I’m reading Captain Cook’s journals for the second time. What he writes about the native people he encountered on his arrival on the East Coast is fascinating. A more miserable people he says he has never seen in all his travels. Stark naked, pathetic bark and shrub shelters, long sticks as spears and living on the edge of starvation. They had no use, nor did they understand the gifts of tools and fabrics he left them. A nomad, stone edge people whose only tool was fire.
The only good thing one can say about their lifestyle is that unlike the Maori, they were not cannibals.
I;d say Cooks description of the East Coast natives was accurate. A listless bunch, they have changed little today bit a few are outstanding human beings.
But Cook did nt know h0w t0 handle aboriginals. This resulted in his death in Hawaii..,,,,,, with his heart being eaten by four powerful Hawaiian Chiefs.