xiety with us all. About noon the whole tribe took
to the river, with the exception of the two old men, the tall man, and
their two gins.

SINGULAR CEREMONIES.

These persons had followed us far, gathering the tribes and leading them
forward to pilfer; but the ceremony they went through when the others
were gone was most incomprehensible, and seemed to express no good
intentions. The two old men moving slowly, in opposite directions, made
an extensive circuit of our camp; the one waving a green branch over his
head and occasionally shaking it violently at us, and throwing dust
towards us, now and then sitting down and rubbing himself over with dust.
The other took the band from his head and waved it in gestures equally
furious, occasionally throwing dust also. When they met, after each had
paced half round our position, they turned their backs on each other,
waving their branches as they faced about, then shaking them at us, and
afterwards again rubbing themselves with dust. On completing their
circumambulation they coolly resumed their seats at a fire some little
way from our camp. An hour or two after this ceremony I observed them
seated at a fire made close to our tents, and on going out of mine, they
called to me, upon which I went and sat down with them as usual, rather
curious to know the meaning of the extraordinary ceremony we had
witnessed. I could not however discover any change in their demeanour;
they merely examined my boots and clothes, as if they thought them
already their own. Meanwhile king Peter and his tribe were much more
sensibly occupied in the river, catching fishes.

ICHTHYOPHAGI. THEIR MANNER OF FISHING.

These tribes inhabiting the banks of the Darling may be considered
Ichthyophagi, in the strictest sense, and their mode of fishing was
really an interesting sight. There was an unusually deep and broad reach
of the river opposite to our camp, and it appeared that they fished daily
in different portions of it, in the following manner. The king stood
erect in his bark canoe, while nine young men with short spears went up
the river, and as many down, until, at a signal from him, all dived into
it, and returned towards him, alternately swimming and diving;
transfixing the fish under water, and throwing them on the bank. Others
on the river brink speared the fish when thus enclosed as they appeared
among the weeds, in which small openings were purposely made that they
might see them. In this man