Less marked differences in frame and physiognomy between the different Australian tribes, have also been long known and definitely insisted upon.
Differences of customs and manners have been similarly noticed and considered. Notwithstanding all this, however, there is no opinion more generally admitted than the fundamental unity of the Australian population from Swan River to Botany Bay, from the Gulf of Carpentaria to Bass's Straits. Captain Grey, Schurman, Teichelman, and all who have devoted average attention to the language, have given their evidence to this; and they have supplied facts of various kinds, of their own collection, towards the proof of it. No man is less inclined to disturb this view than the present writer. In the Fourth Number of the Philological Transactions,[72] he enumerated the whole of the vocabularies then known to him, and added some short lists of the words wherein the more distant ones agreed with each other. Thus a scanty vocabulary from the Gulf of Carpentaria, which had seventeen words in common with one from Endeavour River, had three (perhaps four) identical.
| ENGLISH. | CARPENTARIAN. | ENDEAVOUR RIVER. |
|---|---|---|
| Eye | meal | meul. |
| Hair | marra | morye. |
| Fingers | mingel | mungal bah. |
As the Endeavour River was the nearest point to the Gulf of Carpentaria from which we possessed a vocabulary, the circumstance that no more than three words out of seventeen coincided, was a good measure of the extent to which the Australian dialects exhibited the phænomenon of difference. Still the likeness, as far as it went, was a fact to be admitted on the other side. Now, if we go round the whole coast of Australia, and compare the vocabulary from one point with the vocabulary of the next known locality to it, we shall find that, allowing for difference of distance, the similarity or dissimilarity is, there or thereabouts, the similarity or dissimilarity between the two vocabularies just mentioned, i.e., that the former is shown by the identity between a few fundamental terms, the latter by a discrepancy between the majority.
The comparison, however, of contiguous dialects—gives but one series of facts. It merely shows that we can go all round the island, and find that, of three dialects compared, the last shall have a partial agreement with the second; by no means showing that such (or, indeed, that any) similarity shall exist between the third and first. Nevertheless, for philological reasoning, such a similarity as the last is required. This we get at by two methods,—firstly, by comparing the vocabularies of distant points; secondly, by taking one, or more, particular vocabularies, and comparing them with some, or all, of the others en masse. By each of these processes, applied to Australian languages, we arrive at the same conclusion. The second will be considered in the sequel. A simple instance of the first is, that out of sixty words from Jervis's Bay, compared with sixty from Gulf St. Vincent, the following coincide:
| ENGLISH. | JERVIS'S BAY. | GULF ST. VINCENT. |
|---|---|---|
| Forehead | holo | ioullo. |
| Man | mika | meio. |
| Milk | awanham | ammenhalo. |
| Tongue | talen | talein. |
| Hand | maramale | malla. |
| Nipple | amgnann | amma. |
| Nails | berenou | pere. |
Premising now, that (as all the published grammars exhibit an agglutinate structure) the evidence taken from the grammatical character of the Australian languages is confirmatory rather than derogatory to the evidence taken from the comparison of vocabularies, we come to a fourth class of facts, viz., the extent to which two or more Australian dialects agree or disagree with some third language or class of languages; and as this involves the still more general question of the external relations of the Australian languages as a class, its consideration will be deferred for the present. At present it is sufficient to say that it is affirmative to a fundamental unity of tongue.
The kind of evidence from which we predicate this unity, is evidently of a cumulative kind; and it is merely the statement of its being of this sort that has been laid before the reader: the details would require either a larger volume than the present, or a special monograph. It may also be added, that as the Australian tribes differ more from one another in language than in any other respect, it is the philological portion of their ethnography that presents the most difficulties.
In respect to their manners, morals, and social customs, the similarity, lying less below the surface than it does with respect to their languages, has drawn less attention on the part of investigators. Still the way in which it shows itself is the same. Two neighbouring tribes shall differ more than two distant ones: so that similar customs shall re-appear in distant localities.
As to the physical conformation of the Australians, I believe that it is so uniform throughout the island, that it has never been made the basis of a division;—indeed I am inclined to believe that (like the dissimilarity of language) the similarity of external appearance has been over-rated; nevertheless, it is certain that there are deviations from the general slim and underfed condition of the body; and (what is of more importance), from the usual straight character of the hair. Such is the case, according to Mr. Earle, with the trepang fishers of Arnhem Bay who are bulky men, with broad chests, the lower extremities being but indifferently formed, and the crooked shin being common. Then as to the hair—with the Jaako, or Croker Island tribe, it is coarse and bushy (the whiskers being thick, and curly) and so short, crisp, and abundant about the breast and shoulders as to conceal the skin; whereas on the other hand, the Oitbo, or Bidjenelumbo, have straight silky hair, arched eyebrows, fair complexion, and occasionally the oblique eye.