PROPERTY VESTED IN INDIVIDUALS.
Traditional Laws relative to Landed Property.
Landed property does not belong to a tribe, or to several families, but to a single male; and the limits of his property are so accurately defined that every native knows those of his own land, and can point out the various objects which mark his boundary.

I cannot establish the fact and the universality of this institution better than by the following letter addressed by Dr.Lang, the Principal of Sydney College, New South Wales, to Dr.Hodgkin, the zealous advocate of the Aboriginal Races:* (*Footnote.

Extracted from the Reports of the Aboriginal Protection Society.) Liverpool, 15th November 1840.
My Dear Friend, In reply to the question which you proposed to me some time ago in the course of conversation in London, and of which you have reminded me in the letter I had the pleasure of receiving from you yesterday, with the pamphlets and letters for America, namely, Whether the Aborigines of the Australian continent have any idea of property in land, I beg to answer most decidedly in the affirmative.

It is well known that these Aborigines in no instance cultivate the soil, but subsist entirely by hunting and fishing, and on the wild roots they find in certain localities (especially the common fern) with occasionally a little wild honey; indigenous fruits being exceedingly rare.

The whole race is divided into tribes, more or less numerous, according to circumstances, and designated from the localities they inhabit; for although universally a wandering race, with respect to places of habitation, their wanderings are circumscribed by certain well-defined limits, beyond which they seldom pass, except for purposes of war or festivity.