Page:An Australian Parsonage.djvu/105

 with one hand whilst the other held a bone which he was very diligently gnawing.

The rear of the wayfarers is often brought up by several dogs, whose lean and bony appearance gives little token of the strong affection with which their masters really regard them. The Australian dotes upon his dogs, and never destroys a puppy; but, nevertheless, he will not insult the high intelligence of his four-footed friends, by supposing that they are not equal to the task of finding their own living. The dogs are careful not to disappoint his good opinion of them, and prowl about at night like jackals, robbing all insecure larders, and even the vineyards when grapes are in season. In hopes of abating this nuisance, the colonial authorities have established a dog-tax, which the white population pays, and which the natives for the most part elude altogether.

No native ever encamps unless within easy reach of water, and if huts are wanted the women must build them. They are made of boughs, the roofs round-shaped, too low to stand upright in, with the entrance carefully turned away from the wind; and if the wind shifts in the night some one, again a lady I should presume, has to get up to alter the position of the doorway. In front of each hut a fire is lighted, so that the feet of those who are sleeping within shall be kept warm; and if a relation's death has lately occurred, an additional and solitary fire is lighted at a little distance from the huts, where the ghost of the deceased may sit and warm itself without disturbing the family hearth. Warmth is, in fact, so great a necessity to the native, that he seems to think that the dead can only by degrees become