A fair idea of the size and weight of the boomerang may be gained by the measurements of the weapon which has just been mentioned. It is two feet nine inches long when measured with the curve, and two feet six inches from tip to tip. It is exactly two inches in width, only narrowing at the tips, and its weight is exactly eleven ounces. This, by the way, is a war boomerang, and is shaped like that which is shown in “Boomerangs” on page 731, fig. 3. Another specimen, which is of about the same weight, is shaped like that of fig. 8. It measures two feet five inches along the curve, two feet one inch from tip to tip, and is three inches in width in the middle, diminishing gradually toward the tips.

In order to enable them to ward off these various missiles, the natives are armed with a shield, which varies exceedingly in shape and dimensions, and, indeed, in some places is so unlike a shield, and apparently so inadequate to the office of protecting the body, that when strangers come to visit my collection I often have much difficulty in persuading them that such strange-looking objects can by any possibility be shields. As there is so great a variety in the shields, I have collected together a number of examples, which, I believe, comprise every form of shield used throughout Australia. Two of them are from specimens in my own collection, several from that of Colonel Lane Fox, others are drawn from examples in the British Museum, and the rest were sketched by Mr. Angas in the course of his travels through Australia.

As a general fact, the shield is very solid and heavy, and in some cases looks much more like a club with which a man can be knocked down, than a shield whereby he can be saved from a blow, several of them having sharp edges as if for the purpose of inflicting injury.

If the reader will look at the row of shields on page 742, he will see that figs. 2 and 3 exhibit two views of the same shield. This is one of the commonest forms of the weapon, and is found throughout a considerable portion of Western Australia. It is cut out of a solid piece of the ever useful gum-tree, and is in consequence very hard and very heavy. As may be seen by reference to the illustration, the form of the shield is somewhat triangular, the face which forms the front of the weapon being slightly rounded, and the handle being formed by cutting through the edge on which the other two faces converge. The handle is very small, and could scarcely be used by an ordinary European, though it is amply wide enough for the small and delicate looking hand of the Australian native. My own is a small hand, but is yet too large to hold the Australian shield comfortably.

The reader will see that by this mode of forming the handle the wrist has great play, and can turn the shield from side to side with the slightest movement of the hand. This faculty is very useful, especially when the instrument is used for warding off the spear or the club, weapons which need only to be just turned aside in order to guide them away from the body.

One of these shields in my own collection is a very fine example of the instrument, and its dimensions will serve to guide the reader as to the usual form, size, and weight of an Australian shield. It measures exactly two feet seven inches in length, and is five inches wide at the middle, which is the broadest part. The width of the hole which receives the hand is three inches and three-eighths, and the weight of the shield is rather more than three pounds.

The extraordinary weight of the shield is needed in order to enable it to resist the shock of the boomerang, the force of which may be estimated by its weight, eleven ounces, multiplied by the force with which it is hurled. This terrible weapon cannot be merely turned aside, like the spear or the waddy, and often seems to receive an additional impulse from striking any object, as the reader may see by reference to page 737, in which the mode of throwing the boomerang is described. A boomerang must be stopped, and not merely parried, and moreover, if it be not stopped properly, it twists round the shield, and with one of its revolving ends inflicts a wound on the careless warrior.

Even if it be met with the shield and stopped, it is apt to break, and the two halves to converge upon the body. The very fragments of the boomerang seem able to inflict almost as much injury as the entire weapon; and, in one of the skirmishes to which the natives are so addicted, a man was seen to fall to the ground with his body cut completely open by a broken boomerang.

It is in warding off the boomerang, therefore, that the chief skill of the Australian is shown. When he sees the weapon is pursuing a course which will bring it to him, he steps forward so as to meet it; and, as the boomerang clashes against the shield, he gives the latter a rapid turn with the wrist. If this manœuvre be properly executed, the boomerang breaks to pieces, and the fragments are struck apart by the movement of the shield.

Perhaps some of my readers may remember that “Dick-a-dick,” the very popular member of the Australian cricketers who came to England in 1868, among other exhibitions of his quickness of eye and hand, allowed himself to be pelted with cricket balls, at a distance of fifteen yards, having nothing wherewith to protect himself but the shield and the leowal, or angular club, the former being used to shield the body, and the latter to guard the legs. The force and accuracy with which a practised cricketer can throw the ball are familiar to all Englishmen, and it was really wonderful to see a man, with no clothes but a skin-tight elastic dress, with a piece of wood five inches wide in his left hand, and a club in his right, quietly stand against a positive rain of cricket-balls as long as any one liked to throw at him, and come out of the ordeal unscathed.

Not the least surprising part of the performance was the coolness with which he treated the whole affair, and the almost instinctive knowledge that he seemed to possess respecting the precise destination of each ball. If a ball went straight at his body or head, it was met and blocked by the shield; if it were hurled at his legs, the club knocked it aside. As to those which were sure not to hit him, he treated them with contemptuous indifference, just moving his head a little on one side to allow the ball to pass, which absolutely ruffled his hair as it shot by, or lifting one arm to allow a ball to pass between the limb and his body, or, if it were aimed but an inch wide of him, taking no notice of it whatever. The shield which he used with such skill was the same kind as that which has just been described, and was probably selected because its weight enabled it to block the balls without the hand that held it feeling the shock.

To all appearances, the natives expend much more labor upon the shield than upon the boomerang, the real reason, however, being that much ornament would injure the boomerang, but can have no injurious effect upon the shield. By reference to the illustration, the reader will see that the face of the shield is covered with ornament, which, simple in principle, is elaborate in detail.

There is a specimen in my collection which is ornamented to a very great extent on its face, the sides and the handle being perfectly plain. It has a number of lines drawn transversely in bands, which, however, are seven instead of five in number. Each band is composed of three zigzag grooves, and each groove has been filled with red ochre. The space between is filled in with a double zigzag pattern, and the effect of all these lines, simple as they are, is perfectly artistic and consistent.

The pattern, by the way, is one that seems common to all savage races of men, wherever they may be found, and is to be seen on weapons made by the ancient races now long passed away, among the Kaffir tribes of South Africa, the cannibal tribes of Central Western Africa, the inhabitants of the various Polynesian islands, the savages of the extreme north and extreme south of America, and the natives of the great continent of Australia.

At fig. 7 of the accompanying illustration may be seen a shield made of solid wood, in which the triangular form has been developed in a very curious manner into a quadrangular shape. The handle is made in the same manner as that of the former shield, i. e. by cutting through two of the faces of the triangle, while the front of the shield, instead of being a tolerably round face, is flattened out into a sharp edge. It is scarcely possible to imagine any instrument that looks less like a shield than does this curious weapon, which seems to have been made for the express purpose of presenting as small a surface as possible to the enemy.

The fact is, however, that the Southern Australian who uses these shields has not to defend himself against arrows, from which a man can only be defended by concealing his body behind shelter which is proof against them: he has only to guard against the spear and boomerang, and occasionally the missile club, all which weapons he can turn aside with the narrow shield that has been described.

One of these shields in my collection is two feet seven inches in length, rather more than six inches in width, and barely three inches thick in the middle. Its weight is just two pounds. Such a weapon seems much more like a club than a shield, and, indeed, if held by one end, its sharp edge might be used with great effect upon the head of an enemy. Like most Australian shields, it is covered with a pattern of the same character as that which has already been mentioned, and it has been so thoroughly painted with ochre that it is of a reddish mahogany color, and the real hue of the wood can only be seen by scraping off some of the stained surface. The name for this kind of shield is tamarang, and it is much used in dances, in which it is struck at regular intervals with the waddy.

In the British Museum is a shield which is much more solid than either of those which have been described. The manufacturer evidently found the labor of chipping the wood too much for him, and accordingly made much use of fire, forming his shield by alternate charring and scraping. The handle is rather curiously made by cutting two deep holes side by side in the back of the shield, the piece of wood between them being rounded into a handle. As is the case with most of the shields, the handle is a very small one. The face of the shield is much wider than either of those which have been noticed, and is very slightly rounded. It is ornamented with carved grooves, but rough usage has obliterated most of them, and the whole implement is as rough and unsightly an article as can well be imagined, in spite of the labor which has been bestowed upon it.

We now come to another class of shield, made of bark, and going by the title of Mulabakka. Shields in general are called by the name of Hieleman. Some of these bark shields are of considerable size, and are so wide in the middle that, when the owner crouches behind them, they protect the greater part of his body. As the comparatively thin material of which they are composed prevents the handle from being made by cutting into the shield itself, the native is obliged to make the handle separately, and fasten it to the shield by various methods.

The commonest mode of fixing the handle to a Mulabakka shield is seen at figs. 4 and 5, on page 742, which exhibit the front and profile views of the same shield. Another Mulabakka is shown at fig. 6. The faces of all the Mulabakka shields are covered with ornamented patterns, mostly on the usual zigzag principle, but some having a pattern in which curves form the chief element.