The opinion of Judge Willis upon this point may be gathered from the following extract, from an address to a native of New South Wales, when passing sentence of death upon him:—­

“The principle upon which this court has acted in the embarrassing collisions which have too frequently arisen between the Aborigines and the white Europeans, has been one of reciprocity and mutual protection.  On the one hand, the white man when detected (which I fear seldom happens), has been justly visited with the rigour of the law, for aggressions on the helpless savages; and, on the other, the latter has been accountable for outrages upon his white brethren.  As between the Aborigines themselves, the court has never interfered, for obvious reasons.  Doubtless, in applying the law of a civilized nation to the condition of a wild savage, innumerable difficulties must occur.  The distance in the scale of humanity between the wandering, houseless man of the woods, and the civilized European, is immeasurable!  For protection, and for responsibility in his relation to the white man the black is regarded as A British subject.  In theory, this sounds just and reasonable; but in practice, how incongruous becomes its application!  As a British subject, he is presumed to know the laws, for the infraction of which he is held accountable, and yet he is shut out from the advantage of its protection when brought to the test of responsibility.  As a British subject, he is entitled to be tried by his peers.  Who are the peers of the black man?  Are those, of whose laws, customs, language, and religion, he is wholly ignorant—­nay, whose very complexion is at variance with his own—­his peers?  He is tried in his native land by a race new to him, and by laws of which he knows nothing.  Had you, unhappy man! had the good fortune to be born a Frenchman, or had been a native of any other country but your own, the law of England would have allowed you to demand a trial by half foreigners and half Englishmen.  But, by your lot being the lowest, as is assumed, in the scale of humanity, you are inevitably placed on a footing of fearful odds, when brought into the sacred temple of British justice.  Without a jury of your own countrymen—­without the power of making adequate defence, by speech or witness—­you are to stand the pressure of every thing that can be alleged against you, and your only chance of escape is, not the strength of your own, but the weakness of your adversary’s case.  Surrounded as your trial was with difficulties, everything, I believe, was done that could be done to place your case in a proper light before the jury.  They have come to a conclusion satisfactory, no doubt, to their consciences.  Whatever might be the disadvantages under which you laboured, they were convinced, as I am, that you destroyed