Page:The Aborigines of Victoria and Riverina.djvu/170

165 the latter he has many to contend with, more especially during the periods which he pretends are occupied visiting the Konikatnie, in his humid Loondthal. The greatest scamp in the tribe is usually the candidate who comes forward to fill the departed Bangal's office. As a rule in aboriginal physiology, vagabondism and courage generally go together, and without the latter quality in abundance, it would be virtually impossible to undergo the necessary probationary ordeal, which the office demands of its professors.

One member of every tribe is devoted solely to the office of Ngallow Wattow (postman or messenger). He can travel from tribe to tribe with impunity, whether they should be hostile to his own people, or the contrary; he is employed carrying news backwards and forwards, and it is most wonderful how rapidly anything possessing interest to the aborigines is thus disseminated.

These men also negotiate all barter and trading required by their respective tribes. At the first blush it would almost seem that the aboriginies [sic] could not have very much in the shape of goods to dispose of, but that would be an erroneous conclusion to arrive at; as the districts inhabited by the different tribes produce each their own particular class of commodities, and those alone; therefore, as the aboriginal requirements over the whole of the colony are very similar, the only manner in which many of their wants can be supplied is by means of barter. For example, the tribes inhabiting the mountainous regions have an abundance of stone suitable for making axes of; and the tribes which roam over the vast depression forming the Murray