The Black Man's Home. An Australian Reminiscence

Irish Jesuit Province

The Black Man's Home. An Australian ReminiscenceAuthor(s): Michael PhelanSource: The Irish Monthly, Vol. 25, No. 284 (Feb., 1897), pp. 88-94Published by: Irish Jesuit ProvinceStable URL: http://www.jstor.org/stable/20499087 .

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( 88 )

THE BLACK MAN'S HOME.

AN AUSTRALIAN REMINISCENCE.

I'In lands where bright blossoms are scentless,

And songless bright birds;

Where, with fire and fierce drought in her tresses,

Insatiable summer oppresses

Sere woodlands and sad wildernesses,

And faint flocks and herds." A. L. GORDON.

A long promised visit to the beautiful town of Tumut, New South Wales,-Swiss in its refreshing climate, its cool

gurgling streams and its encircling hills-brought the writer for the first time within the environs of an aboriginal camp in Australia,

After a few hours' drive from GOundagui we found ourselves in

the Tumut district. Having struck a dense 'forest, we were

informed by the worthy pastor, who acted in the dual capacity of

host and " whip " upon the occasion, that we were now approaching

the home of the Brungle blacks. Abandoning the public road, we drove straight towards the

camp. On entering the wood a sight of strange originality was

revealed. Over the shady sward, as far as eye could reach, at

detached intervals were scattered the gunnyahs or black man's huts, while the dusky figures were seen in groups around their " homes," or lazily moving to and fro across the space.

Attached to each gunnya/h was a fowl-house, with high roosts

outside, the inhabitants of which, at our approach, raised their various cries of alarm. The frightened crowings and cacklings of fowl, mingled with the howlings of a few miserable dogs, formed strangely incongruous music for such simple, mild and primitive surroundings.

The camp of ninety souls contained over seventy Catholics. A few of the better instructed advanced to meet and bid us welcomiie.

From the various gunnyaks men and women came out to scan with

pleased curiosity the not unwelcome strangers. In a distant corner we noticed a number grouped around a

burning log; some smoking and seated on fallen timber, and others lying on the grass. This, we were informed, was a wake. Within



[(lhe Black -lan's Home. 89

the gunnyah close by lay the body of a dead child, happily baptized

by the camp catechist, who proved herself to be a girl thoroughly well instructed. We approached the party, who spoke in low tones and in all their demeanour manifested the deepest reverential awe

for the sacred presence of the dead. There, under the shadows of

the primeval bush, with sickly winter sunbeanms flitting across his tangled locks and dusky features, the poor wild child of the forest

displayed a sense of reverence, a propriety of behaviour, and a

tenderness of sympathy for the dead, that, in the home of comfort

or of luxury, his white brother might imitate with profit.

In the whole scene we observed many traces of primitive

ingenuity. The little coffin was a piece of native workmanship, A tree was felled and shaped into boards with the aid of their few

simple instruments; planed and smoothed probably by a piece of broken bottle glass. The oehre tincture of some wild herbs

supplied for paint and staining; and the abundant flowers of the

forest dells filled the coffin and covered the tiny body, which was

buried in deep masses of roses. Smiling above the bed of rose

leaves, the features of the black child were seen, the head calmly

resting on the pillow of flowers newly plucked from his native turf.

No costly shroud, exhibiting the last poor efforts of human vanity,

swathed round his dusky figure; buit the blooms of the valley

slopes drooped their dyii4g heads upon his little breast. Instead

of the mourning candle, the star-gleams from the blue vault

quivered through the wattle wickers above the gentle sleeper.

To what appropriate oadences closed the final act of that

simple life drama ! No jarring sounds of civilization, blut the

simple music that steals out of- nature's untutored heart broke

upon his dying ear, or breathes farewell across his lifeless clay. Above the reverential whispers of his friends, through the silent forest rose the fitful sob of the winds, or the sighs of the swaying branches. Poor child, in a few short hours he rests beside his fellow tribesmen ; the warratak will wave above him and the dirge-lilke mniserere of the Mopake will chant his funeral requiem. Saddest melancholy is the weird music of the Austral forest; per chance it is the spirit voice of the dying race uttered in murmurs half in protest and half in sorrow.

Turning from this simple wake-scene, we were introdLiced to the king of the tribe. If there be a majesty that doth hedge in

a king, certainly it hedges not the sable sovereign of the Brungle VOL. Xxv. No 284 7



0 Ike Irish Monthly.

blacks; for royalty more stripped of all pomp and circumstance it would be difficult to imagine. No courtly retinue of bowing nobles, armed braves, or servitors thronged round the humble bearer of Brungle's sceptre. He was a plain squat man in a cast

off suit of grey, and a straw hat; that he was barefooted, goes

without saying. His face was of serious caste and spoke strong common sense.

Taking one of the men aside, I enquired in what precisely coni

sisted the authority and the functions of his majesty. At the

expression cc his majesty ' a broad smile played across the man's

honest countenance; for in truth, though retaining the kingly title, the government is essentially patriarchal.

The whole functions of state, and exercise of legislative power,

may be summed up in the fact that the king gives safe advice

which hiis subjects wvisely follow. The traditions of the tribe regulate the ordinary affairs of life; in more complex questions he consults the elders. Under present circumstances his regulations are the embodiment of practical wisdom. The fortunes of the tribe are undergoing a process of social evolution. He recognises the inevitable and boldly faces it. His people have almost entirely abandoned the primitive life, and are accommodating them - selves to white civilization. To hasten this consummation, and shorten the precarious transition period, the chief has prohibited

the use of the native tongue, and English alone is spoken. The

corrobaree or war-dance is a thing of the past; the young meni

have abandoned the exercise of the boomerany and spear, for the

more peaceful practice of the spade and shears. The king has

arranged that after him no successor shall be elected, and the

tribal form of life shall be for ever abolished; so, like Do-n C(esar,

he is the last "Of that grand race that ends its blaze iii me."

A surveyor was even then engaged in allotting to each family

forty acres, while the neighbouring farmers were promisiiin donations of sheep and cattle to give the black man a start in 'his

:new life of settled civilization. Pity it is that this primitive tongue should die. It is simple

nature's voice. The euphony of its sound is rich and liquid

entirely free from all tones of harsh metallic timbre. Its semi

guttural strength but braces and gives body to the softer cadences

of sadness that run through all its inflections. If its sense and,



The Black Nan's Home. 91

range are limited, the ideas embodied are oftentimes tenderest poetry. It is a vehicle of thought neither soiled by city smoke

nor redolent of vulgar passion. The reflections of the broken sunbeam, the forest whisperings, or the muttering thunders of the tropic storm find in all its figures a mirror and an echo.

In the legends of the northern tribes are preserved the main facts of revelation, the history of Adam's fall, the deluge etc., with

startli:ng accuracy. The miraculous conception and birth of Our

Lord, from a virgin mother, they retain in a shape almost literally correct. The history of the new testament is briefly embodied in this beautiful legend. They say that among the white men once

came a great and powerful king, goodness itself. By his brothers he was cruelly persecuted. One day, flying for his life before their pursuit, he came to the river's bank, plunged in and sank

bieneath the wave. This to him was disappearance but not death; for one day he will rise above its surface with an army to chastise

his foes, while for those who stood by him there are palaces await

ing in some far off land of light. This they hold to be the crime

of the white, while they felicitate themselves on the fact that, when the angry face appears frowning above the water's surface,

no fear need disturb the black man's breast.

The language being almost entirely onomatopoetic, the sound

not only echoes but almost translates the sense. The system of

naming places is admirable. The mountain peaks when the storm

clouds burst oftenest and with loudest crasn, are called Tambarumbra;

this, when pronounced by a native you need scarcely be told, means

-the land of thunder and lightning, What is now a quarter of

f-ashion and bright villas, once a sloping marsh forming a margin

of Sydney's matchless harbour, is called Wbooloomooloo, a word

barbarlously murdered by Europeans throwing the accent on the final syllable. When the stress is placed on the first, which should

be pronounced long and soft like the " oo " in " school," then,the

whole word spoken slowly, you actually produce its meaning-the sound of the wind sighing through the reeds. The black man

heard the low breeze stealing up from the neighbouring ocean and whispering through the reeds. He imitated the sound and fixed

its echo for a name.

If an animal or bird frequent a spot, it is sure to be called from

some characteristic of the animal or sound of the bird, as "Wagga

Wagga." If the first vowel is pronounced as the c a" in 4" wall,"



92 The Irish Monthly.

you have the reduplicated " caw " of the crow, for Wagga Wagga

mean-crow crow, or in our idiom-the land of many crows. One more reform would complete the monarch's work, without

it his noblest efforts will be vain; yet he will never succeed in

inducing the wild bush children to live in houses. Live pent up

within four walls! No, every spark of their inborn freedom blazes into rebellion at the base idea; and the consequences are

evident and sad. Even where the rum bottle and strong tobacco

are not working their joint mission of demoralization, the .absence of proper shelter is sweeping away the poor aboriginal. H is body, now softened by wearing European clothes, is no longer eapable of

resisting the effects of rude and primitive life, and the fell ravages of consumption are devouring him, while his naked body was

inured by constant exposure, he little recked the rain-soaked earth or the drafty gunniiyak. The case is now changed, and the poor

king beholds, alas! the inereasing grave-plots and waning num

bers of his doomed children.

In going through the camp we were taken to see at poor fellow

whose days were evidently numbered. The hectic flush of con sumption was burning on his cheeks. He expressed a wish to

become a Catholic. Friends previously visiting him impressed him with the advisability of being baptized before he died. For a long time he demurred, but the triumph of conviction was finally

completed by one saying-" Charley, if you do not become a

Catholic, you will not be with the tribe in heaven." This clenched

it. Parted from the tribe in this life or the next ! Never ! I shall

not forget the gush of childish glee with which he clapped his hands in delight when he discovered he did not lose his high

sounding naine-Charles Prince-inl the baptismal process, and

better still he acquired another. Over and over he rapturously

repeated " I am now Charles Joseph Prince." How deep has the

last infirmity of noble minds struck its roots into human nature

when a black fellow, rolled in an opossum rug and dying in the backwoods, lays to his soul the flattering unction that his nanme at least smacks of nobility and 'worldly splendour!

While we were shown through the tribal cemetery, we enquired how did they remember the name of each tenant; this question brought out an ingenious device. They pointed to the fact that each grave had different flowers planted on it. It was true: no

sculptured line or marble scroll of fame but the bright blooms of



The Black Man's Honme. 93

their native forest rescued from oblivion and preserved the memories of their lowly dead.

Their loyalty to the priest is marvellous. During the shearing season two young blacks fell sick at a town twenty miles from the camp; they refused to have any other name put on the hospital books than-" Father C.'s blacks."

The pastor told some amusing incidents in connection with his camp ministrations. In the contre is a government school where the picaninnis or children are taught; this is placed at the priest's disposal when he comes to say mass. When he first faced his squatting congregation, he began with an inastruction on man's creation. Thinking the catechetical method more suited to their rtude understandings, he began with-" Who were our first parents ? " intending, of course, to answer it himself; in this he

was spared the trouble. Scarce had he finished the sentence when a dozen sable hands were waving in the air and a dozen full

grown iiien excitedly shouting-" Adam and Eve." But this did

nuot end the scene. Each enulous of displaying his proficiency squabbled with his neighbour for supremacy, vociferating "I spoke first," and appealing to his bewildered Reverence who alone seemed consciotus of the incongruous mixture of the sacred and grotesque. When, during the course of the sermon, he touched on the Redemption, the whole congregation rose to their feet, clapping their hands and crying-" Christ died for black man and

white man alike."

The knowledge that white and black came by creation from a

common Father and by generation from a common pair gives them

the greatest comfort. That the soul of the black man is equally

dear in the eyes of God and that a common heaven awaits all the

children of Adam's race is a revelation to console ; for the poor

wild child of the Bush is extremely sensitive of his colour, his

firmest conviction being that the first condition awaiting his

glorified body is a transformation into the envied white.

I should like to have taken a few snap-shot sketches, and for

a curio album what a wealth of material abounded on every side!

But the aboriginal's well-known horror of the art precluded the

idea. When he sees his other self on a negative plate, he weeps

and becomes inconsolable; as he is under the firm conviction that

you have taken away half his being. A camera lens and a rifle

barrel are objects of almost equal dread.



94 The Iri8h Monthlq.

Without entering into the question:-Can the race be pre served?-it may be fairly stated that as matters now stand the blackfollow is bound to disappear. He is being actually swept away before the onward march of white civilization.

As it requires no prophetic eye to see future Birminghams and Leeds with their tall Chimneys, their busy marts and their thousand looms, springing from the plains where to-day the timid kangaroo seeks the shady thicket or the " wattle " waves in pride her golden

tresses; assuredly it is not assuming the rHIe of visionary or scarcely trespassing on the domain of fancy to see some future savant taking from the museum repository the antique implements of the extinct race, with their quaint devices and strange carvings; and con vincing a half credulous generation that over this land covered with cities and fair dwellings, now throbbing from end to end with the pulse of busy life, once through primitive forest wilds, roamed a guileless dusky race, that went down before the merciless teeth of our iron civilization; that the whirr of the boomerang once sounded through silent woods over the streets now echoing the tramp of the city throngs; that the very area now occupied by sparkling fountains and terraced gardens-the home of elegance and the resort of fashion-was once the camping ground where the wild cor robar-ee held high revel, and where danced to fantastic measures the aboriginal child of the long vanished Austral forest.

MICIIAEL PHELAN, S.J.



The Black Man's Home. An Australian Reminiscence

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