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FOR AUGUST 1795127garden at Paramatta is so situated by nature, that, in my opinion, it is impossible for art to form so rural a scene.Five miles from Paramatta is another village; at this place Go-vernment have a great deal of land in cultivation ; every mile you tiavel inland the soil improves ; at fourteen miles from the village of Irongabber is another settlement, called the Hawkesbury, at which place is a spacious fresh water river, and the soil rich; and I have not a doubt but in a short time this place will be very flourishing.The farmers are now gathering their wheat; it may appear to you extraordinary, but true it is, that the summers will produce two crops of vegetables. The quantity of timber surpasses all description, though the country has been so much cleared since I came; a great number of boats have been built, which supply us with plenty of fish, and the oysters are the largest I ever saw. About nine days sail from Sydney is Norfolk Island, a.most fertile place, about the size of the Isle of Wight. The natives in general of Botany Bay are tall and slender, have very black, curly hair, flat faces, and very large mouths; some of them run sticks through their noses ; they draw the front tooth in tribute to their chief; are much scarified on the back and breast, done by an oyster-shell cemented with gum at the end of the whommora (or throwing-stick); they talk very quick; dance by raising their arms and wheeling in a circle, at sometimes singing or making a confused noise. One of the females sits thumping her stomach, which gives a droll sound. They burn their dead; are very expert in throwing their spears, and with exactness, at a great distance ; their canoes are formed of solid bark, which they carve from the trees, by means of a stone axe; they fight in a most savage manner; their subsistence is chiefly on fish, the women being very expert at this duty ; their linek are curiously platted from the bark of trees, and the hook is a piece of bark; they assemble in small tribes, each having a different fire : the children when young ride on the parents shoulders, holding by the hair of the head; after death they expect a removal to the sun, which they worship ; they are a very dirty and lazy set of people.
Newspaper Details
London Free Mason Magazine
London, Middlesex, GB
Sat, Aug 01, 1795
Page 65
Full Page
Clipped by
Laura D.
AU 14 Mar 2024
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