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288 would not have been introduced to the reader of these pages. But their cruelty to the Aborigines, their intercourse with the Tasmanian gins, and their connexion with the Isle of Exile, force them into this history. The gratification of lustful impulses, the satisfaction of savage instincts, and the desire of gain in the abduction of slaves, brought them to the pursuit of the weaker sex, and the destruction of the stronger. The unfortunate Natives, when flying from the stern Bushmen of the interior, found themselves confronted by the still more cruel coasters; like the miserable flying-fish, which are chased by the monster of the deep into the voracious jaws of the bird of prey.

Their ravages were as extensive as they were remorseless. Some carried on their operations beyond the limits of civilization, for the security of their persons, and for the greater harvest of their gains. But wherever they roamed, their Sabine propensities exposed them alike to the reproach of Christians and the revenge of barbarians. Even as far as the western limit of the continent of New Holland was their name a terror. Major Lockyer, being sent from Sydney, in 1827, to attempt a convict settlement at King George's Sound, thus accounts for some outrages of the Blacks:—

"It is but too certain that they were driven to it by acts of cruelty committed on them by some gang or gangs of sealers, who have lately visited this place. The fact of these miscreants having left four Natives on Michaelmas Island, who must have inevitably perished if they had not been taken off by the boat sent by the Amity, that brought them to this harbour, when one of them exhibited three deep scars on his neck and back that had been inflicted by some sharp instrument, sufficiently proves that they have suffered injuries from white men; and it is not to be wondered at that they should, as people in a state of nature, seek revenge."

Explorers have lost their lives through the awakened hostility of wild tribes. The death of the excellent Captain Barker, at the mouth of the Murray in 1836, excited much surprise at the time, from the apparent absence of motive in the act. But Mr. Windsor Earle declares that he was "murdered on the south coast of Australia, by a party of runaway convicts from Van Diemen's Land, who resided on an island near the coast, and who were in the habit of visiting the mainland for the purpose