SEALERS V. BLACKS: A STRAITSMAN'S STORY.
(From notes supplied by Mr. Alexander M'Kay,)
But on the Natives of that Land misused,
Not long the silence of amazement hung,
Nor brooked they long their friendly faith abused;
For, with a common shriek, the general tongue
Exclaimed, 'To arms'—and fast to arms they sprung.
In the long contention between black and white, that followed their first rencontre at Risdon, on the 3rd of May, 1804, down to the submission of the last of the tribes to Mr. Robinson, 28th December, 1834, the worst disasters that our opponents suffered, were inflicted on them on the north-east coast of Tasmania, where (and where only) they had the worst of the fight.
These disasters were occasioned them by certain men of our own race, almost as savage as themselves, who occupied some of the islands of the straits, and were known in early history as the sealers of Banks' Straits, (that is that portion of Bass' Straits that lay between Flinders Island and the mainland, about Cape Portland). Of these men, of whom there were not thirty families or single individuals, very little intelligence has been preserved—at least in print—and of their many fights with the blacks, for the possession of their women, nothing that I know of has been communicated to the public except a few general remarks, written by myself, for the Australasian newspaper, about two years ago, which I collected from certain old M.S. documents that are preserved in the Colonial Secretary's office. But even these old papers contain few or no details of the many skirmishes that were fought out on the North East Coast between the sealers and the blacks, during the last 10 or 20 years of the existence of the native tribes at large, in which many lives were sacrificed on both sides. These fights ended mostly, but by no means always, to the disadvantage of the black race, who, in everything connected with bush fighting, were a very formidable foe.
