Wanderers in Eden: Thomas Mitchell Compared with Lewis and Clark

A comparison of the exploring experiences of Australian explorer Thomas Mitchell with those of his American counterparts Lewis and Clark shows certain similarities; their difficulty in talking to the indigenous people, their respect for indigenous property, the suspicion of the indigenous people that whites were not really men but spirits of some sort and their anxiety to get the explorers out of their territory as quickly as possible. But the differences between the Australian and the American experiences were greater and more important. Lewis and Clark, both born in Virginia, came from a society established there for generations. They were at home anywhere in America; they lived off the land and had close relations, usually amicable, with the native born Indians. None of the Australian explorers were born in the country which to them was a strange and often frightening land. They carried their food with them and rarely had more than tenuous relations with the Aborigines. Yet Mitchell was more thoughtful than the Americans about the nature of the indigenous people and their future relations with white society.