Aboriginal Australians -- Government relations; Dunk Island (Qld.); Natural history -- Australia -- Queensland
Many other plants supply the means of killing small fish wholesale, or
of reducing them to palsied cripples. The three described are fairly
common, and have, therefore, been selected to point a moral. Poisoning
fish is a poor sort of sport, perhaps, but there are two classes of
fishermen--the hungry and the artistic. The latter use flimsy tackle and
complicated gear, and play the game, giving the victims to their wiles a
sporting chance. Though not the only representative of the hungry class,
the black boy generally fishes on an empty stomach, and his demeanour
coincides. No slobbering sentiment affects him. Yet he is not so cruel
as the mean white who throws a plug of dynamite into the river while
the fish are enjoying their crowded hour, though he will with as little
taint upon his conscience poison a pool full of fish as drag with hooked
stick a reluctant crab piecemeal from its burrow among the mangrove
roots. But then he is responding to the appeals of a clamant and
not over-particular stomach, while your dynamitard is occasionally a
well-fed barbarian with a queasy palate.
FLY-FISHING.
The neatest and most artistic method by which the blacks kill fish
necessitates the employment of a particular species of spider known to
the learned as NEPHILA MACULATA PISCATORUM. This spider was discovered
on Dunk Island by Macgillivray, the naturalist of the expedition of
H.M.S. RATTLESNAKE in 1848. It has a large ovate abdomen of olive-green
bespangled with golden dust; black thorax, with coral-red mandibles;
and long, slender legs, glossy black, and tricked out at the joints with
golden touches. A fine creature, gentle and stately in demeanour, it
spins a large web, strong enough to hold the biggest of beetles
and other insects, and, to harmonise with the superior air of the
manufacturer, the gossamer is of golden-green. The great spider at the
focus of the resplendent web is a frequent and conspicuous ornament
to the edges of the jungle, and having no fear, and no indocility of
temper, it undergoes the ordeal of admiration with an assumption
of disdainful coquettism. The local name of this comely creature
is “Karan-jamara.” Shameless polyandrist, she maintains several
consorts--from three to five seems to be the average number--and
they, semi-transparent, feeble, meek, subdued little fellows, maintain
precarious isolated existences in the outskirts of the web.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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