Page:The Aborigines of Victoria and Riverina.djvu/86

81 consequently when the whole of these plains are inundated (which they are five months every year, from August to January inclusive) the dikes referred to act the part of dams, and so prevent the water from receding too rapidly, when the sources from whence it comes begin to fail, or, in other words, when the warm weather of spring and early summer has melted all the previous winter's accumulation of snow 'mid the mountains and valleys of the Australian Alps, wherein the many sources of the Murray take their rise.

Whilst the waters cover the reedy plains for miles on every side, the various kinds of fish find delectable grounds in the shallow, semi-tepid fluid wherein to pursue the prey upon which they feed.

In the artificial-looking banks at irregular intervals there are drains three or four feet wide, through which, when the river commences to fall, the waters of the plains find their way back to their parent stream. As a matter of course the fish instinctively return to the river with the receding water. At those seasons the aborigines are in their glory, and no small wonder either, as these times are actual harvests to them. They make stake weirs across the drains, the stakes being driven firmly into the soil within an inch of each other, so that anything having a greater bulk than that space must perforce remain on the landward side of the weir.

Without any great stretch of imagination, the reader can easily fancy the shoals of fish which congregate behind these weirs when the river is falling, and what a very simple matter the taking of them must be. When fish are required