Page:Journal of the Right Hon. Sir Joseph Banks.djvu/368

310 spritsail-yard was rigged across, it completely stopped up both nostrils, so that they spoke in the nose in a manner one would think scarcely intelligible. Besides these extraordinary bones, they had necklaces of shells neatly cut and strung together; bracelets also, if one may call by that name four or five rings of small cord worn round the upper part of the arm; and a belt or string tied round the waist about as thick as worsted yarn, which last was frequently made of either human hair or that of the beast called by them kangooroo.

They paint themselves with red and white. The former they commonly lay on in broad patches on their shoulders or breasts; the white in strips, some of which are narrow and confined to small parts of their bodies, others broad and carried with some degree of taste across their bodies, round their legs and arms, etc. They also lay it on in circles round their eyes, and in patches in different parts of their faces. The red seems to be red ochre, but what the white was we could not find out, it was heavy and close-grained, almost as white lead, and had a saponaceous feel; possibly it might be a kind of steatite. We lamented not being able to procure a bit to examine.

These people seemed to have no idea of traffic, nor could we teach them; indeed, it seemed that we had no one thing upon which they set a value sufficient to induce them to part with the smallest trifle, except one fish which weighed about half a pound. That they brought as a kind of peace token. No one in the ship procured, I believe, from them the smallest article; they readily received the things we gave them, but never would understand our signs, when we asked for returns. This, however, must not be forgotten, that whatever opportunities they had they never once attempted to take anything in a clandestine manner; whatever they wanted they openly asked for, and in almost all cases bore the refusal, if they met with one, with much indifference, except in the case of turtles.

Dirty as these people are, they seem to be entirely free from lice, a circumstance rarely observed among the most cleanly Indians, and which is here the more remarkable, as