on to state that he himself incurred odium by trying to protect the blacks in his neighbourhood from the super- intendent of a neighbouring " run," who wished to shoot them. He explains that though there is theoretically as severe a penalty for the murder of a black as of a white man, "in isolated districts it would often be well-nigh impossible to adduce satisfactory evi- dence. But these are now, we believe, very exceptional cases."

To form some judgment how far this question is one of the past only, we must turn to Mr. E. B. Kennedy's book, "Four Years in Queensland," published in 1870 by Mr. Stanford. In pp. 70-73 is given what Mr. Kennedy describes as a "very truthful article," taken from the Port Denison Times of May, 1868. I make the following extracts :—

"The Black question,is daily assuming a more serious aspect in this

part of Australia Our Government, with their usual short- sighted and miscalled economy, are still reducing the native police force,

which is the only protection that the out-settlers have from the blacks, and which, instead of being reduced, ought to be trebled or quadrupled in strength. If this suicidal policy is persisted in, the inevitable result will be the adoption by the white settlers of a system of self-pro- tection against the savages. It is scarcely necessary to say bow much such a result is to be deprecated, not only on account of the blacks, of whom, for every one that is killed now, ten probably will suffer if the settlers take the matter into their own hands, but on account of the settlers themselves, over whom the demoralising effects of such a sys- tem will exert an influence for evil that it will be difficult to counter- balance."

After some remarks upon pseudo-philanthropists and missionaries, which I need not transcribe, the Port Denison editor concludes :— t, If the settlers are forced into the necessity of taking upon them- selves the responsibility of repelling the aggressions of the blacks, and of doing so in a clandestine and illegal manner, consequences the most deplorable are sure to ensue."

Of this, Mr. Kennedy, writing in 1869, remarks :—" The above gives a very good idea of the state of things at present." It is, of course, impossible for me to adduce satisfactory evidence as to the extent to which this " clandestine " war of extermination is proceeding at the present time. Neither gold-diggers nor squat- ters are likely to tell tales of what is done far up the country, until years are gone by, and the danger of a prosecution for murder is past.

I can only give my own impression, which is that if Mr. Chesson and the Aborigines Protection Society continue to rely upon Dr. Lang's book, and his statements about the year 1845, there will soon be no aborigines for them to protect. That a fierce private war of extermination is now proceeding in North Queensland, uncon- trolled by Government, and conducted with little regard to any- thing but the safety of the English invaders, can hardly be doubted. The Australian Sketcher for February 19, 1876, now before me, gives a graphic illustration of a fight between diggers and blacks on the way to the Palmer Diggings, and mentions (p. 182) that a little while ago it was contemplated by the Chinese merchants at Cookstown to organise a regular Chinese force, to protect their countrymen against the blacks. It reads like satire,—that Chinese merchants should think of organising a police force in British territory.

I feel sure that a little of the over-abundant sentiment spent in England upon a few fugitive slaves or imported Kanakas, might well be used to impress upon the Queensland Government the necessity of establishing an effective native police force. Private and clandes- tine warfare is sure to lead, in some cases, as the Port Denison editor clearly implies, to lamentable atrocities.—I am, Sir, &c.,

W. STANLEY JEVONS.