Tears of the Moon - Di Morrissey [37]
Aboriginal women were offered freely to the Macassan captains and many of these liaisons were re-forged each season. Children they fathered were absorbed into the extended Aboriginal families. Occasionally the Aboriginal brides who had been taken away to Sulawesi and the other islands returned to visit.
Already the beach resembled a village. The praus and their wooden canoes were beached along the sand, portable bamboo smoke houses had been erected to dry the trepang, and men were busy at the lines of circular stone hearths stretched along the shore where iron cauldrons of the sea slugs were boiling before being dried. Piles of cut and dried mangrove wood, prepared on a previous visit, were heaped by the hearths. Several men sat pounding kaolin clay rock to make caulking paste for the boats. Crude thatched shelters were scattered under shady trees and at a large campfire sat Aboriginal elders from the nearby mainland and the leaders of the Macassans who were offering around their tobacco pipes.
They hailed Tyndall as the dinghy came to rest on the beach. Speaking in Malay and a local pidgin Aboriginal language, he greeted his friends.
After stumbling upon this place two years before, Tyndall had returned annually and learned much from the visitors and local tribespeople. It had also proved a valuable bartering situation. He brought fresh food, rice, flour, sugar, jams, fishing gear, kerosene and small boat gear which he exchanged for dried turtle and shell along with some trepang that he sold to the Chinese in the towns along the coast and in Fremantle on trading trips.
Tyndall realised that the present peaceful co-existence of these two disparate communities and their trade alliance had developed through patient understanding of each others’ customs and etiquette. He had heard stories of occasional hostilities resulting from the theft of coveted items, disagreements over women or some breach of custom that warranted reprisal. But for centuries it had been largely a peaceful and mutually beneficial arrangement, ritualised with obligation and traditional behavioural patterns understood and reciprocated.
Once, on a trip inland with a group, Tyndall had been shown ancient rock paintings of these encounters on the coast which had passed into Dreaming stories and the fabric of their oral history in song and dance.
Tyndall joined the men at the fire and they swapped news. Later would come the exchange of gifts and that evening ‘good food’ would be prepared and possibly some of the Macassans’ liquor shared.
They talked, too, of barter and one of the Aboriginal elders asked Tyndall if he had brought a much desired new long-handled axe. Tyndall told the old man that he had indeed brought the axe and, what’s more, a special stone for keeping it sharp. There was a nod of gratification from the old man who immediately launched into a long discussion with other Aborigines that Tyndall had trouble following, but it was connected with some future walkabout into the back country. Tyndall waited until he had nearly finished a mug of tea before turning the conversation back to the axe and payment.
To his surprise the Aboriginal elder pointed to Tyndall’s pearl earring, gestured with cupped hands and pointed south. From his adequate grasp of the language, Tyndall was quickly able to gather that payment was to be the opportunity to harvest some mother-of-pearl and perhaps find a pearl or two at a spot only known to the tribe. The offer pleased Tyndall as much as it surprised