Page:The Aborigines of Victoria and Riverina.djvu/16

11 some purer atmosphere, where they camp, until again compelled by reason of vitiated air to remove further afield.

During the winter months they suffer extreme privations. They are too indolent to make themselves good weatherproof huts, so when it rains heavily they are thoroughly drenched, together with all their belongings, even to their bedding, and at such times they will not stir out to look for food, consequently they have to suffer the gnawing pangs of hunger, along with the miseries arising from their bad huts and severe weather. During these purgatorial times all ages, sexes, and relations huddle up together over a little fire for warmth; they are too lazy even to keep a good fire on at these times. One thinks somebody else should go for firewood, and tells him to do so; he tells another, and so on; consequently the wood is not brought at all. So they lie cold enough, snarling at each other like a pack of discontented dogs. But this is merely an illustration of the axiom which says, "What is everybody's business is nobody's business," applied to aboriginal domestic life. However, it is not a state of things conducive either to health or morality; accordingly they suffer in both cases most perniciously.

At these periods of feasting and privation the seeds of nearly all the diseases to which they ultimately become victims are engendered. The severe wet and cold give rise to affections of the throat and lungs, the latter of which has nearly always a fatal termination. In fact, it is merely a question of time.

Their over-feeding, too, has many ill effects, though perhaps not so many, or so fatal, as those arising from