Page:Last of the tasmanians.djvu/394

Rh not only that, if we put anything into the ground up the creek it either gets trodden to Pieces or otherwise rutted up by somebody, or spoiled in some way so that we can't do any good by it." He is too independent to solicit eight acres of the soil seized by the Whites from his nation, but adds: "I mean for to buy it out."

The same person, believing himself possessed of sufficient means to keep a man, applied to Government in 1856 for a convict servant This was his letter:—

"I beg respectfully to apply for permission to hire a Passholder Servant man subject to existing regulations."

Although many a white man who had been exiled for his country's good, and who had been utterly illiterate, obtained this privilege, it was not thought expedient to place a Christian Englishman under the authority of a savage, and the application was refused. Mr. Calder, who knew him well, gives this report, in 1868, of my aboriginal acquaintance, as it is in reply to a question of my own:—

"Mr. Bonwick asks if the Blacks of Tasmania were capable of true civilization. My reply is, 'Yes, undoubtedly;' and I give as an example the case of Walter George Arthur, a Tasmanian aboriginal, whom I knew well, who was captured when a mere infant, and brought up and educated at the Queen's Orphan School (at Hobart Town). His ideas were perfectly English, and there was not the smallest dash of the savage in him. He was a very conversible man, fond of reading, and spoke and wrote English quite grammatically. His spelling was also quite correct This man had a hundred acres of land, and knew his rights in relation thereto quite as well as you do yours. An instance of this, quite as creditable to his acuteness, sense of right, and of honourable feelings, was related to me by our old friend Bennison, the surveyor. One of Arthur's neighbours was a grasping and rather unprincipled fellow, who mistook Arthur for a person with whom he might do as he pleased, and encroached on a cultivated part of his land, which Arthur had no idea of suffering. So, after expostulating with him to no purpose, he employed and paid Bennison to resurvey his land, which was done in presence of both litigants. This operation proved that Arthur was right, and that he knew his proper boundaries quite well. And when he saw that his opponent