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  "The station usually known as the ""Bellenden-Ker Mission"" is situated ten miles from Cairns, on"

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In addition to the mistake of choosing an unsuitable locality they added the error of cultivating
on low land liable to be swept bare by annual floods. Crops have thus been lost from time to time and
much labour wasted. The soil is a kind of loose white clay common in poor scrubs on carboniferous
country. When it loses the small admixture of alluvium and decomposed vegetable mould it rapidly
degenerates into barren stuff fit for nothing. The standing scrub fertilised itself and added some virtues
to the soil, just as a dense mass of lantana will do on even the poorest formation. When the scrub is
felled, and the surface exposed, all the principal constituents are destroyed by the sun or washed out by
the heavy rains. The Blomfield [sic] is just one of those districts where a mission station should, and could,
easily produce its own food supplies. But there was the usual want of qualified judgement in selecting a
site, and so there has been much wasted labour and heavy expenditure with very little result.
The missionaries have no power to enforce control over the blacks, even those attending school,
and so at the time of my visit all the boys were away in the ranges, or scattered about among the tin
miners. Most of them were said to be at the Chinese camp, twenty miles away. There were only a few
girls at the school, or doing housework, and a number of men and women, either camped there for a while
or working in the cultivation. Insufficient food is the chief reason of discontent and dispersal. It is
worse than useless feeding them unless you give them enough. It is wiser to feed twenty properly than
fifty on a meagre diet. It is folly to give one man's ration to three blacks, or spread over a large number
the provisions only sufficient for a few.
No good can be done with discontented blacks any more than dissatisfied whites.
The proper food for aboriginals on all these stations is maizemeal, containing all its constituents,
and molasses. There is no cheaper food and certainly none that will keep them in better condition.
Both are Queensland products, and easily obtained. Supplemented by yams, sweet potatoes, and bananas,
grown by themselves, and beef once a fortnight, or even once a month, the food would be abundant, and
keep the blacks of all ages healthy and contented. Flour is poor and tasteless food by itself in any
form, and no amount of it would keep an aboriginal in proper condition.
The house and outbuilding accommodation at this station is far beyond the requirements, and
represents much entirely unnecessary expenditure. There are buildings enough to work a large reserve
with a thousand blacks. There are no married white men on the Blomfield [sic] Station. Mr. Hoerlein was
away in South Australia, and the station in charge of assistant missionaries, two Germans who have
acquired some knowledge of the native dialect, and appear to be very earnest and conscientious men.
The questions of how far the work of this and the other missions has been successful, whether
the system is adapted to the aboriginal character, and if the heavy expenditure from five to ten years has
produced justifiable results, are problems that will be discussed in the conclusion of this report.
[centred] Cape Grafton.
The station usually known as the "Bellenden-Ker Mission" is situated ten miles from Cairns, on
the shore of the west side of False Bay, looking north across Trinity Bay, and is not within twenty-five
miles of the Bellenden-Ker Range.
The Mission houses stand within 300 yards of the shore on the foot of the "Murray-Prior" Range.
The mountains rise immediately behind the house. A quarter of a mile south is a belt of tropical scrub
coming down from the mountain and extending a short distance over the low land at the base. Here
the superintendent of the Mission, Mr. Gribble, has started his cultivation. This scrub extends over
hundreds of acres. The land is not first-class, being decomposed granite mixed with vegetable mould
overlying granite, but it is quite good enough to grow the food supply of all the aboriginals likely to
assemble there.
There has been a considerable amount of work done, and the superintendent is certainly not
deficient in energy. The school children looked cheerful and healthy, and the system of teaching,
feeding, and housing was apparently satisfactory.
The Mission is controlled and the funds chiefly supplied by the Church of England, and those
funds so far have not been sufficient to enable the Mission to bring much land under cultivation, nor
supply much food to the blacks. There are good fishing facilities, but very little hunting close to the
station. Dugong are plentiful in the bay, but no attempt has so far been made to spear or net them.
This station receives no aid from the Government. It stands on the "Cape Grafton Aboriginal
Reserve," probably the best at present in Australia, extending from Trinity Bay south to the Mulgrave River,
and west to the top of the "Malbon Thompson" Range and the "Bell Peaks." This area was reserved for
the aboriginals on the recommendation of R. T. Hartley, then police magistrate at Cairns, and myself,
about twelve years ago. There is much excellent land, abundance of water, a large hunting area, and
unlimited sea fishing. Cairns does for this station what Cooktown does for Cape Bedford - attracts the
blacks and demoralises them. So there is only a small number of the surrounding tribes camped at
the Mission. The want of funds has prevented the station feeding even the old men and women.
Practically it is paralysed by financial difficulties. The station, like all the others, is in the wrong
position, and should be ten or twelve miles south from Cape Grafton. In rough weather, communication
with Cairns, if necessary, could be easily established by a track overland to the present station, and
thence by water round [sic] False Cape in Trinity Inlet.
The Cape Grafton Reserve is capable, under systematic management, of supporting 10,000
aboriginals, whose food supplies would come from fishing and cultivation. There are thousands of acres
fitted to grow food-producing plants. There is an abundant supply of pure fresh water, and a liberal
rainfall. The sea, east and north, and a lofty jungle-covered range, west and south, make a perfect
isolation from all traffic and settlement. If the Cairns district blacks were kept out of the town and
clear of settlement, they could be collected on that reserve and made to produce their own food, by
hunting, fishing, and cultivation. There is no hardship to them in this enforced residence in one locality.
In any case the old order of things is passing away, and they must adapt themselves to the changed
environment, just as white races, individuals and communities, have to adapt themselves to sudden or
gradual changes all over the face of the earth. Their land has been taken from them on no other title
offer. Placed on good reserves, such as that of Cape Grafton, under competent management, their lot
would be far better than that of the majority of white settlers of the country, and our "Aboriginal
Settlements" would be creditable alike to the statesmanship and the humanity of Queensland.