Interesting discussions have taken place as to whether the dingo is indigenous to Australia or whether it has come hither from some other land, possibly with man. The wild dog found in the mountains of Java certainly resembles the dingo very closely. Whether or no, the dingo has existed in Australia quite as long as the primitive tribes. Osseous remains of the wild dog have been found contemporaneous with the extinct Diprotodon and other pre-historic monsters. Indeed in the “mammalian drifts” filling the ancient valleys of the ranges in the Noarlunga district, south of Adelaide, bones of such animals have been found showing distinctly the teeth-marks of the dingo upon them. In Victoria, and New South Wales also, dog remains have been found in old cave deposits in company with fossil-mammals and struthious birds, often buried beneath the basaltic flows and ashes of Mount Gambier and other volcanoes, which have long since become dormant. It seems most probable, therefore, that the dingo existed in Australia in the Pliocene period, or at any rate in that immediately following it. It is a strange circumstance that the dingo has never been traced to Tasmania, although, immediately opposite that island on the mainland, the dog was most plentiful in by-gone times. The surmise is that the animal had in its migration not reached so far south before Tasmania was severed from the Australian continent by the breaking through of Bass Strait. It is reasonable to assume then that the dingo came to the south of Australia subsequent to the aboriginals who inhabited Tasmania.
CHAPTER XIV
HUNTING
True sportsman’s instinct—Comprehensive list of game—Land-snails—Fresh-water mussels—Marine molluscs—Caterpillars—Grubs—Tree-climbing—Trees felled by burning—Witchedy hook—Eggs of birds and reptiles—Snakes and lizards—Fishing methods described—A turtle hunt—Crocodile—Dugong—Hawk traps—Wild geese and other birds—The emu—Big game hunted by men—Opossums—Burrowing marsupials—Wallaby—Kangarooing expeditions—The buffalo—Wild bee honey—The honey ant.
Nothing surpasses the pleasure of real pristine chase. The aboriginal’s ideal of life is attained when he finds himself in hot pursuit of the game, which shares with him the wilds of his ancient haunts. He lives at an accelerated pace; his pulse quickens, and in his excitement he completely dissociates his mind from everything but the spoor of his prospective prey. His vision is focussed rigidly upon the fleeing animal—he is blind so far as any other objects are concerned—and, behind it, he beholds just the one picture of his ambition realized, viz. the “kill.”
The love of the sport, the keenness of the senses, and the astounding powers of endurance are natural attributes, which the aboriginal alone knows how to use to their fullest. These are the hereditary gifts of man which characterize the primitive hunter; and these are the instincts which modern representatives of the human species have deplorably neglected.
The object of the chase is, of course, in its original phase, to find the means wherewith to sustain the hunter’s existence. Although he loves the sport so well, a native will never kill wantonly; whatever is slain is eaten; to kill just for the pleasure of the thing is beyond his comprehension and clashes seriously with his profound notions of justice and fair-play being meted out to all his fellow-creatures.
Apart from some of the flabby marine creations, there are few things in the animal world which the aboriginal does not eat, either raw or cooked in ashes. Generally speaking, the male only hunts the larger mammals and such things as require expert knowledge to locate, or the taking of which is associated with adventure and skill. We shall consider a few items separately.
The larger land-snails are collected by the women in their food-carriers. After a good downpour of rain such come out from their hiding places in great numbers and can be collected in large numbers, but even in midsummer, in the ranges of central Australia, a meal of snails can at any time be secured by searching under tussocks and beneath stones. The principal species eaten by the Aluridja, Wongapitcha, and to a less extent by the Arunndta tribes, is the Helix perinflata. When sufficient have been collected, they are merely thrown upon hot ashes to roast and then picked out of the shell with a small pointed stick.
Fresh water mussels are gathered from the mud, roasted and consumed. These molluscs, known as the Unio, are very plentiful in some of the permanent water-holes, such as exist along the Cooper and Strzelecki Creeks in the Yantowannta, Wongkanguru, and Dieri country. Along the banks of the River Murray great heaps of the shells of such mussels are encountered by travellers even nowadays, indicating to what an enormous extent the molluscs were eaten by the extinct river tribes.