The following instances will prove my assertion:  In the month of October 1838 I saw early one morning some natives in the public street in Perth, in the act of murdering a native woman, close to the store of the Messrs. Habgood; many Europeans were present, amongst others a constable; but there was no interference on their part until eventually the life of the woman was saved by the courage of Mr. Brown, a gardener in Perth, who rushed in amongst the natives and knocked down the man who was holding her; she then escaped into the house of the Messrs. Habgood, who treated the poor creature with the utmost humanity.  She was however wounded in several places in the most severe and ghastly manner.

A letter I received from Mr. A. Bussel (a settler in the southern part of the colony) in May 1839 shows that the same scenes are enacted all over it.  In this case their cow-keeper (the native whose burial is narrated above) was speared by the others.  He was at the time the hired servant of Europeans, performing daily a stated service for them; yet they slew him in open daylight, without any cause of provocation being given by him.

Again, in October, 1838, the sister of a settler in the northern district told me that, shortly before this period, she had, as a female servant, a most interesting little native girl, not more than ten or eleven years of age.  This girl had just learned all the duties belonging to her employment, and was regarded in the family as a most useful servant, when some natives, from a spirit of revenge, murdered this inoffensive child in the most barbarous manner, close to the house; her screams were actually heard by the Europeans under whose protection and in whose service she was living, but they were not in time to save her life.  This same native had been guilty of many other barbarous murders, one of which he had committed in the district of the Upper Swan, in the actual presence of Europeans.  In June 1839 he was still at large, unmolested, even occasionally visiting Perth.

CAUSES OF THEIR ATTACHMENT TO THEIR ROVING AND SAVAGE LIFE.

Their fondness for the bush and the habits of savage life is fixed and perpetuated by the immense boundary placed by circumstances between themselves and the whites, which no exertions on their part can overpass, and they consequently relapse into a state of hopeless passive indifference.

I will state a remarkable instance of this:  The officers of the Beagle took away with them a native of the name of Miago, who remained absent with them for several months.  I saw him on the north-west coast, on board the Beagle, apparently perfectly civilized; he waited at the gun-room mess, was temperate (never tasting spirits) attentive, cheerful, and remarkably clean in his person.  The next time I saw him was at Swan River, where he had been left on the return of the Beagle.  He was then again a savage, almost naked, painted all over, and had been concerned in several murders.  Several persons here told me, “you see the taste for a savage life was strong in him, and he took to the bush again directly.”  Let us pause for a moment and consider.