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COPY OF A LETTER*

FROM BANEELON, ONE OF THE NATIVES OF NEW SOUTH
WALES, NOW IN LONDON, TO IllS WIFE BARANGA-
R00, AT BOTANY HAY.
[From the Gazetteer.]

THOUGH this is a very fine country, my dear little
Barangaroo; though I every day see very fine
fights; and though there is great plenty of kangaroo~
and fish, yet I wish I were got back to my wife and
the woods, as I am afraid some accident will happen
to  me here; having just learnt that all the men in
King George's country are mad; as for some time past
I have heard them say nothing to one another but -
"What's the news ?" I said the same to one of them
this morning, and he told me very strange and sad
things indeed.
He said, that some months ago it was discovered
that a part of the tribe of English-gal^ meant to take
advantage of the rest, by putting every body upon the
same footing; and were desirous of ruining their own
country entirely, by way of being happy. That a
great many of the red men were called together, to pre-
vent their doing so, just as they used to prevent our
taking bread when we were hungry at Botany Bay. I
then asked him if the red men had killed them, as they
did some of the tribe of Comeringal in our country
and to my great astonishment he told me that the red
men had left all these mischievous men just as they
were, and gone across the great water to fight the tribe
of French-gal.
   When I asked, why they made war upon the tribe of
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* This letter appeared some months after the
declaration of war when Baneelon was in London.
^ Gal, in the language of the natives of New Holland is a kind of
generic termination, indicating a tribe or nation.

French

COPY OF A LETTER, &c.  115
French-gal, he told me, it was for fear the tribe of
French-gal should make war upon them some hundred
moons hence; and that the English, who were the
only people in this half of the globe who had cut ,off
the head of their chief, and made their own laws,
were resolved never to forgive the other tribe, because
they had cut off the head of their chief, and wanted to
make their own laws. He said, besides, that as it was
much to be feared that the tribe of French-gal might
fall out, and kill one another, the English, and a
number of other tribes, were gone to prevent it, by
killing the greatest number of them possible.- "Sun
and Moon!" exclaimed I, "can this be true?" And
the Englishman laid his hand upon his breast, and said
it was true.
He then went on to tell me, that because the other
tribes were afraid that certain opinions of the tribe of
French-gal should find their way into their country,
they sent thither all the Frenchmen they could lay
hold of; and that, because the French had threatened
to kill the princes of this country, the English princes
were gone to be killed in the country of the French.
Here, my dear Barangaroo, my patience ran away from
me, and I swore by my father's bones that the people of
this country must be mad. The Englishman, to
whom I was speaking, and who, I believe, is not quite
so mad as the rest, said, with the tears shinining in his
eyes, that he was afraid so too; and that very learned
men had proved, that the whole tribe of English-gal
went mad once in seven years. "And is there no
way of preventing it?" said I. "Alas! no," answered
he; "for we never find out that we have been
mad till seven year's after."
 It has been proposed to me to go and throw my spear
at the French', but I have always said, that, as the
French never took away my wife or stole my fishing-
nets, lines, and throwing-stick, I was not angry with
them;