During my last Mission tour, in 1888, through Victoria and part of New South Wales, I visited all Stations of the Aborigines that could be conveniently reached. There the few remnants of a once numerous race are now assembled together. They try hard to constrain themselves to live in houses. But the spirit of the wanderer is in them. They start forth, every now and again, for an occasional ramble over their old hunting grounds, and to taste the sweets of freedom. In Victoria, the Government now provide food and clothing for the Aborigines who will remain at the appointed Stations, so that in regard to temporals the survivors are not badly off. Their religious training and spiritual interests are left entirely to the Churches. The Government provides a Superintendent at each Station; and where he is a Christian man, and takes any interest in the religion and morals of the tribes, contentment reigns. At Ramayeuk, for instance, the Superintendent is Rev. F. A. Haganeur; and he and his excellent wife regularly instruct the blacks. Nothing can be more delightful than the results. The faces of the people were shining with happiness. Their rows of clean and neat cottages were a picture and an emblem. In their Church, a Native woman played the harmonium and led the praise. I never had more attentive Congregations. On two occasions they handed me £5, collected at their own free will, for our Island Mission. Their School received from the Government examiners one of the highest percentages. Many at this Station have, after a consistent Christian life, died in the full hope of Glory together with Jesus.
At all the other Stations in Victoria the outward comforts of the Natives are attended to, but Superintendents ought to be appointed, in every case, to care for their souls as well as their bodies. For strong drink and other vices are rapidly sweeping the Aborigines away; and Australia has but short time to atone for the cruelties of the past, and to snatch a few more jewels from amongst them for the Crown of Jesus our Lord.
At my farewell meeting in Melbourne, Sir Henry Barkley presiding, I pleaded that the Colony should put forth greater efforts to give the Gospel to the Aborigines; I showed the idols which I had discovered amongst them; I read Nora’s letters, and, I may, without presumption, say, the “brute-in-human-shape” theory has been pretty effectually buried ever since.