trackers be substituted (i.e., if the country can afford the expense); but, above all, the officers should be middle-aged men, who know something of the manners and customs of the natives; and the different officers should be kept in the same districts as long as possible, and encouraged to become acquainted with the peculiar habits and languages of the tribes therein residing; otherwise this force will become just as inefficient as the present one, and will only be able to make useless, because in many cases mistaken, reprisals.
The Native Police officers do their duty, as a rule, to the best of their ability, but under the existing system it is impossible for them to do anything more than they do at present. A young man is appointed to command a detachment of N.P. who knows nothing whatever about the aboriginals, and finding that his men are a lot of unruly turbulent savages, always ready to bolt, and only to be kept to their duty by the excitement of bloodshed, and that the traditions of "the force" are—study nothing of the native character or habits, but if sent for "disperse" the first camp you find near the scene of a felony, he naturally follows the usual course. There are certainly, a few thoughtful men in "the force" who endeavour to act in a different manner, but their individual efforts are vain under such a system.
Much has been written about reserves, but no one has yet suggested that the said reserves should be pastoral instead of agricultural. If, say, 500 square miles were reserved in each district, and stocked with sheep or cattle, it could be worked by niggers, and would be self-supporting immediately. The superintendent might be a police officer as well. He should encourage the blacks to camp on the reserve as much as possible; give them work when they wanted it; learn to know all the blacks in the district personally; supervise all agreements made between whites and aborigines; and see that the blacks are protected as well as the whites—particularly in their contracts; and also be empowered by law to administer corporal punishment in a summary manner, as in all dealings with the lower races flogging appears to be as necessary at times as with children; in fact, their minds not being developed as in civilised man, they are much the same, in feeling and ideas, as children. It is not surprising that agricultural reserves have been a failure—that they have been so hitherto is, I think, an acknowledged fact—as nature evidently intended man to pass through two stages before he arrived at the agricultural "house dweller." The Navajo Indian of New Mexico is just entering the pastoral stage, the Kaffir of South Africa is just emerging from it; and all attempts hitherto to force a race of men to jump from hunters to agriculturists have been a failure. the Tasmanian Government placed their aborigines on an island, and they fretted themselves to death, though rations and every necessary were provided. The U.S Government has for the last hundred years been placing the Indians who "came in" on agricultural reserves, with the result that (except a few Choctaws and Cherokees, who have become useful citizens) in a very few years the tribes have become extinct. Perhaps pastoral reserves should not be a success, but as we would be following Nature's teaching more closely tan in any other way, we should have a better chance of success. Almost anything would be better than the present system, which is a disgrace to civilisation. If we failed we should be no worse off than at present, and should have at least the merit of having done our best. Unless some measures are quickly taken, the Aboriginal Question will solve itself. Ten years ago the tribe I am best acquainted with could muster 130 fighting men; now it could not muster more than 40 at most, and few children are growing up. Measles in '65 and the vices of civilisation since have caused this rapid decrease. Yours &c.,
Cape River, June 12.
C.
—Queenslander, July 10, 1880.
Sir,—So much correspondence has appeared in your paper with reference to the aborigines of Queensland that it is with considerable diffidence I add to the bulk of it; but from the year 1863 to the present time having been familiar with the settlement of a large portion of Northern Queensland, extending from the Burdekin River to the western waters, I feel that a few remarks from me may not be out of place at this time. Without particularising the various letters and articles which have appeared in your paper—to none of which letters, however, have the names of the writers been attached, so that it is impossible for the uninitiated to judge of the amount of experience they bring to bear upon the question—it will be sufficient to re-
