Page:The Native Tribes of South Australia (1879).djvu/223

 EFFORT TO SAVE THE ABORIGINES FROM EXTINCTION. 149 It is not wise to attempt to civilise these people too fast. Judgment has to be exercised, and the treatment to be adapted to their condition. We are not to suppose that they are capable of taking upon them the duties of a state of society which we have been trained for by ages of civilisation. Is it too much to expect that one more organised effort will be made to save this race from extinction? There are yet many thousands of Aborigines in the province governed by the colony of South Australia. It is indispensable, if any good is to be done, that the present policy should be reversed, and that the Government should come forward with paternal legislation for their benefit. At present the Aborigines are being injured, not by cruelty, but by ill-judged kindness. They are treated by many of the settlers as almost unreasoning beings; they are foolishly humoured and spoiled; and it is no wonder if they become like spoiled children, and ruin their health and condition by self-indulgence. The restraints of native law, which were to a great degree beneficial, have been removed by the presence of Europeans and the consequent inability of their chiefs and elders to enforce it; thus, lawless and unregulatedsometimes unwisely indulged, at others half-starvedsometimes clothed, at other times naked, the prey of his lusts and passionswhat wonder if the Aborigine goes rapidly to destruction and death! The writer has often said that such treatment as he has seen natives pursue among themselves was of a character which would kill a horse, much more a man. But supposing that such a system was to he instituted by the Government, it must not be expected that it would do everything which needs to be done for the Aborigines. There would still be necessary the unwearied efforts of the missionary of the Cross. The writer firmly believes that nothing but the gospel of Jesus Christ can save these natives from extinction. They are not an irreligious race. The term applied by Paul to the civilised and refined Athenians might be applied to them they are "very religious" (Acts xvii. 22)that is, so far as, the rites and observances of their system of belief are con