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emma_in_dreamTopically, with the Black Lives Matter movement, I read Ernest Giles *Australian Twice Traversed* (1889) about his journeys through central Australia in 1872 and 1874.
Giles compiled the book from his records of his explorations of what is now South Australia, the Northern Territory and Western Australia, often entering as the first white person. He travelled with white companions, Aboriginal guides and sometimes cameleers.
The book has an odd twee tone. He puts in numerous unattributed quotes, amidst his discussions of wandering in a waterless void while his horses die and his companions suffer. He seems to have been completely unable to have a genuine emotional response to his life, just presenting a stiff upper lip.
He generally presents the indigenous population as an inevitable danger to explorers, much like the heat, the lack of water and the native animals. However, he does sometimes acknowledge that maybe there were reasons why he was not greeted with open arms by the people already living there.
'I knew as soon as I arrived in this region that it must be well if not densely populated, for it is next to impossible in Australia for an explorer to discover excellent and well watered regions without coming into deadly conflict with the aboriginal inhabitants. The aborigines are always the aggressors [sic], but then the white man is a trespasser in the first instance, which is a cause sufficient...'
Giles compiled the book from his records of his explorations of what is now South Australia, the Northern Territory and Western Australia, often entering as the first white person. He travelled with white companions, Aboriginal guides and sometimes cameleers.
The book has an odd twee tone. He puts in numerous unattributed quotes, amidst his discussions of wandering in a waterless void while his horses die and his companions suffer. He seems to have been completely unable to have a genuine emotional response to his life, just presenting a stiff upper lip.
He generally presents the indigenous population as an inevitable danger to explorers, much like the heat, the lack of water and the native animals. However, he does sometimes acknowledge that maybe there were reasons why he was not greeted with open arms by the people already living there.
'I knew as soon as I arrived in this region that it must be well if not densely populated, for it is next to impossible in Australia for an explorer to discover excellent and well watered regions without coming into deadly conflict with the aboriginal inhabitants. The aborigines are always the aggressors [sic], but then the white man is a trespasser in the first instance, which is a cause sufficient...'
