Page:Narrative of a survey of the intertropical and western coasts of Australia, Volume 1.djvu/264

  SURVEY OF THE INTERTROPIC&L lSlO. under which the wearer of a. shirt laboured to get JnneSO. it off. Their canoes were not more than five feet long, and generally too small for two people; two small strips of bark, five or six inches square, serves the double purpose of paddling and for bal- ingthe water out, which they are constantly obliged to do to prevent their canoe from sinking; in shoal water the paddles are superseded by a pole, by which this fragile bark is propelled. We endea- youred to persuade them to bring off some spears to barter, for they had no weapon of any descrip- tion with them, but they evidently would not derstand our meng. In the evening our gen- fiemen proceeded to return these visits, at the spot which was pointed out by our morning guests: on landing they were met by the natives and conducted to their huts, where they saw the whole of the male part of this tribe, which con- sisted-of fiReen, of whom two were old and de- crepit, and one of these was reduced to a perfect skeleton by ulcerated sores on his legs, that had eaten away the flesh, and lei large portions of the bone bare; and this miserable object was wasting away without any application or covering to his sores. No teeth were deficient in their jaws; all had the septum-narium perforated, but without wear- ing any appendage in it. The only ornament

�