spectators, the whites being in the centre. The first act of the corrobboree was the representation of a herd of cattle, feeding out of the forest, and camping on the plain, the black performers being painted accordingly. The imitation was most skilful, the action and attitude of every individual member of the entire herd being ludicrously exact. Some lay down and chewed the cud, others stood scratching themselves with hind feet or horns, licking themselves or their calves; several rubbing their heads against each other in bucolic friendliness. This having lasted for some time, scene the second commenced. A party of blacks was seen creeping towards the cattle, taking all the usual precautions, such as keeping to windward, in order to prevent the herd from being alarmed. They got up close to the cattle at last, and speared two head, to the intense delight of the black spectators, who applauded rapturously. The hunters next went through the various operations of skinning, cutting up, and carrying away the pieces, the whole process being carried out with the most minute exactness. Scene the third commenced with the sound of horses galloping through the timber, followed by the appearance of a party of whites on horseback, remarkably well got up. The face was painted whity-brown, with an imitation of the cabbage-tree hat; the bodies were painted, some blue and others red, to represent the shirts: below the waist was a resemblance of the moleskin trousers, the legs being covered with reeds, tied all round, to imitate the hide leggings worn in that district as a protection against the brigalow scrub. These manufactured whites at once wheeled to the right, fired, and drove the blacks before them. The latter soon rallied, however, and a desperate fight ensued, the blacks extending their flanks, and driving back the whites. The fictitious white men bit the cartridges, put on the caps, and went through all the forms of loading, firing, wheeling their horses, assisting each other, &c., with an exactness which proved personal observation. The native spectators groaned whenever a blackfellow fell, but cheered lustily when a white bit the dust; and at length, after the ground had been fought over and over again, the whites were ignominiously driven from the field, amidst the frantic delight of the natives, while Eaglehawk worked himself into such a violent state of excitement that at one time the play seemed likely to terminate in a real and deadly fight."[1]
Major (Sir Thomas) Mitchell was entertained by the natives with a corrobboree—"their universal and highly original dance." Sir Thomas speaks in glowing terms of their movements and of the general character of the picture presented by the warriors in their forest home. "They dance to beaten time, accompanied by a song (to this end they stretch a skin very tight over the knees, and thus may be said to use the tympanum in its rudest form). . . . The surrounding darkness seems necessary to the effect of the whole, all these dances being more or less dramatic—the painted figures coming forward in mystic order from the obscurity of the background, while the singers and beaters of time are invisible—have a highly theatrical effect. Each dance seems most tastefully progressive, the movement being at first slow and introduced by two persons, displaying the most graceful motions both of arms and legs, while
- ↑ The Aborigines of Australia, by Gideon S. Lang, Esq., 1865.
