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[Few words pose more difficulty than “half-caste”. In any modern context the term is offensive, but in the first decade of the twentieth century it carried specific meaning and significance. A view broadly held in the white community was that Aboriginal people would disappear within a generation or two, and that white responsibility extended only to palliative care. The phrase “to smoothe the dying pillow” is often attributed to Daisy Bates. Of course, white responsibility could only be so contained and time-limited if interbreeding were minimised. Increasingly, first-generation part-Aboriginal children were taken from their mothers, to be placed in the care of missionaries or (later) made wards of the state. Although white support for the missions was sincere, government policy reflected a perverse desire to see “half-caste” children quarantined.]