The Aborigines of Victoria, with Notes relating to the Habits of the Natives of other Parts of Australia and Tasmania

Abstract

IN these two bulky volumes we are for the first time presented with a really comprehensive account of the natives of Australia; and by their timely publication under the auspices of the Victorian Government an emphatic reply is given to the charge often brought against the colonists of indifference to the past history, present condition, and ultimate fate of those races. The work, whose tide gives a very imperfect idea of its varied contents, may be best described as a complete encyclopædia of Australian folk-lore, as complete, at least, as a judicious utilisation of all available materials could render it. As such, its appearance may fairly be regarded as an “epoch-making” event in the progress of ethnological studies, performing much the same office for the Australian that the writings of Castren, Uslar, and Bleek, and the Schoolcraft series have done for the Finno-Tartar, Caucasian, South-African, and North-American races. In the character and selection of the subject-matter it bears most resemblance to this last-named compilation, while differing widely from it in the method of its treatment, the confusion and discordant elements inseparable from Schoolcraft's erratic plan being here avoided by a clear arrangement of the materials and a uniform system consistently adhered to throughout.

The Aborigines of Victoria, with Notes relating to the Habits of the Natives of other Parts of Australia and Tasmania.

Compiled from various sources for the Government of Victoria by R. Brough Smyth., &c. 2 vols. (London: Trübner and Co., 1878.)

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