Page:The Aborigines of Victoria and Riverina.djvu/36

31 themselves and their descendants, which is perceptible even to the present day.

As a rule the aborigines have not any great capacity for physical exertion; at least, they cannot compete with average white men, when violent and long drawn out fatigue chances to be the order of the day; they have thews and sinews enough, too; in fact, usually their whole physique is unexceptionable, but they lack what is commonly termed pluck; therefore, it takes but a small matter beyond common to make them give in. They, however, always evince a certain amount of shame at those times, as is evidenced by their invariably attributing their apparent want of stamina to the fact of their having a sore finger, or some equally trivial ailment.

They can bear the pangs of hunger, however, wonderfully well; a whole week's starvation is not by any means an uncommon occurrence with them. At those times, they will not stir out of their camps; indeed, they will scarcely turn themselves round, unless perhaps when they think it will lessen their discomfort somewhat if they give their waist-belts an extra twist, thereby contracting the vacuum which lack of food has made so painfully apparent. 

CHAPTER IV.

BLACKFELLOWS' OVENS, HOW FORMED; MOURNING FOR THE DEAD, SIGNS THEREOF; OF SEPULTURE, AND THE CEREMONIES CONNECTED THEREWITH.

Blackfellows' ovens, or cooking places, have been a fertile source of argument for many years, some holding that they