The Sun.
London, England, 1842-05-17 00:00:00

THE ABORIGINES' P
SOCIETY.

'ROTECTION

The Fifth Annual Meeting of thts Society was held
yesterday at Exeter Hall. Among the ladies and
gentlemen present we noticed 'William Gore Ousely,
Esq., late Charge d'Affaires at Brazil ; Dr. Hodgkin,
Sir C. E. Smith, Bart., Wm. Tooke, Esq., Rev. John
Burnett, Josiah Forster, Esq., John Barton, Esq.,
Chevalier Dillon, Dr. Ernest Dieffenbach, Colonel
Jackson, Edward Backhouse, Esq., Mrs. Samuel
Gurney, Mrs. Amelia Opie, and several other ladies
of distinction.
The Chair having been taken, shortly after one
o'clock, by F. HODGKIN, Esq., M.D., the " Father of
the Society," the Secretary read the following
REPORT.

" The Aborigines' Protection Society are again met in
receive from their Committee a retrospective statement
of a year's exertions. Your Commttee are painfully
sensible that the Society has not attained to that magni-
tude and importance, or achieved those results which,
doubtless, their early friends, who five years since met to
receive their first annual report, might reasonably antici.
pate, when advocating so interesting and important a
cause, and appealing to a public at once enlightened and
benevolent. They are, nevertheless, encouraged to hope
that their constituents and the public will regard with
favourable indulgence the exertions of the past year.
From necessity and not from choice, their labours have
been proportioned to the smallness of their resourens,
rather than to the magnitude, and interest, and neces-
sities of their cause, yet in hopeful confidence they come
before you, trusting that the continuance of your interest,
and the increasing support of the public, may enable
their successors so to conduct the operations of the So-
ciety, that it may more nearly realize the hopes and
wishes of its founders. You will perceive from the ab-
stract of occurrences which this report contains, that the
past year, like its predecessors, has been fruitful in events
of great importance to the existence of' that portion of the
human race, in accordance with custom, rather than with

strict propriety, comprehended in the term Aborigines.
"It might naturally bo supposed that the exalted position
which man holds as the highest and noblest of living
creatures, would render an accurate knowledge of the
varieties into which his species is divided, a most legiti-
mate and interesting object of research ; yet so little
does this view of the subject engage attention, that it,
may safely be said, that man is less generally and mi-
nutely studied than many of the groups of inferior ani-
mals, whether they are numbered amongst the living
inhabitants of the globe, or are only known through
th, se organic remains which are scattered beneath its
surface.

" Important as the study of man must confessedly be,
as the highest object of natural history, the subject be-
comes far higher and more important, when we seek,
through its assistance, to trace out those families, into
which Sacred Record informs us that the decendants of
our first parents have been divided in their diffusion over
the surface of the terraqueous globe. How few are there
who most confidently believe in the common origin of
mankind, who can form any accurate idea of the divi-
sions and combinations of tribes which have taken place,
and how little has been done to prove, by the incontest-
able evidence of living witnesses, that the doubts of the
sceptic in this respect are manifestly groundless. Some
idea of the kind of interest connected with this inquiry
may be formed, if we take as an illustration the attention
which has been paid to any feasible inquiry as to what
is become of the lost tribes of the children of Israel.
Almost every branch of our great family is precisely in
the same state, and we must despair of arriving at any
satisfactory solution, if we allow tribe after tribe to be
sacrificed to our cupidity.
" Your Society do not limit themselves to a particular
portion of the globe, because from all quarters, in which
civilised and uncivilised men are brought into contact,
they may derive those facts which serve to prove the
aggressive character of the former, and to engage the
most attentive interest, and call forth the strongest
sympathy on behalf of the latter.
" At the meeting of the Society last year, the most
gratifying announcement the Committee had to make
related to Western Australia, where a colony had been
founded, under the auspices of the Western Australian
Company, consisting of London merchants and eapital-
ists, who gave assurances that they would surpass all
their predecessors in their efforts to benefit rather than
injure the natives of the soil which they proposed to ap-
propriate; nor could a stronger proof of the merits of
their assurances have been given than the fact, that the
Company offered, if sanctioned by Government, to send
out a Commissioner nominated by your Society, for the
express purpose of making himself thoroughly
acquainted with the natives and their territory;
in order to frame on the spot measures cal-
culated to secure their existence and well-being
in peaceful alliance with their new neighbours. The most
gratifying encouragement, and fullest co-operation was
given at the Colonial-office, and your Committee had
the satisfaction of securing a Commissioner who raised
their hopes in proportion to their entire confidence in
his qualifications for the task assigned him. It is not
for this Committee to dive into or judge of the reasons
which led the Directors of the Company to decline car-
rying out their proposal when preparations were so far
completed. But the Committee would not be doing jus-
tice to themselves if they omitted to state that they did
not relinquish their hopes of success until much time and
careful attention had been devoted to the subject.
" AMERICA.

" With regard to the Aborigines of British possessions
in North America, your Committee regrets the defi-
ciency of documentary evidence, and the want of in-
formation bearing on those people. '
" The little remnant of Micmacs, cut off from com-
munication with kindred tribes, and leading a semi-
civilized life, on a greatly restricted and inadequate ter-
ritory, have sought, by the personal application of a
deputation from their number, relief at the hands of the
Colonial Department of the mother country ; and your
Committee feel unfeigned pleasure in stating that the re-
ception with which those Indians were favoured by the
present head of that department, Lord Stanley, warrants
the hope that the petition will not have been heard in
vain. Through the kind attention of the Rev. Egerton
Ryeson, the Editor of the Christian Guardian, your
Committee have received repeated accounts of the suc-
cessful operations of missions in isolated Indian villages.
The Mohawk children are advancing in school educa-
tion, and the converts to Christianity in the Credit, Rice
Lake, and Muncey settlements, maintain their improved
character with respect to temperance, and are advancing
in agriculture and domestic comfort—facts which esta-
blish the feasibility of those reforms in regard to the
treatment of the Indian population of our North Ame-
rican provinces, for which this Society has perseveringly
pleaded.
" The difficulties which for some time continued to
exist in the arrangements with the Cherokees, subse-
quently to their removal, have, it appears, been satis-
factorily terminated ; and private accounts from IVashin-
ton announce that the enlightened chief John Ross had
received the payment of many thousand dollars due to
his tribe.

" The Chippewa chief, Hesh-ton-i-quet, who formerly
resided within the Canadian frontier, and has often been
mentioned in the publications of your SoCie!y, states in
a recent letter, that the payment of his land is still with-
held, though ordered, nearly two years since, by the
authorities at Washington. The natural consequence
of this delay has been greatly to discourage the efforts of
the chief and his companions, who have been subjected

to insurmo
stock and seed.
I:aitable difficulties in the want of implements
"The Indians of Guiana next demand attention, to
which they have a stronger claim from this Society, as
they are numbered amongst British subjects. It was
announced in last year's Report that the accomplished
traveller, and much esteemed honorary member of this
Society, R. H. Schomburgk, was actually engaged in the
service of the British Government for the settlement of
that disputed boundary, the uncertainty of which ex-
posed the Indians residing upon it, to the kidnap-
ping incursions of Brazilian slave-dealers. From
accounts received, it appears that the Commissioner
has diligently proceeded with his task, yet, from
unexplained causes, the British Government has
thought it right not to maintain the boundary as defined
by him. The kidnappers are consequently still zit li-
berty to enjoy the benefits of that uncertainty which
it is so much their interest to-gee perpetuated; and there
is reason to fear that the simile long since employed 6y an
acute American Indian, may be applicable to the Indians
of Guiana, namely, that the English and their rivals are
like the blades of a pair of scissors, which are brought
together in apparent opposition, whilst the poor Indians
are like a piece of paper placed between them, which re-
ceives all the mischief. Mr. Schomburgk while engaged
in his official duties, has not been unmindful of his In-
dian friends, and has exerted himself to save from con-
demnation a native youth, supposed to have forfeited his
life by conforming to the customs of his tribe, in opposi-
tion to British laws, of which he could have no knowledge.
"It becomes the painful duty of your Committee to
state, in relation to the Indians of South America, that
the proceedings of the remarkable Botocudo Indian Chid,
Guido Poerane, have not been such as to realise the
pleasing anticipations which the accounts published in a
former year were calculated to excite.
" A UST RAL ASIA.
" In the district of New Soutb Wales, ;:ne settler's on
the rivers Ovens, Hume, and Clarence„ have more or less
suffered in the loss of cattle and sheep speared by the
natives, and in addition, at tho latter locality, two set-
tlers have been murdered while, on the other hand,
about twenty of the natives have been killed by a pp.rty
of mounted police, under the command of Major Henry
Oakes ; and for the murder of Mr. Stapleton and his
servant, at Moreton Bay, two natives, named Merridio
and Neugevil, have paid the forfeit of their lives one the
scaffold. A settler at New England has had 1,200 sheep
slaughtered, besides aoo driven into the bush, and his
shepherd murdered. •
" In the vicinity of Port Phillip, a settler and his ser-
vant have been murdered by the natives.
" In the neighbourhood of South Australia, 800 sheep
have been carried off from one station, and a shepherd
severely wounded ; and from another 900 sheep, 'and
the shepherd killed. But the most deplorable accounts
of all, are the impediments thrown in the way of trans-
portinc, cattle and sheep over land from Sydney to
Adelaide. Vast destructiotr of property and loss of life,
both on the part of the Europeans and natives, has taken
place,—calamities, however, which have fallen most
heavily on the latter people, being in the proportion of
more than forty to one.
" In Western Australia, in consequence of a murder
having been committed on a settler by some person; or
persons unknown, an attempt was made to capture a
tribe of blacks on suspicion, and, as they resisted, five of
them were shot. While government and goverbrs
therefore, whose duty it is to watch with equal anxious
solicitude, the Aborigines and the colonists, are regard-
less of that duty, the assumed and the real proprietors of
the soil, or in other words, the colonists and the natives,
are waging wars, if not of extermination, of utter ruin to
one or other of the parties--wars which, if justifiable,
as defensive on the part of the natives, on. that of the
colonists, are not only unjust, but decidedly unchristian.

'‘ TASMANIA.

" It is always with heartfelt ;rrow that your Com-
mittee allude to the natives of Van Diemen's Land. The
poor remnant of that race, amounting now only to fifty-
seven souls, are still imprisoned—for an imprisonment it
must be considered—on Flinder's Island. A year or tivo
more, and they will be among the extinct nations. It
will then be impossible for the reflecting mind to turn
from the page which records their history, without being
strongly impressed with the feeling, that a barbarous
race have been consigned to a premature grave, by a
nation, rendered the more criminal, because they epic'!" '
the blessings of Christianity.
" NEW ZEALAND.

" Your Committee feel convinced, from the impartial
and accurate information they have received, that if ever
a nation of barbarians could be rescued from their own
helpless situation, and from the baneful influence of colo-
nization, and be destined to contradict the fallacious
dogma of the necessary extermination of coloured men
by European settlement, the New Zealanders are that

nation • a result your Committee especially anticipate,
from the fact, that the New Zealanders are an agricultural
people, and accustomed to fixed habitations. But they
are, at the same time perfectly aware, that this advan-
tage over other barbarous races is of no avail, if a
sufficiency of land is not secured to them, on a uniform
principle of reserves, alike applicable to the lands of the
Government, of the New Zealand Land Company, and
of private purchasers. As the most vital point therefore
in future legislation, must be regarded that of the native
territorial rights. No act of the Legislature has as yet
appeared, setting forth the intentions of Government re-
garding native reserves in the districts purchased by the
local government of New Zealand.
" The appointment of Mr. Halswell as a Commissioner
of native lands by the New Zealand Company, has not
produced the expected beneficial result, for on the arrival
of that gentleman in New Zealand, he was restricted to
Port Nicholson, and to a nominal situation, as sub-pro-
tector of that district, under the orders of Mr. Clark, the
chief-protector, appointed by Governor Hobson.

" AFRICA.
" That large corner of the African continent which
forms the British colony of the Cape, is in itself an Eng-
land beyond the seas, and the dwellers in Caffraria are
among the most important of 'the aboriginal nations of
the earth. To them especial attention is therefore
In the last year's Report your Committee had to treat
of the Caffre contracts with the Governor, who met the
chiefs for the especial purpose of modifying the treaties,
so that Colonist and Caffre might find them useful, and
consider them as binding. Almost monthly accounts
have been received from the colony, yet scarcely one
authenticated case throughout the year of actual aggres.
Sion on the part of the Caffres, nor of any infraction of the
treaties on either side has occurred.

" In performing the last act of their official duties in
concluding this Report, your Committee desire very
closely but respectfully to press upon your consideration
the state of the great cause in which you are engaged,
as sketched in the Report, and the very weak and low
condition of your Society in relation to it. Whilst such
a Society attests the existence of acknowledged evils, it
seems to behove us all in good earnest to make efforts
for their correction. The work is confessedly difficult,
but it must not be regarded as impracticable, when as yet
no effort has been made from which any signal success
could reasonably be anticipated. Noble acts have indeed
been performed, but they have unhappily been isolated,
and consequently almost fruitless. May your counte-
nance and support be given to future Committees, in such
a manner as to strengthen their hands, and inspire in-
creasing zeal and energy. They then may reasonably
hope to diffuse knowledge and right feeling amongst
their countrymen, and they may plead with success
when they pray that the Government, amidst numerous.
and pressing cares, may deem it worthy' of its notice, to,
legislate for a just and systematic conduct toWards the:
Aborigines of our colonies-7a work which-would be no •
less honourable to those engaged in it, than cheering, to
the friends of humanity, and fraught with blessings to I
the feeble races of man."

Dr. GARNIER then moved, " That the Report now
produced be printed, under the direction of the Com-
mittee."

A. B. WRIGHT, Esq., briefly seconded the motion,
which was carried unanimously.
The Rev. J. BURNETT then moved the following
resolution :—" That this Society, whilst gratefully
acknowledging the adoption of various measures for
the protection of the Aborigines, on the part of the
Government, cannot be insensible to the fact—that

their claims, and the necessity of strenuous interpo-
sition for their preservation and improvement, remain
unabated, and feels most anxious that there may be
no remission in efforts in their behalf, until, as res-
pects this country at least, an improved system shall
have been adopted, by which, in the British Colonies
and their vicinity, the Aborigines may fully partici-
pate in the protection and privileges of British law,
and the fostering care of the mother country." He
was persuaded that the real objects of the Society
were not understood by the public in general ; if they
were the public would feel at not having given it
greater support. The Society had been formed for
protection of the Aborigines all over the world, and
surely that object ought to excite kind and generous
sympathy. It was impossible to make any progress
in discovery without coming into contact with the
native population ; and it was impossible to proceed
in our researches without either being affiliated to
them, or else resorting to the most deadly warfare.—
(Hear, hear.) It had often been regretted that we
possess no better knowledge of the natives of the inte-
rior of South America and of New Holland. If the
natives knew what they had too much reason to ex-
pect from us, they would rejoice at our not having
penetrated their fastnesses.—(Hear, hear.) It was said
that they were barbarians. Admitting the fact, it
formed no reason why we should take away their
lives ' • but as we had found means of entrapping
their lions and tigers, and wolves and hyaenas, so let
us now find some means of attaching them to our-
selves by kind and generous treatment. He was
ashamed to be obliged to admit that his country had I
not been the schoolmaster of the aboriginal tribes of 1
the world, but their executioner.—(Hear, hear.) He ,
pointed out that, with respect to improvements, it was

Useless to look te.the Government for the initiative.
In`alr periods of history Governments were never
found commencing any course of improvement, or
aiding it, till the people forced it upon them. It was
not to the Government that they must look for com-
mencing any work to save the Aborigines of the
world from ruin. It had not supported the measures
that had been recommended by this Society, and why r
because the public was not sufficiently alive to the im-
portance of the subject, and if they went to the Go-
vernment without backers they would get very little
there. He urged on all the necessity of supporting,
this Society, on the ground that those who did not do
all in their power to prevent great evils must be held,
to be in part guilty of those evils. He showed that
by -introducing civilization, among the Aborigines,,
this country would be benefited, from the demand
that would spring up for our manufactures, while the
native tribes would also become valuable producers of
commodities which this country consumed. Having
dwelt feelingly on the blessings that would follow
from,the world living in a state of universal brother-
hood, he noticed the objection that had been made,
that civilization could not be introduced, if the efforts
for that end were separated from the introduction of
Christianity, and observed, that there was an impres-
sion that this attempt would fail, as all others had
done. In this there were many errors. He denied
that the attempts to civilize barbarous tribes had
failed, because the introduction of Christianity was
not associated with the labour, but because the public.
did not sufficiently enter into the importance of those
labours. This Society was one for interposing between
their own people and the Aborigines of the earth,
when engaged in deadly conflict, and prevented
them from destroying each other. It was a peace-
making :society -- a police society, if they liked,
for the whole world.—(Hear, hear.) 'Was there
any one who would not assist in the efforts
of such a Society ? If the Government could be told
that the great hill up stairs had been crowded with a
meeting, feeling a strong and holy indignation at the
injuries inflicted on the Aborigines of the earth, they
would find that a measure would soon be laid before
Parliament on the subject. The Government would
then take the initiative in formal legislation, but the
initiative would really have been with the public. To
accososslish their ends, a statement of the facts and
principles connected with the subject was necessary,
and this could only be done by meetings, not in Lon-
don only, but in all parts of the kingdom. They-
wanted a grand general movement on the
question, but how could they ' get this with-
out funds ? The Society was left without funds
and could not act; it could not tell upon the com-
munity—it had not the means of reaching the ear of-
the public at large. Let the meeting help it, then
in its future struggles, taking this consideration with:.
them, that in the present state of this country emigra-
tion must increase; and if this must be the case—if
they must create new empires in the east and west,
let them not be as they had hitherto been—empires
founded in blood, 'and consecrated by murder.—
(Cheers.) Sad ! sad, was the, history of British colo-
nisation-. The history of no community exhibited
evils more frightful than the history of British emi-
gration, if faithfully given. Let them make it., then,
in future, a work, not of danger, but of peace—not
of invasion of foreign tribes and people, but of amal-
gamation with them—not of attempts to plant our
feet on the necks of those feebler than themselves,
but of becoming acquainted with to whom we may be
useful, and who may be useful to ourselves. Let
them make the work of emigration so pure, so moral,
so hallowed, so just, so sternly honourable, that no
one need either be afraid or ashamed of the name of
emigrant. lie concluded by enforcing the necessity
Of egrryingsnat the plans of the Society with regard
to all the countries mentioned in the Report.
W. GORE 0 USELY, Esq. (late Charge d'Affaires at
Brazil), seconded the resolution. He said, in seconding
this resolution, I avail myself of the opportunity of
expressing, as a new member of this Association, the
high opinion which I entertain of its praiseworthy
objects, and the extreme satisfaction with which I
perceive that its efforts have not been useless in. call-
ing attention in this country to the duty of affording
to numerous aboriginal races of mankind that protec-
tion to which they have now a just claim from I
Great Britain. My opinions have, am well aware,
no other weight than that which may be Billowed on
the score of personal experience, and an observa-
tion of several years, both in North and South Aine-
rice. That experience goes to prove that without now
referring to those great principles of justice and be-
nevolence upon which this Society is founded, the
best policy for our Colonists to pursrie, is that of ob-
servance, not only of strict equity, hut of the greatest
forbearance 'towards the native tribes with whom they-
may be in contact. lam convinced, from what
have-seen, that well-directed and supported efforts to
conciliate, civilize, and render them useful allies, in-
stead of bitter enemies, will. never be made uselessly;
It is with regret, also, that I have observed, that in
almost every instance of asserted aggression or out-
rage on the part of native tribes, or wherever an
apparent character of determined hostility or fero-
city has been exhibited by them, it could be
traced to wrongs inflicted, in the first instance, on:
the part of the white man, or a violation of all jus-
tice and a denial of rights evinced towards them by
more civilized communities. One of the permanent
and necessary characteristics of this Society, which
formed an additional inducement in my own case for be-
ing desirous of the honour of belonging to it, is the total
absence of all political party spirit or bias tin its object
and composition ; still it may be allowable to express.
the deep feeling of satisfaction with which I have
seen the late declaration of the distinguished Minister
who presides over the Colonial Department of
her Majesty's Government, that attempts such as that
lately made at Natal, in the neighbourhood of
the Cape of Good Hope, will not be allowed
to succeed. I may also be permitted to feel and
express some self-gratulation that the form of Govern-
ment under which we have the advantage of living
enables that Government (possessing, as it does, the
greatest and most important colonial empire that the
world ever saw,) to interfere effectually whenever
necessary, for the protection of those aboriginal
possessors of the territories that our Government now
occupies, from the interested and short-sighted op-
pression exercised towards them by its own subjects.
I trust that the efforts of this Society may become.
practically ancillary to the just and humane policy
adopted by her Majesty's Government towards the
numerous aboriginal tribes under its protection.
H. TINDAL ATKINSON, Esq., seconded the resolution,
in an animated and eloquent address. He could not
conceal from himself that humanity must shudder on
perusing the " History of Colonization." The first
step taken on the settlement in Van Diemen's Land
was to slaughter men, `women, and children. The
history of the unfortunate people in South Africa
would ever be a stain upon the policy of England.
The Boers had come out, they had much to answer
for, their path was tracked with blood, and they had
recklessly sacrificed human life. It had been said,
what had Government done in the initiative for the
improvement of the people ? liie answered, nothing ;
they had left the whole to the people.—(Cheers.)
He trusted that the public would rally round insti-
tutions like the present, and in that hope he would
most cordially support the resolution.
The resolution was then put by the CHAIRMAN, and
declared to be carried unanimously.
Sir C. E. SMITH moved the next resolution
" That this Society recognises the great importance of
investigating and recording facts connected with:the pre-
sent moral and physical condition of the uncivilised races
of man, with a view to the elucidation of their origin,
and the adaptation of suitable measures for the introduc-
tion of the arts of civilised life and intellectual culture,
as offering the most availing means of arresting the pro-
gress of evil, and aiding in the introduction of the bles-
sings of Christianity."
He believed that nothing but Christianity would arm
that Society with success, and it was therefore their
duty to extend its principles as much as possible.
DANIEL LISTER, Esq., seconded, the resolution.
The great object of the meeting was to get rid of the
difficulties that attended the colonisation of other
countries, which he believed was only to. be effected
by the introduction of Christianity.
The resolution was then put to the meeting, and
declared to be carried unanimously.
The SECRETARY, in announcing that Mr. Tooke,
Esq., would move the next resolution, stated that
that gentleman had, since entering the room, sub-
scribed two guineas to the funds of the Society.
Mr. TOOKE then came forward and said that he
had not. intended that the latter part of the informa-
tion should have been communicated to the meeting.
He had been a pleased and an instructed auditor of
their proceedings, and felt as they all must have felt,
that their best thanks were due to their Chairman
for the zeal and ability which he had ever displayed
in promoting. the interests of the Society.—(Cheers.)
There could be no _doubt but that his endeavours

must be ultimately successful. Dr. Hodgkin would
enrol his name on that small Fist of practical philan-
thropists, to whom was due the credit of having ori-
ginated great designs.—(Loud cheers.) The Hon.
Gentleman concluded by moving the thanks of the
meeting to Dr. Ibdgkin for his able conduct in the
Chair.

LINsTANT, of Hayti, seconded the motion,
which was carried by acclamation.
The c.ompliment having been acknowledged by Dr.
Honce_aN, the meeting separated.

- - -
THE cONFLAGRATIOX AT HAMBURG H.—The Queen,
ith tier usual sympathy and feeling for the sufferings
of the distressed, has ordered 2001. to be transmitted by
Messrs. Coutts and Co. in aid of the fund for the relief
of the Ilatuburghers deprived of their homes and all
they possessed by the recent calamitous fire. Prince
Albert has sent 100/, for the same benevolent object.
The number thus deprived of shelter is estimated at
30,000. 10,000/. was sent over in dollars and money by
the steamer, subscribed by some of the public cm'
panies, merchants, bankers, and others in the course of
three days after the news of the catastrophe WIIS kft"ll
in-London.