{"collection":"myth-cosmogony","full_text_available":true,"graph_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/v2/api/page/gutenberg_3819/graph","html_url":"https://unchartedknowledge.5gfusion.net/v2/page/gutenberg_3819","id":"gutenberg_3819","license":"Public Domain (US)","rights_basis":"gutenberg_metadata_copyright_false","source":"gutenberg","source_url":"https://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/3819","summary":null,"tags":["Australia","Category: Archaeology & Anthropology","Category: Mythology, Legends & Folklore","Euahlayi (Australian people)"],"text":"Produced by Col Choat.  HTML version by Al Haines.\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\n\nThe Euahlayi Tribe\n\nA Study of Aboriginal Life in Australia\n\n\nby\n\nK. Langloh Parker\n\n\n\n\n\nCONTENTS\n\n\n  INTRODUCTION\n  I.    INTRODUCTORY\n  II.   THE ALL FATHER, BYAMEE\n  III.  RELATIONSHIPS AND TOTEMS\n  IV.   THE MEDICINE MEN\n  V.    MORE ABOUT THE MEDICINE MEN AND LEECHCRAFT\n  VI.   OUR WITCH WOMAN\n  VII.  BIRTH--BETROTHAL--AN ABORIGINAL GIRL FROM INFANCY TO WOMANHOOD\n  VIII. THE TRAINING OF A BOY UP TO BOORAH PRELIMINARIES\n  IX.   THE BOORAH AND OTHER MEETINGS\n  X.    CHIEFLY AS TO FUNERALS AND MOURNING\n  XI.   SOMETHING ABOUT STARS AND LEGENDS\n  XII.  THE TRAPPING OF GAME\n  XIII. FORAGING AND COOKING\n  XIV.  COSTUMES AND WEAPONS\n  XV.   THE AMUSEMENTS OF BLACKS\n  XVI.  BUSH BOGIES AND FINIS\n\n\n\nLIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS\n\nBy one of the Euahlayi Tribe (Omitted from etext)\n\n  A NATIVE CARRYING A MESSAGE-STICK\n  TWO NATIVES READY FOR A CORROBOREE\n  THE FUNERAL OF A NATIVE. A BARK COFFIN\n  A NATIVE SINGING TO HIS OWN ACCOMPANIMENT\n  A NATIVE GRINDING GRASS SEED ON A DAYOORL-STONE\n  A NATIVE WITH SHIELD AND WADDY IN FRONT OF HIS CAMP\n\n\n\n\n\nINTRODUCTION\n\n\nNo introduction to Mrs. Langloh Parker's book can be more than that\nsuperfluous 'bush' which, according to the proverb, good wine does not\nneed. Our knowledge of the life, manners, and customary laws of many\nAustralian tribes has, in recent years, been vastly increased by the\nadmirable works of Mr. Howitt, and of Messrs. Spencer and Gillen. But\nMrs. Parker treats of a tribe which, hitherto, has hardly been\nmentioned by anthropologists, and she has had unexampled opportunities\nof study. It is hardly possible for a scientific male observer to be\nintimately familiar with the women and children of a savage tribe. Mrs.\nParker, on the other hand, has had, as regards the women and children\nof the Euahlayi, all the advantages of the squire's wife in a rural\nneighbourhood, supposing the squire's wife to be an intelligent and\nsympathetic lady, with a strong taste for the study of folklore and\nrustic custom. Among the Zulus, we know, it is the elder women who tell\nthe popular tales, so carefully translated and edited by Bishop\nColenso. Mrs. Parker has already published two volumes of Euahlayi\ntales, though I do not know that I have ever seen them cited, except by\nmyself, in anthropological discussion. As they contain many beautiful\nand romantic touches, and references to the Euahlayi 'All Father,' or\npaternal 'super man,' Byamee, they may possibly have been regarded as\ndubious materials, dressed up for the European market. Mrs. Parker's\nnew volume, I hope, will prove that she is a close scientific observer,\nwho must be reckoned with by students. She has not scurried through the\nregion occupied by her tribe, but has had them constantly under her\neyes for a number of years.\n\nMy own slight share in the book as it stands ought to be mentioned.\nAfter reading the original MS., I catechised Mrs. Parker as to her\namount of knowledge of the native language; her methods of obtaining\ninformation; and the chances that missionary influence had affected the\nEuahlayi legends and beliefs. I wrote out her answers, and she read and\nrevised what I had written. I also collected many scattered notices of\nByamee into the chapter on that being, which Mrs. Parker has read and\napproved. I introduced a reference to Mr. Howitt's theory of the 'All\nFather,' and I added some references to other authorities on the\nAustralian tribes. Except for this, and for a very few purely verbal\nchanges in matter of style, Mrs. Parker's original manuscript is\nuntouched by me. It seems necessary to mention these details, as I\nhave, in other works, expressed my own opinions on Australian religion\nand customary law. [MAKING OF RELIGION, second edition; MYTH, RITUAL, AND\nRELIGION, second edition.] These opinions I have not, so to speak, edited\ninto the work of Mrs. Parker. The author herself has remarked that,\nbeginning as a disciple of Mr. Herbert Spencer in regard to the\nreligious ideas of the Australians--according to that writer, mere\ndread of casual 'spirits'--she was obliged to alter her attitude, in\nconsequence of all that she learned at first hand. She also explains\nthat her tribe are not 'wild blacks,' though, in the absence of\nmissionary influences, they retain their ancient beliefs, at least the\nold people do; and, in a decadent form, preserve their tribal\ninitiations, or Boorah. How she tested and controlled the evidence of\nher informants she has herself stated, and I venture to think that she\ncould hardly have made a better use of her opportunities.\n\nIn one point there is perhaps, almost unavoidably, a lacuna or gap in\nher information. The Euahlayi, she says, certainly do not possess the\nDieri and Urabunna custom of Pirrauru or Piraungaru, by which married,\nand unmarried men, of the classes men and women which may intermarry,\nare solemnly allotted to each other as more or less permanent paramours.\n[See Mr. Howitt's NATIVE TRIBES OF SOUTH-EAST AUSTRALIA, and my\nSECRET OF THE TOTEM, chapter iii.] That custom, for some unknown reason,\nis confined to certain tribes possessing the two social divisions with the\nuntranslated names MATTERI and KIRARU. These tribes range from Lake Eyre\nsouthward, perhaps, as far as the sea. Their peculiar custom is unknown to\nthe Euahlayi, but Mrs. Parker does not inform us concerning any recognised\nlicence which may, as is usual, accompany their Boorah assemblies, or\ntheir 'harvest home' of gathered grass seed, which she describes.\n\nAny reader of Mrs. Parker's book who has not followed recent\nanthropological discussions, may need to be apprised of the nature of\nthese controversies, and of the probable light thrown on them by the\nfull description of the Euahlayi tribe. The two chief points in dispute\nare (1) the nature and origin of the marriage laws of the Australians;\nand (2) the nature and origin of such among their ideas and practices\nas may be styled 'religious.' As far as what we commonly call material\ncivilisation is concerned, the natives of the Australian continent are\nprobably the most backward of mankind, having no agriculture, no\ndomestic animals, and no knowledge of metal-working. Their weapons and\nimplements are of wood, stone, and bone, and they have not even the\nrudest kind of pottery. But though the natives are all, in their\nnatural state, on or about this common low level, their customary laws,\nceremonials, and beliefs are rich in variety.\n\nAs regards marriage rules they are in several apparently ascending\ngrades of progress. First we have tribes in which each person is born\ninto one or other of two social divisions usually called 'phratries.'\nSay that the names of the phratries mean Eagle Hawk and Crow. Each\nborn Crow must marry an Eagle Hawk; each born Eagle Hawk must marry a\nCrow. The names are derived through the mothers. One obvious result is\nthat no two persons, brother and sister maternal, can intermarry; but\nthe rule also excludes from intermarriage great numbers of persons in\nno way akin to each other by blood, who merely share the common phratry\nname, Crow or Eagle Hawk.\n\nIn each phratry are smaller sets of persons, each set distinguished by\nthe name of some animal or other natural object, their 'totem.' The\nsame totem is never found in both phratries. Thus a person marrying out\nof his or her phratry, as all must do, necessarily marries out of his\nor her totem.\n\nThe same arrangements exist among tribes which derive phratry and totem\nnames through the father.\n\nThis derivation of names and descent through the father is regarded by\nalmost all students, and by Mr. J. G. Frazer, in one passage of his\nlatest study of the subject, as a great step in progress. ['The Beginnings\nof Religion and Totemism among the Australian Aborigines,' FORTNIGHTLY\nREVIEW, September 1905, p. 452.] The obvious result of paternal descent is\nto make totem communities or kins local. In any district most of the\npeople will be of the same paternal totem name--say, Grub, Iguana, Emu,\nor what not. Just so, in Glencoe of old, most of the people were MacIans;\nin Appin most were Stewarts; in South Argyll Campbells, and so on.\n\nThe totem kins are thus, with paternal descent, united both by supposed\nblood ties in the totem kin, and by associations of locality. This is\ncertainly a step in social progress.\n\nBut while Mr. Frazer, with almost all inquirers, acknowledges this, ten\npages later in his essay he no longer considers the descent of the\ntotem in the paternal line as necessarily 'a step in progress' from\ndescent in the maternal line. 'The common assumption that inheritance\nof the totem through the mother always preceded inheritance of it through\nthe father need not hold good,'[IBID. p. 462.] he remarks.\n\nThus it appears that a tribe has not necessarily made 'a great step in\nprogress,' because it reckons descent of the totem on the male side. If\nthis be so, we cannot so easily decide as to which tribe is socially\nadvanced and which is not.\n\nIn any case, however, there is a test of social advance. There is an\nacknowledged advance when a tribe is divided into, not two, but four or\neight divisions, which may not intermarry. [IBID. p. 454] The Euahlayi have\nfour such divisions. In each of their intermarrying phratries are two\n'Matrimonial Classes,' each with its name, and these are so constituted\nthat a member of the elder generation can never marry a member of the\nsucceeding generation. This rule prevents, of course, marriage between\nparent and child, but such marriages never do occur in the pristine\ntribes of the Darling river which have no such classes. The four-class\narrangement excludes from intermarriage all persons, whether parents\nand children or not, who bear the same class name, say Hippai.\n\nAmong the central and northern tribes, from the Arunta of the\nMacdonnell hills to the Gulf of Carpentaria, the eight-class rule\nexists, and it is, confessedly, the most advanced of all.\n\nIn this respect, then, the Arunta of the centre of Australia are\ncertainly more advanced than the Euahlayi. The Arunta have eight, not\nfour, intermarrying classes. In the matter of rites and ceremonies,\ntoo, they are, in the opinion of Messrs. Spencer and Gillen, more\nadvanced than, say, the Euahlayi. They practise universal 'subincision'\nof the males, and circumcision, in place of the more primitive knocking\nout of the front teeth. Their ceremonies are very prolonged: in Messrs.\nSpencer and Gillen's experience, rites lasted for four months during a\ngreat tribal gathering. That the Arunta could provide supplies for so\nprolonged and large an assembly, argues high organisation, or a region\nwell found in natural edible objects. Yet the region is arid and barren,\nso the organisation is very high. For all these reasons, even if we do not\nregard paternal descent of the totem as a step in progress from maternal\ndescent, the Arunta seem greatly advanced in social conditions.\n\nYet they are said to lack entirely that belief in a moral and kindly\n'All Father,' such as Byamee, which Mrs. Parker describes as potent\namong the less advanced Euahlayi, and which Mr. Howitt has found among\nnon-coastal tribes of the south-east, with female descent of the totem,\nbut without matrimonial classes--that is, among the most primitive tribes\nof all.\n\nHere occurs a remarkable difficulty. Mr. Howitt asserts, with Mr.\nFrazer's concurrence, that (in Mr. Frazer's words) 'the same regions in\nwhich the germs of religion begin to appear have also made some\nprogress towards a higher form of social and family life.'['The Beginnings\nof Religion and Totemism among the Australian Aborigines,' Fortnightly\nReview, September 1905, p. 452.] But the social advance from maternal to\npaternal descent of the totem, we have seen, is not necessarily an advance\nat all, in Mr. Frazer's opinion. [IBID. p. 462.] The Arunta, for example,\nhe thinks, never recognised female descent of the totem. They have never\nrecognised, indeed, he thinks, any hereditary descent of the totem,\nthough in all other respects, as in hereditary magistracies, and\ninheritance of the right to practise the father's totemic ritual, they\ndo reckon in the male line. By such advantage, however it was acquired,\nthey are more progressive than, say, the Euahlayi. But, progressive as\nthey are, they have not, like the more pristine tribes of the south-east,\ndeveloped 'the germs of religion,' the belief in a benevolent or ruling\n'All Father.' Unlike the tribes of the south-east, they have co-operative\ntotemic magic. Each totem community does magic for its totem, as part of\nthe food supply of the united tribe. But the tribe, though so SOLIDAIRE,\nand with its eight classes and hereditary magistracies so advanced, has\ndeveloped no germs of religion at all. Arunta progress has thus been\nsingularly unequal.\n\nThe germs of religion are spoken of as the results of social advance,\nbut, while so prominent in social advance, the Arunta have no trace of\nreligion. The tribes northward from them to the sea are also very\nadvanced socially, but (with one known exception not alluded to by Mr.\nFrazer) have no 'All Father,' no germ of religion.\n\nFrom this fact, if correctly reported, it is obvious that social\nprogress is not the cause, nor the necessary concomitant, of advance in\nreligious ideas.\n\nAgain, the influence of the sea, in causing a 'heavier rainfall, a more\nabundant vegetation, and a more plentiful supply of food,' with an\neasier and more reflective life than that of 'the arid wilderness of\nthe interior,' cannot be, as is alleged, the cause of the germs of\nreligion. [IBID. p. 463.] If this were the case, the coastal tribes of the\nGulf of Carpentaria and of the north generally would have developed the\nAll Father belief. Yet, in spite of their coastal environment, and richer\nexistence, and social advance, the northern coastal tribes are not\ncredited with the belief in the All Father. Meanwhile tribes with no\nmatrimonial classes, and with female descent of the totem--tribes\ndwelling from five to seven hundred miles away from the southern sea--do\npossess the All Father belief as far north as Central Queensland, no\nless than did the almost or quite extinct tribes of the south coast,\nwho had made what is (or is not) 'the great step in progress' of\npaternal descent of the totem.\n\nAgain, arid and barren as is the central region tenanted by the Arunta,\nit seems to permit or encourage philosophic reflection, for their\ntheory of evolution is remarkably coherent and ingenious. The theory of\nevolution implies as much reflection as that of creation! Their magic\nfor the behoof of edible objects is attributed to the suddenness of\ntheir first rains,[IBID. p. 465.] and the consequent outburst of life,\nwhich the natives attribute to their own magical success. But\nrainmaking magic, as Mrs. Langloh Parker shows, is practised with\nsometimes amazing success among the Euahlayi, who work no magic at all\nfor their totems. Their magic, if it brings rain, benefits their totems\nat large, but for each totem in particular, no Euahlayi totem kin does\nmagic.\n\nAgain, agricultural magic has been, and indeed is, practised in Europe,\nin conditions of climate unlike those of the Arunta; and totemic magic\nis freely practised in North America, in climatic conditions dissimilar\nfrom those of Central Australia.\n\nFor all these reasons I must confess that I do not follow the logic of\nthe philosophy which makes social advance the cause of the belief in\nthe All Father, and coastal rains the cause of social advance. The\nArunta have the social advance, the eight classes, the relatively high\norganisation; but they have neither the climatic conditions supposed to\nproduce the advance, nor the religion which the advance is supposed to\nproduce. The northern coastal tribes, again, have the desired climatic\nconditions, and the social advance, but they have not the germs of\nreligion found in many far inland southern tribes, like the Euahlayi,\nwhose social progress is extremely moderate. We thus find, from the\nnorthern coast to the centre, one supposed result of coastal\nconditions, namely, social progress, but not the other supposed result\nof coastal conditions, namely, the All Father belief. I do not say that\nit does not exist, for it is a secret belief, but it is not reported by\nMessrs. Spencer and Gillen. On the other hand, among tribes of the\nsouth-east very far from the coast, we find the lowest grades of social\nprogress, but we also find the All Father belief. I am ready, of\ncourse, to believe that good conditions of life beget progress, social\nand religious, as a general rule. But other causes exist; speculation\nanywhere may take crudely scientific rather than crudely religious\nlines. Especially the belief in ancestral spirits may check or nullify\nthe belief in a remote All Father. We see this among the Zulus, where\nspirits entirely dominate religion, and the All Father is, at most, the\nshadow of a name, Unkulunkulu. We may detect the same influence among\nthe northern tribes of Australia, where ancestral spirits dominate\nthought and society, though they receive no sacrifice or prayer.\nMeanwhile, if we accept Mrs. Parker's evidence, among the Euahlayi\nancestral spirits are of no account in religion, while the All Father\nis obeyed, and, on some occasions, is addressed in prayer; and may even\ncause rain, if property approached by a human spirit which has just\nentered his mansions. Clearly, climatic causes and natural environment\nare not the only factors in producing and directing the speculative\nideas of men in early society.\n\nWe must also remember that the neighbours of the Arunta, northwards,\nwho share certain peculiar Arunta ideas, possess, beyond all doubt,\neither the earliest germs of belief in the All Father, or that belief\nin a decadent condition of survival. This is quite certain; for,\nwhereas the Arunta laugh at all inquiries as to what went before the\n'Alcheringa,' or mythic age of evolution, the Kaitish, according to\nMessrs. Spencer and Gillen, aver that an anthropomorphic being, who\ndwells above the sky, and is named Atnatu, first created himself, and\nthen 'made the Alcheringa,'--the mythic age of primal evolution. Of\nmankind, some, in Kaitish opinion, were evolved; of others Atnatu is\nthe father. He expelled men to earth from his heaven for neglect of his\nceremonies, but he provided them with weapons and all that they\npossess. He is not TROS FERRO SUR LA MORALE: he has made no MORAL laws,\nbut his ritual laws, as to circumcision and the whirling of the\nbull-roarer, must be observed as strictly as the ritual laws of Byamee\nof the Euahlayi. In this sense of obedience due to a heavenly father\nwho begat men, or some of them, punished them, and started them on\ntheir terrene career, laying down ceremonial rules, we have certainly\n'the germs of religion' in a central tribe cognate to the Arunta.\n\nMr. Frazer detects only two traces of religion in the centre, omitting\nthe Kaitish Atnatu, ['The Beginnings of Religion and Totemism among the\nAustralian Aborigines,' FORTNIGHTLY REVIEW, September 1905, p. 452,\nNote 1.] but I am unable to see how the religious aspect of Atnatu,\nnon-moral as it is, can be overlooked. He is the father of part of the\ntribe, and all are bound to, observe his ceremonial rules. He accounts for\nthe beginning of the beginning; he is the cause of the Alcheringa; men owe\nduties to him. We do not know whether he was once as potent in their\nhearts, and as moral as Byamee, but has DOGRINGOLO under Arunta\nphilosophic influences; or whether Byamee is a more highly evolved form of\nAtnatu. But it is quite certain that the Kaitish, in a region as far\nalmost from the north sea as that of the Arunta, and further from southern\ncoastal influences than the Arunta, have a modified belief in the All\nFather. How are we to account for this on the philosophic hypothesis of\nOceanus as the father of all the gods; of coastal influences producing a\nricher life, and causing both social and religious progress?\n\nAnother difficulty is that while the Arunta, with no religion, and the\nKaitish, with the Atnatu belief, are socially advanced in organisation\n(whether we reckon male descent of the totem 'a great step in\nprogress,' or an accident), they are yet supposed by Mr. Frazer to be,\nin one respect, the least advanced, the most primitive, of known human\nbeings. The reason is this: the Arunta do not recognise the processes\nof sexual union as the cause of the production of children. Sexual\nacts, they say, merely prepare women for the reception of original\nancestral spirits, which enter into them, and are reincarnated and\nbrought to the birth.\n\nIf the women cannot accept the spirits without being 'prepared' by\nsexual union, then sexual union plays a physical part in the generation\nof a spirit incarnated, a fact which all believers in the human soul\nare as ready as the Arunta to admit. If the Arunta recognise the\nprior necessity of 'preparation,' then they are not so ignorant as\nthey are thought to be; and their view is produced, not so much by\nstark ignorance, as by their philosophy of the eternal reincarnation of\nprimal human spirits. The Arunta philosophers, in fact, seem to\nconcentrate their speculation on a point which puzzled Mr. Shandy. How\ndoes the animating principle, or soul, regarded as immaterial, clothe\nitself in flesh? Material acts cannot effect the incarnation of a\nspirit. Therefore, the spirit enters women from without, and is not the\ndirect result of human action.\n\nThe south-eastern tribes, with female descent of the totem, and with no\nbelief in the universal and constant reincarnation of ancestral\nspirits, take the 'schylean view, according to Mr. Howitt, that the\nmale is the sole originating cause of children, while the female is\nonly the recipient and 'nurse.' These tribes, socially less advanced\nthan the Arunta, have not the Arunta nescience of the facts of\nprocreation, a nescience which I regard as merely the consequence and\ncorollary of the Arunta philosophy of reincarnation. Each Arunta child,\nby that philosophy, has been in being since the Alcheringa: his mother\nof the moment only reproduces him, after 'preparation.' He is not a new\nthing; he is as old as the development of organic forms. This is the\nArunta belief, and I must reckon it as not more primitive than the\npeculiar philosophy of reincarnation of ancestral spirits. Certainly\nsuch an elaborate philosophy manifestly cannot be primitive. It is,\nhowever, the philosophy of the tribes from the Urabunna, on Lake Eyre\n(with female descent of the totem), to the most northerly tribes, with\nmale descent.\n\nBut among none of these tribes has the philosophy that extraordinary\neffect on totemic institutions which, by a peculiar and isolated\naddition, it possesses among the septs of the Arunta nation, and in a\nlimited way among the Kaitish.\n\nAmong all tribes except these the child inherits its totem: from the\nmother, among the Urabunna; from the father in the northern peoples.\nBut, among the Arunta and Kaitish, the totem is not inherited from\neither parent. According to the belief of these tribes, in every\ndistrict there is a place where the first human ancestors--in each case\nall of one totem, whichsoever that totem, in each case, might happen to\nbe--died, 'went under the earth.' Rocks or trees arose to mark such\nspots. These places are haunted by the spirits of the dead ancestors;\nhere they are all Grubs, there all Eagle Hawks, or all Iguanas, or all\nEmus, or all Cats. Or as in these sites the ancestors left each his own\nsacred stone, CHURINGA NANJA, with archaic patterns inscribed on it,\npatterns now fancifully interpreted as totemic inscriptions. Such\nstones are especially haunted by the ancestral souls, all desiring\nreincarnation.\n\nWhen a woman becomes aware of the life of the child she bears, among\nthe Arunta and Kaitish, she supposes that a local spirit of the local\ntotem has entered her, and her child's totem is therefore the totem of\nthat locality, whatever other totems she and her husbands may own. The\nstone amulet of the ancestral spirit, WHO IS THE CHILD, is sought; if\nit cannot be found at the spot, a wooden CHURINGA is made to represent\nit, and it is kept carefully in a sacred storehouse.\n\nEven in the centre and north, where the belief in reincarnation\nprevails, this odd manner of acquiring totems is only practised by the\nArunta tribes and the Kaitish, and only among them are the inscribed\nstones known to exist as favoured haunts of ancestral spirits desiring\nincarnation. The other northern tribes believe in reincarnation, but\nnot in the haunted sacred stones, which they do not, north of the\nWorgaia, possess; nor do they derive totems from locality, but, as\nusual, by inheritance.\n\nIt thus appears that these Arunta sacred stones are an inseparable\naccident of the Arunta method of acquiring the totem. How they and the\nfaith in them cause that method is not obvious, but the two things--the\nhaunted sacred stone, and the local source of totems--are\ninseparable--that is, the former never is found apart from the latter.\nNow such stones, with the sense and usage attached to them, cannot well\nbe primitive. They are the result of the peculiar and strictly isolated\nArunta custom and belief, which gives to each man and woman one of\nthese stones, the property of himself or herself, since the mythical\nage, through all reincarnations.\n\nOne cannot see how such an unique custom and belief, associated with\nobjects of art, can be reckoned primitive. Yet, where such stones do\nnot exist, the usage of acquiring totems by locality does not exist;\neven where the belief in reincarnation and in local centres haunted by\ntotemic spirits is found in North Australia. [For an hypothesis of the\norigin of the CHURINGA NANJA belief, see my SECRET OF THE TOTEM,\nchapter iv.]\n\nOn these grounds it appears that the hereditary totem is the earlier,\nand that the Arunta usage is the result of the special and inseparable\nsuperstition about the sacred stones. It may be a relatively recent\ncomplication of and addition to the theory of reincarnation. Meanwhile,\nthe belief and usage produce an unique effect. The Arunta and Kaitish,\nwe saw, are so advanced socially that they possess not two, or four,\nbut eight matrimonial classes. The tribe is divided into two sets of\nfour classes each, and no person in A division (nameless) of four\nclasses may marry another person of any one of these four, but must\nmarry a person of a given class among the four in B division\n(nameless). The succession to the class is hereditary in the mate line.\nBut any person among the Arunta, contrary to universal custom\nelsewhere, may marry another person of his or her own totem, if that\nperson be in the right class of the opposite division. Nowhere else can\na person of division A and totem Grub find a Grub to marry in the\nopposite division B. But this is possible among the Arunta and Kaitish,\nbecause their totems are acquired by pure accident, are not hereditary,\nand all totems exist, or may exist, in division A and also in division B.\n\nMr. Frazer argues that the Arunta is the earlier state of affairs. He\nsupposes that men acquired their totems, at first, by local accident,\nbefore they had laid any restrictions on marriage. Later, they divided\ntheir tribe, first into two, then into four, then into eight classes;\nand every one had to marry out of his class, or set of classes. All\nother known tribes introduced these restrictions after totems had been\nmade hereditary. On passing the restrictive marriage law, they merely\ndrafted people of one set of hereditary totems into one division, all\nthe other totem kins into the other division. But the Arunta had not\nmade totems hereditary, but accidental, so all the children of one\ncrowd of mothers were placed in division A, all other children in\ndivision B. The mothers in each division would have children of all the\ntotems, and thus the same totems now appeared in both of the exogamous\ndivisions. If a man married into his lawful opposite class, the fact\nthat the woman was of the same totem made no difference.\n\nI have offered quite an opposite explanation. Arunta totems were,\noriginally, hereditary among the Arunta, as everywhere else, and no\ntotem occurred in both exogamous divisions. The same totems, later, got\ninto both divisions as the result of the later and isolated belief in\nreincarnation PLUS the sacred haunted stones. That superstition has\nleft the Kaitish PRACTICE of marriage still almost untouched. A Kaitish\nMAY, like an Arunta, marry a woman of his own totem, but he scarcely\never does so. The old prohibition, extinct in law, persists in custom;\nunless we say that the Kaitish are now merely imitating the usual\npractice of the rest of the totemic races of the world.\n\nMoreover, even among the Arunta, certain totems greatly preponderate in\neach of the two exogamous intermarrying divisions of the tribe. This\nmust be because the present practice has not yet quite upset the\nancient usage, by which no totem ever occurred in both divisions. There\nis even an Arunta myth asserting that this was so, but it is, of\ncourse, of no historical value as evidence. Here it is proper to give\nMr. Frazer's contrary theory in his own words:--\n\n'This [Arunta] mode of determining the totem has all the appearance of\nextreme antiquity. For it ignores altogether the intercourse of the\nsexes as the cause of offspring, and further, it ignores the tie of\nblood on the maternal as well as the paternal side, substituting for it\na purely local bond, since the members of a totem stock are merely\nthose who gave the first sign of life in the womb at one or other of\ncertain definite spots. This form of totemism, which may be called\nconceptional or local to distinguish it from hereditary totemism, may\nwith great probability be regarded as the most primitive known to exist\nat the present day, since it seems to date from a time when blood\nrelationship was not yet recognised, and when even the idea of\npaternity had not yet presented itself to the savage mind. Moreover, it\nis hardly possible that this peculiar form of local totemism, with its\nimplied ignorance of such a thing as paternity at all, could be derived\nfrom hereditary totemism, whereas it is easy to understand how\nhereditary totemism, either in the paternal or in the maternal line,\ncould be derived from it. Indeed, among the Umbaia and Gnanji tribes we\ncan see at the present day how the change from local to hereditary\ntotemism has been effected. These tribes, like the Arunta and Kaitish,\nbelieve that conception is caused by the entrance into a woman of a\nspirit who has lived in its disembodied state, along with other spirits\nof the same totem, at any one of a number of totem centres scattered\nover the country; but, unlike the Arunta and Kaitish, they almost\nalways assign the father's totem to the child, even though the infant\nmay have given the first sign of life at a place haunted by spirits of\na different totem. For example, the wife of a snake man may first feel\nher womb quickened at a tree haunted by spirits of goshawk people; yet\nthe child will not be a goshawk but a snake, like its father. The\ntheory by which the Umbaia and Gnanji reconcile these apparently\ninconsistent beliefs is that a spirit of the husband's totem follows\nthe wife and enters into her wherever an opportunity offers, whereas\nspirits of other totems would not think of doing so. In the example\nsupposed, a snake spirit is thought to have followed up the wife of the\nsnake man and entered into her at the tree haunted by goshawk spirits,\nwhile the goshawk spirits would refuse to trespass, so to say, on a\nsnake preserve by quartering themselves in the wife of a snake man.\nThis theory clearly marks a transition from local to hereditary\ntotemism in the paternal line. And precisely the same theory could,\nMUTATIS MUTANDIS, be employed to effect a change from local to\nhereditary totemism in the maternal line; it would only be necessary to\nsuppose that a pregnant woman is always followed by a spirit of her own\ntotem, which sooner or later effects a lodgement in her body. For\nexample, a pregnant woman of the bee totem would always be followed by\na bee spirit, which would enter into her wherever and whenever she felt\nher womb quickened, and so the child would be born of her own bee\ntotem. Thus the local form of totemism, which obtains among the Arunta\nand Kaitish tribes, is older than the hereditary form, which is the\nordinary type of totemism in Australia and elsewhere, first, because it\nrests on far more archaic conceptions of society and of life; and,\nsecondly, because both the hereditary kinds of totemism, the paternal\nand the maternal, can be derived from it, whereas it can hardly be\nderived from either of them.'\n\nThis argument appears to take for granted that the conception of primal\nancestral spirits, perpetually reincarnated, is primitive. But, in\nfact, we seem to know it, among Australian tribes, only in these which\nhave advanced to the possession of eight classes, and have made 'the\ngreat step in progress' (if it is a great step), of descent of the\ntotem in the paternal line. The Urabunna, with female descent of the\ntotem, have, it is true, the belief in reincarnation. But they\nintermarry with the Arunta, borrow their sacred stones, and practise\nthe same advanced rites and ceremonies. The idea may thus have been\nborrowed. On the other hand, the more pristine tribes of the\nsouth-east, with two or four exogamous divisions, and with female\ndescent of the totem, have no known trace of the doctrine of\nreincarnation (except as displayed by the Euahlayi), and have no doubt\nthat the father is the cause of procreation, save in the case of the\nEuahlayi, who believe that the Moon and the Crow 'make' the new\nchildren.\n\nIt would thus appear that the central and northern belief in perpetual\nreincarnation of primal spirits is not primitive, yet the Arunta method\nof acquiring totems does not exist save by grace of this belief, PLUS\nthe isolated belief in primal sacred stones.\n\nI am obliged to differ from Mr. Frazer when he says that 'it is easy to\nsee how hereditary totemism, either in the paternal or in the maternal\nline, would be derived from' the Arunta belief and practice, whereas\n'it is hardly possible that this peculiar form of local totemism\n[Arunta], with its implied ignorance of such a thing as paternity at\nall, could be derived from hereditary totemism.'\n\nI do not know whether the other northern tribes share the Arunta\nnescience of procreation, or not. Whether they do or do not, it was as\neasy for them to e plain all difficulties by a reconciling myth--a\nspirit of the husband's totem follows his wife--as for a white savant to\nframe an hypothesis. The Urabunna, with female descent of the totem,\nhave quite another myth--to reconcile everything.\n\nNothing can be more easy. Supposing the Arunta to have begun, as in my\ntheory, with hereditary totemism, the rise of their isolated belief in\nspirit-haunted sacred stones, encroached on and destroyed the\nhereditary character of their totemism. The belief in CHURINGA NANJA is\nan isolated freak, but it has done its work, while leaving traces of an\nearlier state of things, as we have shown, both among the Kaitish and\nArunta.\n\nIf I am right in differing from such a master of many legions as the\nlearned author of THE GOLDEN BOUGH, the irreligion of the Arunta and\nnorthern tribes (if these be really without religion) is the result of\ntheir form of speculation, wholly occupied by the idea of\nreincarnation, while the Arunta form of totemism is the consequence of\nan isolated fantasy about their peculiar sacred stones. Meanwhile the\nEuahlayi, as Mrs. Parker proves, entertain, in a limited way, not\nelsewhere recorded in Australia, the belief in the reincarnation of the\nsouls of uninitiated young people. They also, like the Arunta,\nrecognise haunted trees and rocks, but the haunting spirits do not\ndesire reincarnation, and are not ancestral. Spirits of the dead go to\none or other abode of souls, to Baiame, or far from his presence to a\nplace of pain. So limited is human fancy, that here, as in Beckford's\npicture of hell in VATHEK, each spirit eternally presses his hand\nagainst his side. Were this a Christian doctrine, the Euahlayi would be\nsaid to have borrowed it, but few will accuse them of plagiarising from\nBeckford. These myths, like all myths, are not consistent. Baiame may\nchange a soul into a bird.\n\nWe may ask whether, with their limited belief in reincarnation, and\nwith their haunted Minggah trees and rocks, the Euahlayi have set up a\ncreed which might possibly develop into the northern faith, or whether\nthey once held the northern faith, and have almost emerged from it.\nWithout further information about intermediate tribes and their ideas\non these matters, the question cannot be answered. We are also without\ndata as to whether the nearly extinct southern coastal tribes evolved\nthe All Father belief, and transmitted it to the Euahlayi, to some\nQueensland tribe, with their Mulkari, and even to the Kaitish, or\nwhether the faith has been independently developed among the tribes\nwith no matrimonial classes and the others. Conjecture is at present\nuseless.\n\nIn one respect a discovery of Mrs. Parker's is unfavourable to my\ntheories. In THE SECRET OF THE TOTEM have shown that, when the names of\nthe phratry divisions of the tribes can be interpreted, they prove to\nbe names of animals, and I have shown how this may have come to be the\ncase. But among the Euahlayi the phratry names mean 'light blood' and\n'dark blood.' This, PRIMA FACIE, seems to favour the theory of the Rev.\nMr. Mathews, in his EAGLE HAWK AND CROW, that two peoples, lighter and\ndarker, after an age of war, made CONNUBIUM and marriage treaty, whence\ncame the phratries. The same author might urge, if he pleased, that\nEagle Hawk (about the colour of the peregrine) was chosen to represent\n'light,' and Crow to represent 'dark'; while the phratry animals, White\nand Black Cockatoo, were selected, elsewhere, to represent the same\ncontrast. But we need more information as to the meanings of other\nphratry names which have defied translation.\n\nIn many other things, as in the account of the YUNBEAI of the Euahlayi,\ntheir mode of removing the tabu on the totem in food, their magic,\ntheir 'multiplex totems,' their methods of hunting, their initiatory\nceremonies, their highly moral lullabies, and the whole of their kindly\nlife, Mrs. Parker's book appears to deserve a welcome from the few who\ncare to study the ways of early men, 'the pit whence we were dug.' The\nEuahlayi are a sympathetic people, and have found a sympathetic\nchronicler.\n\nA. LANG.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER I\n\nINTRODUCTORY\n\n\nThe following pages are intended as a contribution to the study of the\nmanners, customs, beliefs, and legends of the Aborigines of Australia.\nThe area of my observation is mainly limited to the region occupied by\nthe Euahlayi tribe of north-western New South Wales, who for twenty\nyears were my neighbours on the Narran River. I have been acquainted\nsince childhood with the natives, first in southern South Australia;\nnext on my father's station on the Darling River, where I was saved by\na native girl, when my sisters were drowned while bathing. I was\nintimate with the dispositions of the blacks, and was on friendly terms\nwith them, before I began a regular attempt to inquire into their\nfolk-lore and customary laws, at my husband's station on the Narran,\ndue north of the Barwon River, the great affluent of the Murray River.\n\nMy tribe is a neighbour of that mentioned by Mr. Howitt as the\n'Wollaroi,' 'Yualloroi,' or 'Yualaroi.' [Howitt, NATIVE TRIBES OF\nSOUTH-EAST AUSTRALIA, pp. 57, 467, 694, 769.] I spell the tribal name\n'Euahlayi'; the accent is on the second syllable--'You-ahl-ayi'; and\nthe name is derived from the tribal word for the negative: EUAHL, or\nYOUAL, 'No,' as in the case of the Kamilaroi (Kamil, 'No'), and many\nother tribes.\n\nMr. Howitt regards these tribes as on the limits of what he calls the\n'Four Sub-Class' system. The people, that is to say, have not only the\ndivision into two 'phratries,' or 'exogamous moieties,' intermarrying,\nbut also the four 'Matrimonial Classes' further regulating marriage.\nThese classes bear the Kamilaroi names, of unknown meaning, Ipai, Kumbo,\nMurri, and Kubbi; but the names of the two main divisions, or phratries,\nare not those of the Kamilaroi--DILBI and KUPATHIN.\n\nThe Euahlayi language, or dialect, is not identical with that of the\ngreat Kamilaroi tribe to their south-east, but is clearly allied with\nit, many names of animals being the same in both tongues. A few names\nof animals are shared with the Wir djuri speech, as MULLIAN, Eagle\nHawk; Pelican, GOOLAYYAHLEE (Wir djuri, GULAIGULI). The term for the\nbeing called 'The All Father' by Mr. Howitt is also the term used by\nthe Wir djuri and Kamilaroi, 'Baiame' or 'Byamee.' The Euahlayi,\nhowever, possess myths, beliefs, and usages not recorded as extant\namong the Kamilaroi, but rather forming a link with the ideas of\npeoples dwelling much further west, such as the tribes, on Lake Eyre,\nand the southernmost Arunta of the centre. Thus, there is a limited and\nmodified shape of the central and northern belief in reincarnation, and\nthere is a great development of what are called by Mr. Howitt\n'sub-totems,' which have been found most in a region of Northern\nVictoria, to the south of the Euahlayi. There is a belief in\nspirit--haunted trees, as among the Arunta, and there is a form of the\nArunta myth of the 'Dream Time,' the age of pristine evolution.\n\nThe Euahlayi thus present a mixture of ideas and usages which appears\nto be somewhat peculiar and deserving of closer study than it has\nreceived. Mr. Howitt himself refers to the tribe very seldom. It will\nbe asked, 'How far have the Euahlayi been brought under the influence\nof missionaries, and of European ideas in general?'\n\nThe nearest missionary settlement was founded after we settled among\nthe Euahlayi, and was distant about one hundred miles, at Brewarrina.\nNone of my native informants had been at any time, to my knowledge,\nunder the influence of missionaries. They all wore shirts, and almost\nall of them trousers, on occasion; and all, except the old men, my\nchief sources, were employed by white settlers. We conversed in a kind\nof LINGUA FRANCA. An informant, say Peter, would try to express himself\nin English, when he thought that I was not successful in following him\nin his own tongue. With Paddy, who had no English but a curse, I used\ntwo native women, one old, one younger, as interpreters, checking each\nother alternately. The younger natives themselves had lost the sense of\nsome of the native words used by their elders, but the middle-aged\ninterpreters were usually adequate. Occasionally there were disputes on\nlinguistic points, when Paddy, a man already grey in 1845, would march\noff the scene, and need to be reconciled. They were on very good terms\nwith me. They would exchange gifts with me: I might receive a carved\nweapon, and one of them some tobacco. The giving was not all on my\nside, by any means.\n\nMy anthropological reading was scanty, but I was well acquainted with\nand believed in Mr. Herbert Spencer's 'Ghost theory' of the origin of\nreligion in the worship of ancestral spirits. What I learned from the\nnatives surprised me, and shook my faith in Mr. Spencer's theory, with\nwhich it seemed incompatible.\n\nIn hearing the old blacks tell their legends you notice a great\ndifference between them as raconteurs--some tell the bare plot or\nfeature of the legend, others give descriptive touches all through. If\nthey are strangers to their audience, they get it over as quickly as\npossible in a half-contemptuous way, as if saying, 'What do you want to\nknow such rubbish for?' But if they know you well, and know you really\nare interested, then they tell you the stories as they would tell them\nto one another, giving them a new life and adding considerably to their\npoetical expression.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER II\n\nTHE ALL FATHER, BYAMEE\n\n\nAs throughout the chapters on the customary laws, mysteries, and\nlegends of the Euahlayi, there occur frequent mentions of a superhuman\nthough anthropomorphic being named Byamee (in Kamilaroi and Wir djuri\n'Baiame'), it is necessary to give a preliminary account of the beliefs\nentertained concerning him. The name Byamee (usually spelled Baiame)\noccurs in Euahlayi, Kamilaroi, and Wir djuri; 'the Wir djuri language\nis spoken over a greater extent of territory than any other tongue in\nNew South Wales.'[R. H. Mathews, J. A. I., vol. xxxiv. p. 284.] The word\noccurs in the Rev. Mr. Ridley's GURRE KAMILAROI, an illustrated manual of\nBiblical instruction for the education of the Kamilaroi: Mr. Ridley\ntranslated our 'God' by 'Baiame.' He supposed that native term, which he\nfound and did not introduce, to be a derivative from the verb BAIA, or\nBIAI, 'to make.' Literally, however, at least in Euahlayi, the word BYAMEE\nmeans 'great one.' In its sense as the name of the All Father it is not\nsupposed to be used by women or by the uninitiated. If it is necessary to\nspeak to them of Byamee, he is called Boyjerh, which means Father, just as\nin the Theddora tribe the women speak of Darramulun as PAPANG, 'Father.'\n[Howitt, Native Tribes of South-East Australia, p. 493.] Among the\nEuahlayi both women and the uninitiated use byamee, the adjective for\n'great,' in ordinary talk, though the more usual adjective answering to\n'great' is BOOROOL, which occurs in Kamilaroi as well as in Euahlayi. The\nverb baia or biai, to make or shape, whence Mr. Ridley derived Baiame, is\nnot known to me in Euahlayi. Wir djuri has BAI, a footmark, and Byamee\nleft footmarks on the rocks, but that is probably a chance coincidence.\n\nI was first told of Byamee, in whispers, by a very old native, Yudtha\nDulleebah (Bald Head), said to have been already grey haired when Sir\nThomas Mitchell discovered the Narran in 1846. My informant said that\nhe was instructed as to Byamee in his first Boorah, or initiation. If\nhe was early grey, say at thirty, in 1846, that takes his initiation\nback to 1830, when, as a matter of fact, we have contemporary evidence\nto the belief in Byamee, who is not of missionary importation, though\nafter 1856 Christian ideas may, through Mr. Ridley's book, have been\nattached to his name by educated Kamilaroi. But he was a worshipful\nbeing, revealed in the mysteries, long before missionaries came, as all\nmy informants aver.\n\nThere has, indeed, been much dispute as to whether the Aborigines of\nAustralia have any idea, or germ of an idea, of a God; anything more\nthan vague beliefs about unattached spirits, mainly mischievous, who\nmight be propitiated or scared away. Mr. Huxley maintained this view,\nas did Mr. Herbert Spencer. [ECCLESIASTICAL INSTITUTIONS, p. 674.] Both of\nthese authors, who have great influence on popular opinion, omitted to\nnotice the contradictory statement of Waitz, published in 1872. He\ncredited the natives, in some regions, with belief in, and dances\nperformed in honour of, a 'Good Being,' and denied that the belief and\nrites were the result of European influence. [Waitz, ANTHROPOLOGIE DER\nNATUR--V(tm)LKER, vol. vi. pp. 796-798. Leipzig, 1872.] Mr. Tylor,\nadmitting to some extent that the belief now exists, attributed it in part\nto the influence of missionaries and of white settlers. [Journal,\nAnthropological Institute, vol. xxi. p. 292 ET SEQ.] 'Baiame,' he held,\nwas a word of missionary manufacture, introduced about 1830-1840. This\nopinion was controverted by Mr. Lang,[MAGIC AND RELIGION, p. 25 SQ. MYTH,\nRITUAL, AND RELIGION, vol. ii. chap. xii., 1899.] and by Mr. N. W. Thomas.\nMr. Thomas [MAN, 1905, No. 28.] has produced the evidence of Henderson,\nwriting in 1829-1830, for the belief in 'Piame' or Byamee, or\nBaiame. [OBSERVATIONS AN THE COLONIES OF NEW SOUTH WALES AND VAN DIEMAN'S\nLAND, p. 147.]\n\nIn 1904 Mr. Howitt gave a great mass of evidence for the belief in what\nhe calls an 'All Father': in many dialects styled by various names\nmeaning 'Our Father,' dwelling in or above the sky, and often receiving\nthe souls of blacks who have been 'good.' These ideas are not derived,\nMr. Howitt holds, from Europeans, or developed out of ancestor-worship,\nwhich does not exist in the tribes. The belief is concealed from women,\nbut communicated to lads at their initiation. [Howitt, NATIVE TRIBES OF\nSOUTH-EAST AUSTRALIA, pp. 488-508.] The belief, in favourable\ncircumstances, might develop, Mr. Howitt thinks, into what he speaks of as\na 'religion,' a 'recognised religion.' Without asking how 'a recognised\nreligion' is to be defined, I shall merely tell what I have gathered as to\nthe belief in Byamee among the Euahlayi.\n\nIt may seem strange that I should know anything about a belief\ncarefully kept from women, but I have even been privileged to hear\n'Byamee's Song,' which only the fully initiated may sing; an old black,\nas will later appear, did chant this old lay, now no longer understood,\nto myself and my husband. Moreover, the women of the Euahlayi have some\nknowledge of, and some means of, mystic access to Byamee, though they\ncall him by another name.\n\nByamee, in the first place, is to the Euahlayi what the 'Alcheringa' or\n'Dream time' is to the Arunta. Asked for the reason why of anything,\nthe Arunta answer, 'It was so in the Alcheringa.' Our tribe have a\nsubsidiary myth corresponding to that of the Alcheringa. There was an\nage, in their opinion, when only birds and beasts were on earth; but a\ncolossal man and two women came from the remote north-east, changed\nbirds and beasts into men and women, made other folk of clay or stone,\ntaught them everything, and left laws for their guidance, then\nreturned whence they came. This is a kind of 'Alcheringa' myth, but\nwhether this colossal man was Byamee or not, our tribe give, as the\nfinal answer to any question about the origin of customs, 'Because\nByamee say so.' Byamee declared his will, and that was and is enough\nfor his children. At the Boorah, or initiatory ceremonies, he is\nproclaimed as 'Father of All, whose laws the tribes are now obeying.'\nByamee, at least in one myth (told also by the Wir djuri), is the\noriginal source of all totems, and of the law that people of the same\ntotem may not intermarry, 'however far apart their hunting-grounds.' I\nheard first in a legend, then received confirmation from all old\nblacks, that Byamee had a totem name for every part of his body, even\nto a different one for each finger and toe. And when he was passing on\nto fresh fields, he gave each kinship of the tribe he was leaving one\nof his totems. The usual version is, that to such as were metamorphosed\nfrom birds and animals he gave as totem the animal or whatever it was\nfrom which they were evolved. But no one dreams of claiming Byamee as a\nrelation belonging to one clan; he is one apart and yet the father of\nall, even as Birrahgnooloo is mother of all and not related to any one\nclan; Cunnumbeillee, his other wife, had only one totem.\n\nCertainly woman is given a high place in their sacred lore. The chief\nwife of Byamee, Birrahgnooloo, is claimed as the mother of all, for\nshe, like him, had a totem for each part of her body; no one totem can\nclaim her, but all do.\n\nMother of all, though mother of none in particular, she was not to be\nvulgarised by ordinary domestic relations, For those purposes\nCunnumbeillee was at hand, as a bearer of children and a caterer. Yet\nit was Birrahgnooloo whom Byamee best loved and made his companion,\ngiving her power and position which no other held. She too, like him,\nis partially crystallised in the sky-camp, where they are together; the\nupper parts of their bodies are as on earth; to her, those who want\nfloods go, and when willing to grant their requests, she bids\nCunnumbeillee start the flood-ball of flood rolling down the mountains.\nCunnumbeillee, as has been said, had but one totem which her children\nderived from her.\n\nByamee is the originator of things less archaic and important than\ntotemism. There is a large stone fish-trap at Brewarrina, on the Barwan\nRiver. It is said to have been made by Byamee and his gigantic sons,\njust as later Greece attributed the walls of Tiryns to the Cyclops, or\nas Glasgow Cathedral has been explained in legend as the work of the\nPicts. Byamee also established the rule that there should be a common\ncamping-ground for the various tribes, where, during the fishing\nfestival, peace should be strictly kept, all meeting to enjoy the fish,\nand do their share towards preserving the fisheries.\n\nByamee still exists. I have been told by an old native, as will be\nshown later, that prayers for the souls of the dead used to be\naddressed to Byamee at funerals; certainly not a practice derived from\nProtestant missionaries.\n\nByamee is supposed to listen to the cry of an orphan for rain. Such an\none has but to run out when the clouds are overhead, and, looking at\nthe sky, call aloud\n\n'Gullee boorboor. Gullee boorboor.'\n\n'Water come down. Water come down.'\n\nOr should it be raining too much, the last possible child of a woman\ncan stop it by burning Midjeer wood.\n\nBootha told me after one rain that she had sent one of her tutelary\nspirits to tell Boyjerh--Byamee is called by women and children\nBoyjerh--that the country wanted rain. In answer he had taken up a\nhandful of crystal pebbles and thrown them from the sky down into the\nwater in a stone basin on the top of the sacred mountain; as the\npebbles fell in, the water splashed up into the clouds above, whence it\ndescended as the desired rain.\n\nIt is told to me, that at some initiatory rites the oldest medicine\nman, or Wirreenun, present addresses a prayer to Byamee, asking him to\ngive them long life, as they have kept his law.\n\nThe tribesmen do not profess to pray, or to have prayed, to Byamee on\nany occasions except at funerals, and at the conclusion of the Boorah.\n\nAs for Byamee's relation to ethics, it will be stated in the chapter on\nthe tribal ceremonies, while the stories as to the rewards and\npunishments of the future life will be given in their place. Baiame's\ntroubles with a kind of disobedient deputy, Darramulun, will also be\nnarrated: the myth is current, too, among the Wir djuri tribe.\n\nOther particulars about Byamee will occur in the course of later\nchapters: here I have tried to give a general summary of the native\nbeliefs. The reader may interpret them in his own fashion, and may\ndecide as to whether the beliefs do or do not indicate a kind of\n'religion,' whether 'a recognised religion' or not. There is\nnecessarily, of course, an absence of temples and of priests, and I\nhave found no trace or vestige of sacrifice. What may be said on the\naffirmative side as to the religious aspect of the belief, the reader\ncan supply from the summary of facts. Other potent beings occur in\nnative myth, as we shall show, but there appears to exist between them\nand mankind no relation of affection, reverence, or duty, as in the\ncase of Byamee.\n\nHere it seems necessary to advert to a remark of Mr. Howitt's which\nappears to be erroneous. He says 'that part of Australia which I have\nindicated as the habitat of that belief' (namely, in an All Father),'\nis also the area where there has been the advance from group marriage\nto individual marriage; from descent in the female line to that in the\nmale line; where the primitive organisation under the class system has\nbeen more or less replaced by an organisation based on locality; in\nfact, where these advances have been made to which I have more than\nonce drawn attention.'[Howitt, NATIVE TRIBES OF SOUTH-EAST AUSTRALIA,\np. 500.]\n\nMr. Howitt forgets that he himself attributes the early system of\ndescent through women, and also the belief in an All Father (Nurelli),\nto the Wiimbaio tribe [IBID. p. 489] to the Wotjobaluk tribe,[NATIVE\nTRIBES OF SOUTH-EAST AUSTRALIA, pp. 120, 490.] to the Kamilaroi, to the\nTa-Ta-thi,[IBID. p. 494] while female descent and the belief in Baiame\nmark the Euahlayi and Wir djuri. [JOURNAL, ANTHROPOLOGICAL INSTITUTE,\nXXV., p. 297.]\n\nThese tribes cover an enormous area of country, and, though they have\nnot advanced to male kinship, they all possess the belief in an All\nFather. That belief does not appear to be in any way associated with\nadvance in social organisation, for Messrs. Spencer and Gillen cannot\nfind a trace of it in more than one of the central and northern tribes,\nwhich have male kinship, and a kind of local self-government. On the\nother hand, it does occur among southern tribes, like the Kurnai, which\nhave advanced almost altogether out of totemism.\n\nIn short, we have tribes with female descent, such as the Dieri and\nUrabunna, to whom all knowledge of an All Father is denied. We have\nmany large and important tribes with female descent who certainly\nbelieve in an All Father. We have tribes of the highest social\nadvancement who are said to show no vestige of the belief, and we have\ntribes also socially advanced who hold the belief with great vigour. In\nthese circumstances, authenticated by Mr. Howitt himself, it is\nimpossible to accept the theory that belief in an All Father is only\nreached in the course of such advance to a higher social organisation\nas is made by tribes who reckon descent in the male line.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER III\n\nRELATIONSHIPS AND TOTEMS\n\n\nSome savants question the intellectual ability of the blacks because\nthey have not elaborate systems of numeration and notation, which in\ntheir life were quite unneeded. Such as were needed were supplied. They\nare often incorporate in one word-noun and qualifying numerical\nadjective, as for example--\n\nGundooee      A SOLITARY EMU\n\nBooloowah     TWO EMUS\n\nOogle oogle   FOUR EMUS\n\nGayyahnai     FIVE OR SIX EMUS\n\nGonurrun      FOURTEEN OR FIFTEEN EMUS.\n\nI fancy the brains that could have elaborated their marriage rules were\ncapable of workaday arithmetic if necessary, and few indeed of us know\nour family trees as the blacks know theirs.\n\nEven the smallest black child who can talk seems full of knowledge as\nto all his relations, animate and inanimate, the marriage taboos, and\nthe rest of their complicated system.\n\nThe first division among this tribe is a blood distinction (I\nphratries'):--\n\nGwaigulleeah  LIGHT BLOODED\n\nGwaimudthen   DARK BLOODED.\n\nThis distinction is not confined to the human beings of the tribe, who\nmust be of one or the other, but there are the Gwaigulleeah and\nGwaimudthen divisions in all things. The first and chief division in\nour tribe, as regards customary marriage law, is the partition of all\ntribes-folk into these 'phratries,' or 'exogamous moieties.' While in\nmost Australian tribes the meanings of the names of phratries are lost,\nwhere the meanings are known they are usually names of animals--Eagle,\nHawk, and Crow, White Cockatoo and Black Cockatoo, and so forth. Among\nthe great Kamilaroi tribe, akin in speech to the Euahlayi, the names of\nphratries, DILBI and KUPATHIN, are of unknown significance. The\nEuahlayi names, we have seen, are Gwaigulleeah, Light blooded, and\nGwaimudthen, Dark blooded.\n\nThe origin of this division is said to be the fact that the original\nancestors were, on the one side, a red race coming from the west, the\nGwaigulleeah; on the other, a dark race coming from the east.\n\nA Gwaigulleeah may under no circumstances marry a Gwaigulleeah; he or\nshe must mate with a Gwaimudthen. This rule has no exception. A child\nbelongs to the same phratry as its mother.\n\nThe next name of connection is local, based on belonging to one country\nor hunting-ground; this name a child takes from its mother wherever it\nmay happen to be born. Any one who is called a Noongahburrah belongs to\nthe Noongah-Kurrajong country; Ghurreeburrah to the orchid country;\nMirriehburrah, poligonum country; Bibbilah, Bibbil country, and so on.\nThis division, not of blood relationship, carries no independent\nmarriage restriction, but keeps up a feeling equivalent to Scotch,\nIrish, or English, and is counted by the blacks as 'relationship,' but\nnot sufficiently so to bar marriage.\n\nThe next division is the name in common for all daughters, or all sons\nof one family of sisters. The daughters take the name from their\nmaternal grandmother, the sons from their maternal great-uncle.\n\nOf these divisions, called I Matrimonial Classes, there are four for\neach sex, bearing the same names as among the Kamilaroi. The names\nare--\n\n  Masculine Kumbo     BROTHER AND SISTER\n  Feminine, Bootha\n\n  Masculine Murree    BROTHER AND SISTER\n  Feminine, Matha\n\n  Masculine Hippi     BROTHER AND SISTER\n  Feminine, Hippitha\n\n  Masculine Kubbee    BROTHER AND SISTER\n  Feminine, Kubbootha\n\n\nThe children of Bootha will be\n\n  Masculine Hippi     BROTHER AND SISTER\n  Feminine, Hippitha\n\n\nThe children of Matha will be\n\n  Masculine Kubbee    BROTHER AND SISTER\n  Feminine, Kubbootha\n\n\nThe children of Hippatha will be\n\n  Masculine Kumbo     BROTHER AND SISTER\n  Feminine, Bootha\n\n\nThe children of Kubbootha will be\n\n  Masculine Murree    BROTHER AND SISTER\n  Feminine, Matha\n\n\nThus, you see, they take, if girls, their grandmother's and her\nsisters' 'class' names in common; if boys, the 'class' name of their\ngrandmother's brothers.\n\nBootha    can only marry Murree,\n\nMatha     can only marry Kumbo,\n\nHippitha  can only marry Kubbee,\n\nKubbootha can only marry Hippi.\n\n\nBoth men and women are often addressed by these names when spoken to.\n\nA PROPOS of names, a child is never called at night by the same name as\nin the daytime, lest the 'devils' hear it and entice him away.\n\nNames are made for the newly born according to circumstances; a girl\nborn under a Dheal tree, for example, was called Dheala. Any incident\nhappening at the time of birth may gain a child a name, such as a\nparticular lizard passing. Two of my black maids were called after\nlizards in that way: Barahgurree and Bogginbinnia.\n\nNimmaylee is a porcupine with the spines coming; such an one having\nbeen brought to the camp just as a girl was born, she became Nimmaylee.\n\nThe mothers, with native politeness, ask you to give their children\nEnglish names, but much mote often use in familiar conversation either\nthe Kumbo Bootha names, or others derived from place of birth, from\nsome circumstance connected with it, a child's mispronunciation of a\nword, some peculiarity noticed in the child, or still more often they\ncall each other by the name proclaiming the degree of relationship.\n\nFor example, a girl calls the daughters of her mother and of her aunts\nalike sisters.\n\n  Boahdee       SISTER\n  Wambaneah     FULL BROTHER\n  Dayadee       HALF BROTHER\n  Gurrooghee    UNCLE\n  Wulgundee     UNCLE'S WIFE\n  Kummean       SISTER'S SISTER\n  Numbardee     MOTHER\n  Numbardee     MOTHER'S SISTER\n  Beealahdee    FATHER\n  Beealahdee    MOTHER'S SISTERS' HUSBANDS\n  Gnahgnahdee   GRANDMOTHER ON FATHER'S SIDE\n  Bargie        GRANDMOTHER ON MOTHER'S SIDE\n  Dadadee       GRANDFATHER ON MOTHER'S SIAE\n  Gurroomi      A SON-IN-LAW, OR ONE WHO COULD BE A SON-IN-LAW\n  Goonooahdee   A DAUGHTER-IN-LAW, OR ONE WHO COULD BE A DAUGHTER-IN-LAW\n  Gooleerh      HUSBAND OR WIFE, OR ONE WHO MIGHT BE SO.\n\n\nSo relationships are always kept in their memories by being daily used\nas names. There are other general names, too, such as--\n\n  Mullayerh     A TEMPORARY MATE OR COMPANION\n  Moothie       A FRIEND OF CHILDHOOD IN AFTER LIFE\n  Doore-oothai  A LOVER\n  Dillahga      AN ELDERLY MAN OF THE SAME TOTEM\n  Tuckandee     A YOUNG MAN OF THE SAME TOTEM, RECKONED AS A SORT OF\n                  BROTHER.\n\n\nAnother list of names used ordinarily is--\n\n  Boothan       LAST POSSIBLE CHILD OF A WOMAN\n  Mahmee        OLD WOMAN\n  Beewun        MOTHERLESS GIRL\n  Gowun         FATHERLESS GIRL\n  Yumbui        FATHERLESS BOY\n  Moogul        ONLY CHILD.\n\n\nThose of the same totem are reckoned as brothers and sisters, so cannot\nintermarry. 'Boyjerh' relations, as those on the father's side are\ncalled, are not so important as on the mother's side, but are still\nrecognised.\n\nNow for the great Dhe, or totem system, by some called Mah, but Dhe, is\nthe more correct.\n\nDinewan, or emu, is a totem, and has amongst its multiplex totems' or\n'sub-totems'--\n\n  Goodoo        OR CODFISH\n  Gumbarl       SILVER BREAM\n  Inga          CRAYFISH\n  Boomool       SHRIMPS\n  Gowargay      WATER EMU SPIRIT\n  Moograbah     BIG BLACK-AND-WHITE MAGPIE\n  Booloorl      LITTLE NIGHT OWL\n  Byahmul       BLACK SWAN\n  Eerin         A LITTLE NIGHT OWL\n  Beerwon       A BIRD LIKE A SWALLOW\n  Dulloorah     THE MANNA-BRINGING BIRDS\n  Bunnyal       FLIES\n  Dheal         SACRED FIRE\n  Gidya         AN ACACIA\n  Yaraan        AN EUCALYPTUS\n  Deenyi        IRONBARK\n  Guatha        QUANDONG\n  Goodooroo     RIVER BOX\n  Mirieh        POLIGONUM\n  Yarragerh     THE NORTH-EAST WIND\n  Guie          TREE--OWENIA ACIDULA\n  Niune         WILD MELON\n  Binnamayah    BIG SALTBUSH.\n\n\nBohrah, the kangaroo, is another totem, and is considered somewhat akin\nto Dinewan. For example, in a quarrel between, say, the Bohrah totem\nand the Beewee, the Dinewan would take the part of the former rather\nthan the latter.\n\nAmongst the multiplex totems of Bohrah are--\n\n  Goolahwilleel    TOPKNOT PIGEONS\n  Boogoodoogadah   THE RAIN-BIRD\n  Gilah            FINK-BREASTED PARROT\n  Quarrian         YELLOW AND RED BREASTED GREY PARROT\n  Buln Buln        GREEN PARROT\n  Gidgerregah      SMALL GREEN PARROT\n  Cocklerina       A ROSE AND YELLOW CRESTED WHILE COCKATOO\n  Youayah          FROGS\n  Guiggahboorool   BIGGEST ANT-BEDS\n  Dunnia           WATTLE TREE\n  Mulga            AN ACACIA\n  Gnoel            SANDALWOOD\n  Brigalow         AN ACACIA\n  Yarragerh        NORTH-EAST WIND, SAME AS DINEWAN'S.\n\n\nAll clouds, lightning, thunder, and rain that is not blown up by the\nwind of another totem, belong to Bohrah.\n\nBeewee, brown and yellow Iguana, numerically a very powerful totem, has\nfor multiplex totems--\n\n  Gai-gai           CATFISH\n  Curreequinquin    BUTCHER-BIRD\n  Gougourgahgah     LAUGHING-JACKASS\n  Deenbi            DIVERS\n  Birroo Birroo     SAND BUILDERS\n  Deegeenboyah      SOLDIER-BIRD\n  Weedah            BOWER-BIRD\n  Mooregoo Mooregoo BLACK IBIS\n  Booloon           WHITE CRANE\n  Noodulnoodul      WHISTLING DUCKS\n  Goborrai          STARS\n  Gulghureer        PINK LIZARD\n  Goori             PINE\n  Talingerh         NATIVE FUCHSIA\n  Guiebet           NATIVE PASSION FRUIT\n  Boonburr          POISON TREE\n  Gungooday         STOCKMAN'S WOOD\n  Guddeeboondoo     BITTER BARK\n  Boorgoolbean or\n  Mooloowerh        A SHRUB WITH CREAMY BLOSSOMS\n  Yarragerh         SPRING WIND\n  Muddernwurderh    WEST WIND.\n\n\nThose with whom the Beewee shares the winds he counts as relations. It\nis the Beewees of the Gwaimudthen, or dark blood, who own Yarragerh\n(spring wind); the light-blooded own Mudderwurderh (west wind).\n\nAnother totem is Gouyou, or Bandicoot. The animal has disappeared from\nthe Narran district, but the totem tribe is still strong, though not so\nnumerous as either the Beewees or Dinewans.\n\nMultiplex totems of Gouyou--\n\n  Wayarnberh              TURTLE\n  Mungghee                MUSSELS\n  Piggiebillah            PORCUPINE\n  Dayahminnah             SMALL CARPET SNAKE\n  Mungun                  LARGE CARPET SNAKE\n  Douyouie                ANTS\n  Moondoo                 WASPS\n  Murgahmuggui            SPIDER\n  Bayarh                  GREEN-HEAD ANTS\n  Mubboo                  BEEFWOOD\n  Coolabah                EUCALYPTUS, FLOODED BOX\n  Bingahwingul            NEEDLEBUSH\n  Mayarnah                STONES\n  Gheeger Gheeger         COLD WEST WIND\n  Gibbon                  YAM\n  Boondoon                KINGFISHER\n  Durnerh brown           PIGEON\n  Guineeboo               REDBREASTS\n  Munggheewurraywurraymul SEAGULLS\n  Guiggah ordinary        ANT-BEDS.\n\n\nNext we take Doolungaiyah, or Bilber, commonly known as Bilby, a large\nspecies of rat the size of a small rabbit, like which it burrows;\nalmost died out now. The totem clan are very few here too, so it is\ndifficult to learn much as to their multiplex totems, amongst which,\nhowever, are--\n\n  Ooboon           BLUE-TONGUED LIZARD\n  Goomblegubbon    PLAINS TURKEY OR BUSTARD\n  Boothagullagulla BIRD LIKE SEAGULL\n  Tekel Barain     LARGE WHITE AMARYLLIS.\n\nDouyou, black snake, totem claims--\n\n  Noongah            KURRAJONG--STERCULIA\n  Carbeen            AN EUCALYPTUS\n  Booroorerh         BULRUSHES\n  Gargooloo          YAMS\n  Yhi                THE SUN (FEMININE)\n  Gunyahmoo          THE EAST WIND\n  Kurreah            CROCODILE\n  Wa-ah              SHELLS\n  Douyougurrah       EARTH-WORMS\n  Deereeree          WILLY WAGTAIL\n  Burrengeen         JEEWEE\n  Bouyoudoorunnillee GREY CRANES\n  Ouyan              CURLEW\n  Bouyougah          CENTIPEDES\n  Bubburr            BIG SNAKE\n  Woggoon            SCRUB TURKEY\n  Beeargah           CRANE\n  Waggestmul         KIND OF RAT\n  Wi                 SMALL FISH\n  Millan             SMALL WATER-YAM--SOURTOP\n\n\nMoodai, or opossum, another totem, claims--\n\n  Bibbil             POPULAR-LEAVED GUM\n  Bumble             CAPPARIS MITCHELLIANNI\n  Birah              WHITEWOOD\n  Beebuyer           YELLOW FLOWERING BROOM\n  Illay              HOP BUSH\n  Mirrie             WILD CURRANT BUSH\n  Mooregoo           SWAMP OAK--BELAH\n  Mungoongarlee      LARGEST IGUANA\n  Mouyi              WHITE COCKATOO\n  Beeleer            BLACK COCKATOO\n  Wungghee           WHITE NIGHT OWL\n  Mooregoo           MOPOKE\n  Narahdarn          BAT\n  Bahloo             MOON\n  Euloowirrie        RAINBOW\n  Bibbee             WOODPECKER\n  Billai             CRIMSON WING PARROT\n  Durrahgeegin       GREEN FROG.\n\n\nMaira, a paddy melon, claims as multiplex totems--\n\n  Wahn                   THE CROW\n  Mullyan                THE EAGLE-HAWK\n  Gooboothoo             DOVES\n  Goolayyalilee          PELICAN\n  Oonaywah               BLACK DIVER\n  Gunundar               WHILE DIVER\n  Birriebungar           SMALL DIVER\n  Mounin                 MOSQUITO\n  Mouninguggahgui        MOSQUITO BIRD\n  Bullah Bullah          BUTTERFLIES\n  Tucki                  A KIND OF BREAM\n  Beewerh                BONY BREAM\n  Gulbarlee              SHINGLEBACK LIZARD\n  Budtha                 ROSEWOOD\n  Goodoogah              YALLI\n  Wayarah                WILD GRAPES\n  Garwah                 RIVERS\n  Gooroongoodilbaydilbay SOUTH WIND.\n\n\nIt is said a Maira will never be drowned, for the rivers are a\nsub-totem of theirs; but I notice they nevertheless learn to swim.\n\nYubbah, carpet snake, as a kin has almost disappeared, only a few\nmembers remaining to claim\n\n  Mungahran             HAWK.\n\n\nBurrahwahn, a big sandhill rat, now extinct here, claims--\n\n  Mien                  DINGO\n  Dalleerin             A LIZARD\n  Gaengaen              WILD LIME\n  Willerhderh, or\n  Douran Douran         NORTH WIND\n  Bralgah               NATIVE COMPANION.\n\n\nBuckandee, native cat kin, claim--\n\n  Buggila               LEOPARD WOOD\n  Bean                  MYALL\n  Bunbundoolooey        A LITTLE BROWN BIRD\n  Dunnee Bunbun         A VERY LARGE GREEN PARROT\n  Dooroongul            HAIRY CATERPILLAR.\n\n\nAmongst other totems were once the Bralgah, Native Companion, and\nDibbee, a sort of sandpiper, but their kins are quite extinct as far as\nour blacks are concerned; the birds themselves are still plentiful. The\nBralgah birds have a Boorah ground at the back of our old\nhorse-paddock, a smooth, well-beaten circle, where they dance the\ngrotesque dances peculiar to them, which are really most amusing to\nwatch, somewhat like a set of kitchen lancers into which some dignified\ndames have got by mistake, and a curious mixture is the dance of\ndignity and romping.\n\nThe totem kins numerically strongest with us were the Dinewans,\nBeewees, Bohrahs, and Gouyous. Further back in the country, they tell\nme, the crow, the eaglehawk, and the bees were original totems, not\nmultiplex ones, as with us.\n\nIt may be as well for those interested in the marriage law puzzles to\nstate that Dinewans, Bohrahs, Douyous, and Doolungayers are always\n\n  Kumbo             Hippi\n  Bootha            Hippitha.\n\n\nThat Moodai, Gouyou, Beewee, Maira, Yubbah are always\n\n  Murree            Kubbee\n  Matha             Kubbootha.\n\nOur blacks may and do eat their hereditary totems, if so desirous, with\nno ill effects to themselves, either real or imaginary; their totem\nnames they take from their mothers. They may, in fact, in any way use\ntheir totems, but never abuse them. A Beewee, for example, may kill, or\nsee another kill, and eat or use a Beewee, or one of its multiplex\ntotems, and show no sign of sorrow or anger, but should any one speak\nevil of the Beewee, or of any of its multiplex totems, there will be a\nquarrel.\n\nThere will likewise be a quarrel if any one dares to mimic a totem,\neither by drawing one, except at Boorahs, or imitating it in any way.\n\nThere are members of the tribes, principally wizards, or men intended\nto be such, who are given an individual totem called Yunbeai. This they\nmust never eat or they will die. Any injury to his yunbeai hurts the\nman himself In danger he has the power to assume the shape of his\nyunbeai, which of course is a great assistance to him, especially in\nlegendary lore; but, on the other hand, a yunbeai is almost a Heel of\nAchilles to a wirreenun (see the chapter on Medicine and Magic).\n\nWomen are given a yunbeai too, sometimes. One girl had a yunbeai given\nher as a child, and she was to be brought up as a witch, but she caught\nrheumatic fever which left her with St. Vitus's dance. The yunbeai\nduring one of her bad attacks jumped out of her, and she lost her\nchance of witchery. One old fellow told me once that when he was going\nto a public-house he took a miniature form of his yunbeai, which was\nthe Kurrea--crocodile--out of himself and put it safety in a bottle of\nwater, in case by any chance he got drunk, and an enemy, knowing his\nyunbeai, coaxed it away. I wanted to see that yunbeai in a bottle, but\nnever succeeded.\n\nThe differences between the hereditary totem or Dhe, inherited from the\nmother, and the individual totem or yunbeai, acquired by chance, are\nthese: Food restrictions do not affect the totem, but marriage\nrestrictions do; the yunbeai has no marriage restrictions; a man having\nan opossum for yunbeai may marry a woman having the same either as her\nyunbeai or hereditary totem, other things being in order, but under no\ncircumstances must a yunbeai be eaten by its possessor.\n\nThe yunbeai is a sort of alter ego; a man's spirit is in his yunbeai,\nand his yunbeai's spirit in him.\n\nA Minggah, or spirit-haunted tree of an individual, usually chosen from\namongst a man's multiplex totems, is another source of danger to him,\nas also a help.\n\nAs Mr. Canton says: 'What singular threads of superstition bind the\nends of the earth together! In an old German story a pair of lovers\nabout to part chose each a tree, and by the tree of the absent one was\nthe one left to know of his wellbeing or the reverse. In time his tree\ndied, and she, hearing no news of him, pined away, her tree withering\nwith her, and both dying at the same time.\n\nWell, that is just what a wirreenun would believe about his Minggah.\nThese Minggah and Goomarh spirit trees and stones always make me think,\nperhaps irrelevantly, of one of the restored sayings of the Lord, which\nends 'Raise the stone, and there thou shalt find Me; cleave the wood,\nand I am there.'\n\nBlacks were early scientists in some of their ideas, being before\nDarwin with the evolution theory, only theirs was a kind of evolution\naided by Byamee. I dare say, though, the missing link is somewhere in\nthe legends. I rather think the Central Australians have the key to it.\nOne old man here was quite an Ibsen with his ghastly version of\nheredity.\n\nHe said, when I asked him what harm it would do for, say, a Beewee\ntotem man to come from the Gulf country, where his tribe had never had\nany communication with ours, and marry a girl here,--that all Beewees\nwere originally changed from the Beewee form into human shape. The\nBeewee of the Gulf, originally, like the Beewee here, had the same\nanimal shape, and should two of this same blood mate the offspring\nwould throw back, as they say of horses, to the original strain, and\npartake of iguana (Beewee) attributes either in nature or form.\n\nFrom the statements just given, it will be seen that the Euahlayi are\nin the Kamilaroi stage of social organisation. They reckon descent in\nthe female line: they have 'phratries' and four matrimonial classes,\nwith totems within the phratries. In their system of 'multiplex-totems'\nor 'sub-totems' they resemble the Wotjobaluk tribe. [Howitt, NATIVE TRIBES\nOF SOUTH-EAST AUSTRALIA, pp. 121, 125, 453, 455.] The essence of the\n'sub-totem' system is the division of all things into the categories\nprovided by the social system of the human society. The arrangement is a\nvery early attempt at a scientific system of classification.\n\nPerhaps the most peculiar feature in the organisation of the Euahlayi\nis the existence of Matrimonial Classes, which are named as in the\nKamilaroi tongue, while the phratry names are not those of the Kamilaroi,\nand alone among phratry names in Australia which can be translated, are\nnot names of animals. The phratries have thus no presiding animals, and in\nthe phratries there are no totem kins of the phratriac names. The cause of\nthese peculiarities is matter of conjecture.\n\nA peculiarity in the totemic system of the Euahlayi--the right of each\nindividual to kill and eat his own totem--has been mentioned, and may\nbe associated here with other taboos on food.\n\nThe wunnarl, or food taboo, was taken off a different kind of food for\nboys at each Boorah, until at last they could eat what they pleased\nexcept their yunbeai, or individual familiar: their Dhe, or family\ntotem, was never wunnarl or taboo to them.\n\nA child may not perhaps know that it has had a yunbeai given to it, and\nmay eat of it in ignorance, when immediately they say that child\nsickens.\n\nShould a boy or a girl eat plains turkey or bustard eggs while they\nwere yet wunnarl, or taboo, he or she would lose his or her sight.\nShould they eat the eggs or flesh of kangaroo or piggiebillah, their\nskins would break out in sores and their limbs wither.\n\nEven honey is wunnarl at times to all but the very old or very young.\nFish is wunnarl for about four years after his Boorah to a boy, and\nabout four months after she is wirreebeeun, or young woman, to a girl.\n\nWhen the wunnarl was taken off a particular kind of meat, a wizard\npoured some of the melted fat and inside blood of that animal or bird,\nas the case might be, over the boy, and rubbed it into him. The boy,\nshaking and shivering, made a spluttering noise with his lips; after\nthat he could eat of the hitherto forbidden food.\n\nThis did not necessarily refer to his totem, but any food wunnarl to\nhim, though it is possible that there may have been a time in tribal\nhistory, now forgotten, when totems were wunnarl, and these ceremonies\nmay be all that is left to point to that time.\n\nWhen a boy, after his first Boorah, killed his first emu, whether it\nwas his Dhe, or totem, or not, his father made him lie on the bird\nbefore it was cooked. Afterwards a wirreenun (wizard) and the father\nrubbed the fat on the boy's joints, and put apiece of the flesh in his\nmouth. 'The boy chewed it, making a noise as he did so of fright and\ndisgust; finally he dropped the meat from his mouth, making a blowing\nnoise through his lips of 'Ooh! Ooh! Ooh!' After that he could eat the\nflesh.\n\nA girl, too, had to be rubbed with the fat and blood of anything from\nwhich the wunnarl was to be removed for her. No ceremony of this sort\nwould be gone through with the flesh, fat, or blood of any one's\nyunbeai, or individual familiar animal, for under no circumstances\nwould any one kill or eat their yunbeai.\n\nConcerning the yunbeai, or animal familiar of the individual, conferred\nby the medicine men, more is to be said in the ensuing chapters. The\nyunbeai answers to the Manitu obtained by Red Indians during the fast\nat puberty; to the 'Bush Soul' of West Africa; to the Nagual of South\nAmerican tribes; and to the Nyarong of Borneo. The yunbeai has hitherto\nbeen scarcely remarked on among Australian tribes. Mr. Thomas declares\nit to be 'almost non-existent' in Australia, mentioning as exceptions\nits presence among the Euahlayi; the Wotjobaluk in Victoria; the\nYaraikkanna of Cape York; and 'probably' some of the northern tribes on\nthe other side of the Gulf of Carpentaria. [MAN (1904), No. 53, p. 85.]\n\nPerhaps attention has not been directed to the animal familiar in\nAustralia, or perhaps it is really an infrequent thing among the\ntribes.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER IV\n\nTHE MEDICINE MEN\n\n\nI used to wonder how the wirreenuns or doctor-wizards of the tribe\nattained their degrees.\n\nI found out that the old wizards fix upon a young boy who is to follow\ntheir profession. They take him to a tribal burial-ground at night.\nThere they tie him down and leave him, after having lit some fires of\nfat at short distances round him.\n\nDuring the night that boy, if he be shaky in his nerves, has rather a\nbad time.\n\nOne doctor of our tribe gave me a recital of his own early experience.\n\nHe said, after the old fellows had gone, a spirit came to him, and\nwithout undoing his fastenings by which he was bound, turned him over,\nthen went away. Scarcely had the spirit departed when a big star fell\nstraight from the sky alongside the boy; he gazed fixedly at it, and\nsaw emerge from it, first the two hind legs, then the whole of a Beewee\nor iguana. The boy's totem was a Beewee, so he knew it would not hurt\nhim. It ran close up to him, climbed on him, ran down his whole length,\nthen went away.\n\nNext came a snake straight towards his nose, hissing all the time. He\nwas frightened now, for the snake is the hereditary enemy of the\niguana. The boy struggled to free himself, but ineffectually. He tried\nto call out but found himself dumb. He tried to shut his eyes, or turn\nthem from the snake, but was powerless to do so. The snake crawled on\nto him and licked him. Then it went away, leaving the boy as one\nparalysed. Next came a huge figure to him, having in its hand a gunnai\nor yam stick. The figure drove this into the boy's head, pulled it out\nthrough his back, and in the hole thus made placed a 'Gubberah,' or\nsacred stone, with the help of which much of the boy's magic in the\nfuture was to be worked.\n\nThis stone was about the size and something the shape of a small lemon,\nlooking like a smoothed lump of semi-transparent crystal. It is in such\nstones that the wi-wirreenuns, or cleverest wizards, see visions of the\npast, of what is happening in the present at a distance, and of the\nfuture; also by directing rays from them towards their victims they are\nsaid to cause instantaneous death.\n\nNext, to the doctor-boy on trial, came the spirits of the dead who\ncorroboreed round him, chanting songs full of sacred lore as regards\nthe art of healing, and instructions how, when he needed it, he could\ncall upon their aid.\n\nThen they silently and mysteriously disappeared. The next day one of\nthe old wizards came to release the boy; he kept him away from the camp\nall day and at night took him to a weedah, or bower-bird's, playground.\nThere he tied him down again, and there the boy was visited again by\nthe spirits of the dead, and more lore was imparted to him.\n\nThe reason given for taking him to a weedah's playground is, that\nbefore the weedah was changed into a bird, he was a great wirreenun;\nthat is why, as a bird, he makes such a collection of pebbles and bones\nat his playground.\n\nThe bower-bird's playgrounds are numerous in the bush. They are made of\ngrass built into a tent-shaped arch open at each end, through which the\nweedahs run in and out, and scattered in heaps all around are white\nbones and black stones, bits of glass, and sometimes we have found\ncoins, rings, and brooches.\n\nThe weedahs do not lay their eggs at their playgrounds their nests are\nhard to find. A little boy always known as 'Weedah,' died lately, so\nprobably a new name will have to be found for the bird, or to mention\nit will be taboo, at all events before the old people, who never allow\nthe names of the dead to be mentioned.\n\nFor several nights the medical student was tied down in case he should\nbe frightened and run away, after that he was left without bonds. He\nwas kept away from the camp for about two months. But he was not\nallowed to become a practitioner until he was some years older: first\nhe dealt in conjuring, later on he was permitted to show his knowledge\nof pharmacy.\n\nHis conjuring cures are divers.\n\nA burn he cures by sucking lumps of charcoal from it. Obstinate pains\nin the chest, the wizard says, must be caused by some enemy having put\na dead person's hair', or bone in it. Looking wisdom personified in\ntruly professional manner, he sucks at the affected spot, and soon\nproduces from his mouth hair, bones, or whatever he said was there.\n\nIf this faith-healing does not succeed, a stronger wizard than he must\nhave bewitched the patient; he will consult the spirits. To that end he\ngoes to his Minggah, a tree or stone--more often a tree, only the very\ngreatest wirreenuns have stones, which are called Goomah--where his own\nand any spirits friendly towards him may dwell.\n\nHe finds out there who the enemy is, and whence he obtained his poison.\nIf a wirreenun is too far away to consult his friendly spirits in\nperson, he can send his Mullee Mullee, or dream spirit, to interview\nthem.\n\nHe may learn that an enemy has captured the sick person's Doowee, or\ndream spirit--only wirreenuns' dream spirits are Mullee Mullee, the\nothers are Doowee--then he makes it his business to get that Doowee\nback.\n\nThese dream spirits are rather troublesome possessions while their\nhuman habitations sleep they can leave them and wander at will. The\nthings seen in dreams are supposed to be what the Doowees see while\naway from the sleeping bodies. This wandering of the Doowees is a great\nchance for their enemies: capture the Doowee and the body sickens;\nknock the Doowee about before it returns and the body wakes up tired\nand languid. Should the Doowee not return at all, the person from whom\nit wandered dies. When you wake up unaccountably tired in the morning,\nbe sure your Doowee has been 'on the spree,' having a free fight or\nsomething of that sort. And though your Doowee may give you at times\nlovely visions of passing paradises, on the whole you would be better\nwithout him.\n\nThere is on the Queensland border country a dillee bag full of\nunclaimed Doowees. The wirreenun who has charge of this is one of the\nmost feared of wirreenuns; he is a great magician, who, with his\nwonder-working glassy stones, can conjure up visions of the old fleshly\nhabitations of the captured Doowees.\n\nHe has Gubberahs, or clever stones, in which are the active spirits of\nevil-working devils, as well as others to work good. Should a Doowee\nonce get into this wirreenun's bag, which has the power of\nself-movement, there is not a great chance of getting it back, though\nit is sometimes said to be done by a rival combination of magic. The\nworst of it is that ordinary people have no power over their Doowees;\nall they can do is to guard against their escaping by trying to keep\ntheir mouths shut while asleep.\n\nThe wirreenuns are masters of their Mullee Mullees, sending them where\nthey please, to do what they are ordered, always provided they do not\nmeet a greater than themselves.\n\nAll sorts of complications arise through the substitution of mad or\nevil spirits for the rightful Doowee. Be sure if you think any one has\nsuddenly changed his character unaccountably, there has been some\nhankey-pankey with that person's Doowee. One of the greatest warnings\nof coming evil is to see your totem in a dream; such a sign is a herald\nof misfortune to you or one of your immediate kin. Should a wirreenun,\nperhaps for enmity, perhaps for the sake of ransom, decide to capture a\nDoowee, he will send his Mullee Mullee out to do it, bidding the Mullee\nMullee secrete the Doowee in his--the wirreenun's--Minggah, tree or\nrock.\n\nWhen he is consulted as to the return of the missing Doowee, he will\norder the one who has lost it to Sleep, then the Doowee, should the\nterms made suit the wirreenun, re-enters the body. Should it not do so,\nthe Doowee-less one is doomed to die.\n\nIn a wirreenun's Minggah, too, are often secreted shadow spirits stolen\nfrom their owners, who are by their loss dying a lingering death, for\nno man can live without Mulloowil, his shadow. Every one has a shadow\nspirit which he is very careful not to parade before his enemies, as\nany injury to it affects himself. A wirreenun can gradually shrink the\nshadow's size, the owner sickens and dies. 'May your shadow never be\nless!'\n\nThe shadow of a wirreenun is, like his head, always mahgarl, or taboo;\nany one touching either will be made to suffer for such sacrilege.\n\nA man's Minggah is generally a tree from amongst his multiplex totems,'\nas having greater reason to help him, being of the same family.\n\nIn his Minggah a wirreenun will probably keep some Wundah, or white\ndevil spirits, with which to work evil. There, too, he often keeps his\nyunbeai, or animal spirit--that is, his individual totem, not\nhereditary one. All wirreenuns have a yunbeai, and sometimes a special\nfavourite of the wirreenuns is given a yunbeai too--or in the event of\nany one being very ill, he is given a yunbeai, and the strength of that\nanimal goes into the patient, making him strong again, or a dying\nwirreenun leaves his yunbeai to some one else. Though this spirit gives\nextra strength it likewise gives an extra danger, for any injury to the\nanimal hurts the man too; thus even wirreenuns are exposed to danger.\n\nNo one, as we have said, must eat the flesh of his yunbeai animal; he\nmay of his family totem, inherited from his mother, but of his yunbeai\nor individual familiar, never.\n\nA wirreenun can assume the shape of his yunbeai; so if his yunbeai\nwere, for example, a bird, and the wirreenun were in danger of being\nwounded or killed, he would change himself into that bird and fly away.\n\nA great wirreenun can substitute one yunbeai for another, as was done\nwhen the opossum disappeared from our district, and the wirreenun,\nwhose yunbeai it was, sickened and lay ill for months. Two very\npowerful wirreenuns gave him a new yunbeai, piggiebillah, the\nporcupine. His recovery began at once. The porcupine had been one of\nhis favourite foods; from the time its spirit was put into him as his\nyunbeai, he never touched it.\n\nA wirreenun has the power to conjure up a vision of his particular\nyunbeai, which he can make visible to those whom he chooses shall see\nit.\n\nThe blacks always told me that a very old man on the Narran, dead some\nyears ago, would show me his yunbeai if I wished; it was Oolah, the\nprickly lizard.\n\nOne day I went to the camp, saw the old man in his usual airy costume,\nonly assumed as I came in sight, a tailless shirt. One of the gins said\nsomething to him; he growled an answer; she seemed persuading him to do\nsomething. Presently he moved away to a quite clear spot on the other\nside of the fire; he muttered something in a sing-song voice, and\nsuddenly I saw him beating his head as if in accompaniment to his song,\nand then--where it came from I can't say--there beside him was a\nlizard. That fragment of a shirt was too transparent to have hidden\nthat lizard; he could not have had it up his sleeve, because his\nsleeves were in shreds. It may have been a pet lizard that he charmed\nin from the bush by his song, but I did not see it arrive.\n\nThey told me this old man had two yunbeai, the other was a snake. He\noften had them in evidence at his camp, and when he died they were seen\nbeside him; there they remained until he was put into his coffin, then\nthey disappeared and were never seen again. This man was the greatest\nof our local wizards, and I think really the last of the very clever\nones. They say he was an old grey-headed man when Sir Thomas Mitchell\nfirst explored the Narran district in 1845. We always considered him a\ncentenarian.\n\nIt was through him that I heard some of the best of the old legends,\nwith an interpreter to make good our respective deficiencies in each\nother's language.\n\nIn the lives of blacks, or rather in their deaths, the Gooweera, or\npoison sticks or bones, play a great part.\n\nA Gooweera is a stick about six inches long and half an inch through,\npointed at both ends. This is used for sickening' or killing men.\n\nA Guddeegooree is a similar stick, but much smaller, about three inches\nin length, and is used against women.\n\nA man wishing to injure another takes one of these sticks, and warms it\nat a small fire he has made; he sticks the gooweera in the ground a few\ninches from the fire. While it is warming, he chants an incantation,\ntelling who he wants to kill, why he wants to kill him, how long he\nwants the process to last, whether it is to be sudden death or a\nlingering sickness.\n\nThe chant over, and the gooweera warmed, he takes it from the fire.\nShould he wish to kill his enemy quickly, he binds opossum hair cord\nround the stick, only leaving one point exposed; should he only want to\nmake his enemy ill, he only partially binds the stick. Then he ties a\nligature tightly round his right arm, between the wrist and elbow, and\ntaking the gooweera, or guddeegooree, according to the sex of his\nenemy, he points it at the person he wishes to injure, taking care he\nis not seen doing it.\n\nSuddenly he feels the stick becoming heavier, he knows then it is\ndrawing the blood from his enemy. The poison is prevented from entering\nhimself by the ligature he has put round his arm. When the gooweera is\nheavy enough he ceases pointing it.\n\nIf he wants to kill the person outright, he goes away, makes a small\nhole in the earth, makes a fire beside it. In this hole he puts a few\nDheal leaves--Dheal is the tree sacred to the dead; on top of the\nleaves he puts the gooweera, then more leaves this done, he goes away.\nThe next day he comes back with his hand he hits the earth beside the\nburied stick, out jumps the gooweera, his enemy is dead. He takes the\nstick, which may be used many times, and goes on his way satisfied.\nShould he only wish to inflict a lingering illness on his enemy, he\nrefrains from burying the gooweera, and in this case it is possible to\nsave the afflicted person.\n\nFor instance, should any one suspect the man with the gooweera of\nhaving caused the illness, knowing of some grudge he had against the\nsick person, the one who suspects will probably intercede for mercy.\nThe man may deny that he knows anything about it. He may, on the other\nhand, confess that he is the agent. If the intercessions prevail, he\nproduces the gooweera, rubs it all over with iguana fat, and gives the\nintercessor what fat is left to rub over the sick person, who, on that\nbeing done, gradually regains his normal condition after having\nprobably been reduced to a living skeleton from an indescribable\nwasting sickness, which I suspect we spell funk.\n\nThe best way to make a gooweera effective is to tie on the end of it\nsome hair from the victim's head--a lock of hair being, in this country\nof upside-downs, a hate token instead of one of love.\n\nWhen the lock of hair method is chosen as a means of happy dispatch,\nthe process is carried out by a professional.\n\nThe hair is taken to the Boogahroo--a bag of hair and gooweeras--which\nis kept by one or two powerful wirreenuns in a certain Minggah. The\nwirreenun on receiving the hair asks to whom it belongs. Should it\nbelong to one of a tribe he is favourably disposed towards, he takes\nthe gooweera or hair, puts it in the bag, but never sings the I death\nsong' over it, nor does he warm it.\n\nShould he, however, be indifferent, or ill-disposed towards the\nindividual or his tribe, he completes the process by going through the\nform already given, or rather when there are two wirreenuns at the\nBoogahroo, the receiver of the hair gives it to the other one, who\nsings the death-song, warms the gooweera, and burns the hair. The\nperson from whose head the hair on the gooweera came, then by\nsympathetic magic, at whatever distance he is, dies a sudden or\nlingering death according to the incantation sung over the\npoison-stick. Gooweeras need not necessarily be of wood; bone is\nsometimes used, and in these latter days even iron.\n\nSometimes at a large meeting of the blacks the Boogahroo wirreenuns\nbring the bag and produce from it various locks of hair, which the\nowners or their relations recognise, claim, and recover. They find out,\nfrom the wirreenun, who put them there; on gaining which knowledge a\ntribal feud is declared--a regular vendetta, which lasts from generation\nto generation.\n\nIf it be known that a man has stolen a lock of hair, he will be watched\nand prevented from reaching the Boogahroo tree, if possible.\n\nThese gooweeras used to be a terrible 'nuisance to us on the station. A\nreally good working black boy would say he must leave, he was going to\ndie. On inquiry we would extract the information that some one was\npointing a gooweera at him.\n\nThen sometimes the whole camp was upset; a strange black fellow had\narrived, and was said to have brought gooweeras. This reaching the\nboss's ears, confiscation would result in order to restore peace of\nmind in the camp. Before I left the station a gin brought me a gooweera\nand told me to keep it; she had stolen it from her husband, who had\nthreatened to point it at her for talking to another man.\n\nSome of them, though they still had faith in the power of such charms,\nhad faith also in me. I used to drive devils out with patent medicines;\nmy tobacco and patent medicine accounts while collecting folk-lore were\nenormous.\n\nA wirreenun, or, in fact, any one having a yunbeai, has the power to\ncure any one suffering an injury from whatever that yunbeai is; as, for\nexample, a man whose yunbeai is a black snake can cure a man who is\nbitten by a black snake, the method being to chant an incantation which\nmakes the yunbeai enter the stricken body and drive out the poison.\nThese various incantations are a large part of the wirreenun's\neducation; not least valuable amongst them is the chant sung over the\ntracks of snakes, which renders the bites of those snakes innocuous.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER V\n\nMORE ABOUT THE MEDICINE MEN AND LEECHCRAFT\n\n\nThe wirreenuns sometimes hold meetings which they allow\nnon-professionals to attend. At these the spirits of the dead speak\nthrough the medium of those they liked best on earth, and whose bodies\ntheir spirits now animate. These spirits are known as Yowee, the\nequivalent of our soul, which never leave the body of the living,\ngrowing as it grows, and when it dies take judgment for it, and can at\nwill assume its perishable shape unless reincarnated in another form.\nSo you see each person has at least three spirits, and some four, as\nfollows: his Yowee, soul equivalent; his Doowee, a dream spirit; his\nMulloowil, a shadow spirit; and may be his Yunbeai, or animal spirit.\n\nSometimes one person is so good a medium as to have the spirits of\nalmost any one amongst the dead people speak through him or her, in the\nwhistling spirit voice.\n\nI think it is very clever of these mediums to have decided that spirits\nall have one sort of voice.\n\nAt these meetings there would be great rivalry among the wirreenuns.\nThe one who could produce the most magical stones would be supposed to\nbe the most powerful. The strength of the stones in them, whether\nswallowed or rubbed in through their heads, adds its strength to\ntheirs, for these stones are living spirits, as it were, breathing and\ngrowing in their fleshly cases, the owner having the power to produce\nthem at any time. The manifestation of such power is sometimes, at one\nof these trials of magic, a small shower of pebbles as seeming to fall\nfrom the heads and mouths of the rivals, and should by chance any one\nsteal any of these as they fall, the power of the original possessor\nwould be lessened. The dying bequeath these stones, their most precious\npossessions, to the living wirreenun most nearly related to them.\n\nThe wirreenun's health and power not only depend upon his crystals and\nyunbeai, but also on his Minggah; should an accident happen to that,\nunless he has another, he will die--in any case, he will sicken. Many of\nthe legends deal with the magic of these spirit-animated trees.\n\nThey are places of refuge in time of danger; no one save the wirreenun,\nwhose spirit-tree it was, would dare to touch a refugee at a Minggah;\nand should the sanctuary be a Goomarh, or spirit-stone, not even a\nwirreenun would dare to interfere, so that it is a perfectly safe\nsanctuary from humanly dealt evil. But a refugee at a Minggah or\nGoomarh runs a great risk of incurring the wrath of the spirits, for\nMinggah are taboo to all but their own wirreenun.\n\nThere was a Minggah, a great gaunt Coolabah, near our river garden.\nSome gilahs build in it every year, but nothing would induce the most\navaricious of black bird-collectors to get the young ones from there.\n\nA wirreenun's boondoorr, or dillee bag, holds a queer collection:\nseveral sizes of gooweeras, of both bone and wood, poison-stones,\nbones, gubberahs (sacred stones), perhaps a dillee--the biggest, most\nmagical stone used for crystal-gazing, the spirit out of which is said\nto go to the person of whom you want to hear, wherever he is, to see\nwhat he is doing, and then show you the person in the crystal. A\ndinahgurrerhlowah, or moolee, death-dealing stone, which is said to\nknock a person insensible, or strike him dead as lightning would by an\ninstantaneous flash.\n\nTo these are added in this miscellaneous collection medicinal herbs,\nnose-bones to put through the cartilage of his nose when going to a\nstrange camp, so that he will not smell strangers easily. The blacks\nsay the smell of white people makes them sick; we in our arrogance had\nthought it the other way on.\n\nSwansdown, shells, and woven strands of opossum's hair are valuable,\nand guarded as such in the boondoorr, which is sometimes kept for\nsafety in the wirreenun's Minggah.\n\nHaving dealt with the supernatural part of a wirreenun's training,\nwhich argues cunning in him and credulity in others, I must get to his\nmore natural remedies.\n\nSnakebite they cure by sucking the wound and cauterising it with a\nfirestick. They say they suck out the young snakes which have been\ninjected into the bitten person.\n\nFor headaches or pains which do not yield to the vegetable medicine,\nthe wirreenuns tie a piece of opossum's hair string round the sore\nplace, take one end in their mouths, and pull it round and round until\nit draws blood along the cord. For rheumatic pains in the head or in\nthe small of the back and loins they often bind the places affected\nwith coils of opossum hair cord, as people do sometimes with red\nknitting-silk.\n\nThe blacks have many herbal medicines, infusions of various barks,\nwhich they drink or wash themselves with, as the case may be.\n\nVarious leaves they grind on their dayoorl-stones, rubbing themselves\nwith the pulp. Steam baths they make of pennyroyal, eucalyptus, pine,\nand others.\n\nThe bleeding of wounds they stanch with the down of birds.\n\nFor irritations of the skin they heat dwarf saltbush twigs and put the\nhot ends on the irritable parts.\n\nAfter setting a broken limb they put grass and bark round it, then bind\nit up.\n\nFor swollen eyes they warm the leaves of certain trees and hold them to\nthe affected parts, or make an infusion of Budtha leaves and bathe the\neyes in it.\n\nFor rheumatic pains a fire is made, Budtha twigs laid on it, a little\nwater thrown on them; the ashes raked out, a little more water thrown\non, then the patient lies on top, his opossum rug spread over him, and\nthus his body is steamed. To induce perspiration, earth or sand is also\noften heated and placed in a hollowed-out space; on it the patient\nlies, and is covered with more heated earth.\n\nPennyroyal infused they consider a great blood purifier they also use a\nheap as a pillow if suffering from insomnia. It is hard to believe a\nblack ever does suffer from insomnia, yet the cure argues the fact.\n\nBeefwood gum is supposed to strengthen children. It is also used for\nreducing swollen joints. A hole is made in the ground, some coals put\nin, on them some beefwood leaves, on top of them the gum; over the hole\nis put enough bark to cover it with a piece cut out of it the size of\nthe swollen joint to be steamed, which joint is held over this hole.\n\nVarious fats are also used as cures. Iguana fat for pains in the head\nand stiffness anywhere. Porcupine and opossum fats for preserving their\nhair, fish fat to gloss their skins, emu fat in cold weather to save\ntheir skins from chapping.\n\nBut what is supposed to strengthen them more than anything, both\nmentally and physically, is a small piece of the flesh of a dead\nperson, or before a body is put in a bark coffin a few incisions were\nmade in it; when it was coffined it was stood on end, and what drained\nfrom the incisions was caught in small wirrees and drunk by the\nmourners.\n\nI fancy such cannibalism as has been in these tribes was not with a\nview to satisfaction of appetite but to the incorporation of additional\nstrength. Either men or women are allowed to assist in this\nparticularly nauseating funeral rite, but not the young people.\n\nNor must their shadows fall across any one who has partaken of this\nrite; should they do so some evil will befall them.\n\nIf the mother of a young child has not enough milk for its sustenance,\nshe is steamed over 'old man' saltbush, and hot twigs of it laid on her\nbreasts. To expedite the expulsion of the afterbirth, an old woman\npresses the patient round the waist, gives her frequent drinks of cold\nwater, and sprinkles water over her. As soon as the afterbirth is\nremoved a steam is prepared. Two logs are laid horizontally, some\nstones put in between them, then some fire, on top leaves of\neucalyptus, and water is then sprinkled over them. The patient stands\nastride these logs, an opossum rug all over her, until she is well\nsteamed. After this she is able to walk about as if nothing unusual had\nhappened. Every night for about a month she has to lie on a steam bed\nmade of damped eucalyptus leaves. She is not allowed to return to the\ngeneral camp for about three months after the birth of her child.\n\nThough perfectly well, she is considered unclean, and not allowed to\ntouch anything belonging to any one. Her food is brought to her by some\nold woman. Were she to touch the food or food utensils of another they\nwould be considered unclean and unfit for use. Her camp is gailie--that\nis, only for her; and she is goorerwon as soon as her child is born--a\nwoman unclean and apart. Immediately a' baby is born it is washed in\ncold water.\n\nGhastly traditions the blacks have of the time when Dunnerh-Dunnerh,\nthe smallpox, decimated their ancestors. Enemies sent it in the winds,\nwhich hung it on the trees, over the camps, whence it dropped on to its\nvictims. So terror-stricken were the tribes that, with few exceptions,\nthey did not stay to bury their dead; and because they did not do so,\nflying even from the dying, a curse was laid on them that some day the\nplague would return, brought back by the Wundah or white devils; and\nthe blacks shudder still, though it was generations before them, at the\nthought that such a horror may come again.\n\nPoison-stones are ground up finely and placed in the food of the person\ndesired to be got rid of. These poison-stones are of two kinds, a\nyellowish-looking stone and a black one; they cause a lingering death.\nThe small bones of the wrist of a dead person are also pounded up and\nput into food, in honey or water, as a poison.\n\nOne cure struck me as quaint. The patient may be lying down, when up\nwill come one of the tribe, most likely a wirreenun with a big piece of\nbark. He strikes the ground with this all round the patient, making a\ngreat row; this is to frighten the sickness away.\n\nWhat seems to me a somewhat peculiar ceremony is the reception a coming\nbaby holds before its birth.\n\nThe baby is presumably about to be born. Its grandmother is there\nnaturally, but the black baby declines to appear at the request of its\ngrandmother, and, moreover, declines to come if even the voice of its\ngrandmother is heard; so grannie has to be a silent spectator while\nsome other woman tempts the baby into the world by descanting on the\nglories of it. First, perhaps, she will say:\n\n'Come now, here's your auntie waiting to see you.'\n\n'Here's your sister.'\n\n'Here's your father's sister,' and so on through a whole list. Then she\nwill say, as the relatives and friends do not seem a draw:\n\n'Make haste, the bumble fruit is ripe. The guiebet flowers are\nblooming. The grass is waving high. The birds are all talking. And it\nis a beautiful place, hurry up and see for yourself.'\n\nBut it generally happens that the baby is too cute to be tempted, and\nan old woman has to produce what she calls a wi-mouyan--a clever\nstick--which she waves over the expectant mother, crooning a charm which\nbrings forth the baby.\n\nIf any one nurses a patient and the patient dies, the nurse wears an\narmlet of opossum's hair called goomil, and a sort of fur boa called\ngurroo.\n\nIf blacks go visiting, when they leave they make a smoke fire and smoke\nthemselves, so that they may not carry home any disease.\n\nAs a rule blacks do not have small feet, but their hands are almost\ninvariably small and well shaped, having tapering fingers.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER VI\n\nOUR WITCH WOMAN\n\n\nOur witch woman was rather a remarkable old person. When she was, I\nsuppose, considerably over sixty, her favourite granddaughter died.\n\nOld Bootha was in a terrible state of grief, and chopped herself in a\nmost merciless manner at the burial, especially about the head. She\nwould speak to no one, used to spend her time about the grave, round\nwhich she fixed upright posts which she painted white, red, and black.\nAll round the grave she used to sweep continually.\n\nMore and more she isolated herself, and at last discarded all her\nclothes and roamed the bush A LA Eve before the Fall, as she had\nprobably done as a young girl.\n\nShe dug herself an underground camp, roofed it over, and painted\nenormous posts which she erected in front of her 'Muddy wine,' as she\ncalled her camp. She never came near the house, though we had been\ngreat friends before.\n\nShe used to prowl round the outhouses and pick up all sorts of things,\nrubbish for the most part, but often good utensils too; all used to be\nsecreted in the underground camp. She never talked to any one, but used\nto mutter continually to herself and her dogs in an unknown tongue\nwhich only her dogs seemed to understand.\n\nWe thought she was quite mad.\n\nOne day, while we were playing tennis, she suddenly, muttering her\nstrange language and dancing new corroboree steps, clad only in her\nblack skin, came up. Matah told her to go away, but she only\ncorroboreed round him and said she wanted to see me. I have the most\nmorbid horror of lunacy in any form. I was once induced to go over a\nlunatic asylum--the horror of it haunts me still. However, I thought it\nwould never do to show the coward I was, so though I felt as if I had\nbeen scooped out and filled up with ice, I went to her. She danced\nround me for a little time, then sidled up to me and said:\n\n'Wahl you frightened, wahl me hurt you. I only womba--mad--all\nyowee--spirits--in me tell me gubbah--good--I lib 'long a youee; bimeby\nI come back big feller wirreenun; wahl you frightened? I not hurt you.'\n\nAnd after crooning an accompaniment to her steps off she went, a\nstrange enough figure, dancing and crooning as she went towards her\ncamp; and not until the spirits gave up possession of her did she come\nnear the house again.\n\nOne day she gave us a start. We were schooling a new team of four\nhorses. The off-side leader had only been in once before, and was a\nbrumby (horse run in from a wild mob). We had to pass Bootha's camp. I\nlooked about as we neared it but saw nothing of her. Suddenly from the\nground, as it seemed, out dashed the weird old figure, arms full of\nthings, jabbering away at a great rate. Whiz came a tin plate past the\nleaders' heads; the offside horse reared and plunged and took some\nholding. Whiz came an old bill; then, one after another, a regular\nfusilade of various utensils.\n\nIt did not take us long to get past, but for as long as we could see\nthe attack was kept up. Coming back we saw nothing of Bootha, and all\nthe utensils had been picked up.\n\nI used to tell the other blacks to see that Bootha had plenty of food.\nThey said she was all right, the spirits were looking after her.\nLunatics, from their point of view, are only persons spirit-possessed.\n\nGradually old Bootha, clothed as usual, came back about the place.\n\nStrange stories came through the house blacks to me of old Bootha. She\nwas very ill for a long time, then suddenly she recovered; not only\nrecovered but seemed rejuvenated. We heard of wonderful cures she made;\nhow she always consulted the spirits about any illness; how there were\nsaid to be spirits in some of her dogs; how she was now a rainmaker\nand, in fact, a fully fledged witch.\n\nI was curious to see some of these wonders, so used to get the old\nwoman to come up when any one was ill, consult her, and generally make\nmuch of her. There is no doubt she could diagnose a case well enough.\nMatah suffered a good deal with a constant pain in one knee, he was\nquite lame from it. He showed it to Bootha one day. She sang a song to\nher spirits, then said:\n\n'Too muchee water there; you steam him, put him on hot rag; you drink\nplenty cold water, all lite dat go.'\n\nAs it happened a medical man was passing a few days afterwards with an\ninsurance agent. Matah consulted him.\n\n'Hum! Yes, yes. Hot fomentations to the place affected, poultices, a\ncooling draught. There's a stoppage of fluid at the knee-joint which\nmust be dispersed.'\n\nI thought Bootha ought to have been called in consultation.\n\nA girl I had staying with me was taken suddenly and, to us,\nunaccountably ill. She was just able to get out of her room into the\ndrawing-room, where she would lie back on the cushions of a lounge\nlooking dreadfully limp and utterly washed out. Hearing of her illness\nold Bootha came up. I thought it might amuse Adelaide to see an old\nwitch; she agreed, so I brought her in.\n\nBootha went straight up to the sick girl, expressed a few sympathetic\nsentences, then she said she would ask the spirits what had made\nAdelaide ill and what would cure her.\n\nShe moved my furniture until she left the centre of the room clear; she\nsquatted down, and hanging her head began muttering in an\nunintelligible dialect. Presently her voice ceased and we heard from\nbeside her a most peculiar whistling sort of voice, to which she\nresponded, evidently interrogating. Again the whistling voice from\nfurther away. Bootha then told me she had asked a dead black fellow,\nBig Joe, to tell her what she wanted to know; but he could not, so now\nshe was going to ask her dead granddaughter. Again she said a sort of\nincantation, and again, after a while, came the whistling voice\nreply--this time from another direction, not quite so loud. The same\nsort of thing was gone through with the same result.\n\nThen Bootha said she would ask Guadgee, a black girl who had been one\nof my first favourites in the camp, and who had died a few years\npreviously.\n\nThe whistling voice came from a third direction, though all the time I\ncould see Bootha's lips moving.\n\nGuadgee answered all she was asked. She said Adelaide was made ill\nbecause she had offended the spirits by bathing in the creek under the\nshade of a Minggah, or spirit-tree, a place tabooed to all but\nwirreenuns, or such as hold communion with spirits.\n\nOf course, according to the blacks, to disturb a shadow is to hurt the\noriginal.\n\nIn this Minggah, Guadgee said, were swarms of bees invisible to all\nbut wirreenuns, and they are ready always to resent any insult to the\nMinggah or its shadow. These spirit-bees had entered Adelaide and\nsecreted some wax on her liver; their bites, Guadgee said, were on her\nback.\n\nWell, that can't be it, I said, I for you never did bathe in the shade\nof a Minggah; for, going as you always do with the house-girls, you are\nbound to be kept from such sacrilege; they would never dare such\ndesecration.'\n\n'Which is their Minggah? Is it a big Coolabah between the Bend and the\ngarden?'\n\n'Yes.'\n\n'Then I did bathe there the last time I went down. I was up too late to\ngo with the Black-but-Comelys, and as the sun was hot I went further\nround the point and bathed in the shade. And the bee-bites must be\nthose horribly irritating pimples I have across my back.'\n\nThe cause of illness settled to her satisfaction, Bootha asked how to\ncure it. The patient was to drink nothing hot nor heating but as much\ncold water as she liked, especially a long drink before going to bed.\nGuadgee said she would come in the night when the patient was asleep\nand take the wax from her liver; she would sleep well and wake better\nin the morning.\n\nBootha got up then, came over to the patient, took her hand, rubbed it\nround the wrist several times, muttering an incantation; then saying\nshe would see her again next day, off she went, taking, she told us,\nall the spirits away inside her, whence at desire they could be\nreturned to such Minggah in their own Noorunbah, or hereditary\nhunting-grounds, as wirreenuns had placed them in, or to roam at their\npleasure when not required by those in authority over spirits. Our old\nspiritualist denies us freedom even in the after-life she promises us.\n\nAdelaide slept that night, looked a better colour the next morning, and\nrapidly recovered.\n\nWe think old Bootha must be a good physician and a ventriloquist, only\nI believe it is said ventriloquists cannot live long, and Bootha is now\nover eighty.\n\nOthers besides wirreenuns see spirits sometimes, but rarely, though\nwirreenuns are said to have the power to conjure them up in a form\nvisible to ordinary eyes.\n\nBabies are said to see spirits when they are smiling or crowing as if\nto themselves; it's to some spirit visible to them but to no one else.\n\nWhen a baby opens his hands and shuts them again quickly, smiling all\nthe while, that baby is with the spirits catching crabs!\n\nDogs see spirits; when they bark and howl suddenly and you see nothing\nabout, it is because they have seen a spirit.\n\nOne person may embody many spirits, but such an one must be careful not\nto drink anything hot or heating, such would drive out the spirits at\nonce. The spirits would never enter a person defiled by the white man's\n'grog.'\n\nOld Bootha had an interview with a very powerful spirit after she was\nill, who told her that the spirit of her father was now in Bahloo, the\nmoon; and that it was this spirit which had cured her, and if she kept\nhis commands she would live for ever. The commands were never to drink\n'grog,' never to wear red, never to eat fish. This was told her fifteen\nyears ago, never once has she transgressed; her vigour for an old woman\nconsiderably over eighty is marvellous.\n\nShe was going away for a trip. Before going she said, as she would not\nbe able to know when I wanted rain for my garden, she would put two\nposts in it which had in them the spirits of Kurreahs, or crocodiles.\nAs these spirits required water I might be certain my tanks would never\ngo dry while they were on guard. She asked one of my Black-but-Comelys,\na very stalwart young woman, to help her lift one of these posts into\nthe garden where she wanted to erect it. The girl took hold of one end,\nbut in a little while dropped it, said it was too heavy. Old Bootha got\nfurious.\n\n'I get the spirits to help me,' she said, and started a little\nsing-song, then shouldered the post herself and carried it in. These\nposts are painted red, black, and white, with a snaky pattern, the\nKurreah sign, on them. She also planted in my garden two other\nwitch-poles, one painted red and having a cross-bar about midway down\nit from which raddled strings were attached to the top; this was to\nkeep away the Euloowayi, black fellows possessed of devils, who came\nfrom behind the sunset.\n\nThe other was a plain red-painted, tapering pine-pole which she said,\nwhen it fell to the ground, would tell of the death of some one related\nto an inmate of the house. Should it lean towards the house it foretold\nmisfortune; or if she were any time away, when she was returning she\nwould send her Mullee Mullee to sit on the top and bend it just to let\nus know. This pole would also keep away the spirits of the dead from\nthe house during her absence. While she was away there would be no one\nto come and clear the place of evil by smoking the Budtha twigs all\nround it, as she always did if I were alone and, she thought, in need\nof protection.\n\nOld Bootha has what she calls a wi-mouyan, clever-stick. It is about\nsix feet long, great lumps of beefwood gum making knobs on it at\nintervals; between each knob it is painted. Armed with this stick, a\npiece of crystal, some green twigs, and sometimes a stick with a bunch\nof feathers on top, and a large flat stone, she goes out to make rain.\nThe crystal and stone she puts under the water in the creek, the\nfeathered stick she erects on the edge of the water, then goes in and\nsplashes about with green twigs, singing all the time.\n\nAfter a while she gets out and parades the bank with the wi-mouyan,\nsinging a rain-song which charms some of the water out of the creek\ninto the clouds, whence it falls where she directs it. Once my garden\nof roses looked very wilted. I asked Bootha to make rain, but just then\nshe was very offended with Matah. One of her dogs had been poisoned,\nshe would make no rain on his country. However, at last she said she\nwould make some for me. I bound her down to a certain day. The day\ncame; a heavy storm fell just over my garden, filling the ground tank,\nwhich was almost empty. About two inches fell. Within half a mile of\neach side of the garden the dust was barely laid.\n\nOld Bootha's luck stuck to her that time, and I had to give her a new\ndress and some 'bacca.' But during the last drought she failed\nsignally. Her excuse for failing was that a great wirreenun up the\ncreek was so angry with the white people who were driving away all emu,\nkangaroo, and opossums, the black fellow's food, and yet made a fuss if\ntheir dogs killed a sheep for them sometimes, that he put his\nrain-stone in a fire, and while he did that no rain would fall. He said\nif all the sheep died the white fellows would go away again, and then,\nas long ago, the black fellows' country would have plenty of emu and\nkangaroo.\n\nWe saw a curious coincidence in connection with one of Bootha's\nwitch-poles in my garden, the pole whose falling foretold death of some\nrelative of some one in the house.\n\nOne afternoon there had been drizzling rain and a grey mist\novershadowing things. Matah went out to look at the chances of a\ncontinuance of rain, the usual drought being on. He called to me to\ncome and see a curious sky. Looking towards the west I saw a golden\nball of a sun piercing the grey clouds which seemed like a spangled\nveil over its face; shooting from the sun was a perfect halo of golden\nlight, from which three shafts spread into roadways up past the grey\nclouds into the vault of heaven. The effect was very striking indeed,\nagainst the grey clouds shaded from silver to almost black.\n\nAs we stood waiting for the sun to sink and the afterglow to paint\nthese clouds, as it did, from shrimp pink and heliotrope to vivid\ncrimson, we saw Bootha's pole fall. The air was quite still.\n\n'The damp has loosened its setting,' said Matah, 'but we had better\nleave it alone and let the old girl fix it up again herself; it may be\ntaboo to ordinary mortals like us.'\n\nWe left it.\n\nThat evening a messenger arrived from the sheep station to say my\ncook's mother had died just before sunset. The camp were firm believers\nin Bootha's witch-stick after that.\n\nIt was just as well we did not touch that stick; had we done so, Bootha\nsays we should have broken out in sores all over our bodies.\n\nThey say that long ago the wirreenuns always used to have a sort of\ntotem wizard-stick guarding the front of their camps.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER VII\n\nBIRTH--BETROTHAL--AN ABORIGINAL GIRL FROM INFANCY TO WOMANHOOD\n\n\nTo begin at the beginning, Bahloo, the moon, is a sort of patron of\nwomen. He it is who creates the girl babies, assisted by Wahn, the\ncrow, sometimes.\n\nShould Wahn attempt the business on his own account the result is\ndireful; women of his creating are always noisy and quarrelsome.\n\nBahloo's favourite spot for carrying on the girl manufacturing is\nsomewhere on the Culgoa. On one of the creeks there is to be seen, when\nit is dry, a hole in the ground. As water runs along, the bed of this\ncreek, gradually a stone rises from this hole. As the water rises it\nrises, always keeping its top out of the water.\n\nThis is the Goomarh, or spirit-stone, of Bahloo. No one would dare to\ntouch this stone where the baby girls' spirits are launched into space.\n\nIn the same neighbourhood is a clear water-hole, the rendezvous of the\nsnakes of Bahloo. Should a man go to drink there he sees no snakes, but\nno sooner has he drunk some of the water than he sees hundreds; so even\nwater-drinkers see their snakes.\n\nThe name of the hole is Dahn.\n\nSpirit-babies are usually despatched to Waddahgudjaelwon and sent by\nher to hang promiscuously on trees, until some woman passes under where\nthey are, then they will seize a mother and be incarnated. This\nresembles the Arunta belief, but with the Euahlayi the spirits are new\nfreshly created beings, not reincarnations of ancestral souls, as among\nthe Arunta. To live, a child must have an earthly father; that it has\nnot, is known by its being born with teeth.\n\nWurrawilberoo is said to snatch up a baby spirit sometimes and whirl\nalong towards some woman he wishes to discredit, and through the medium\nof this woman he incarnates perhaps twins, or at least one baby. No\ndoubt were it not for signs of teeth in a spirit-baby of immaculate\nconception, many a camp scandal would be conveniently nipped in the\nbud.\n\nBabies are sometimes sent directly to their mothers without the\nCoolabah-tree or whirlwind medium.\n\nThe bronze mistletoe branches with their orange-red flowers are said to\nbe the disappointed babies whose wailing in vain for mothers has\nwearied the spirits who transform them into these bunches, the red\nflowers being formed from their baby blood. The spirits of babies and\nchildren who die young are reincarnated, and should their first mother\nhave pleased them they choose her again and are called millanboo--the\nsame again.\n\nThey can instead, if they like, choose some other woman they know,\nwhich seems very accommodating in those presiding over the\nreincarnation department.\n\nSometimes two baby spirits will hang on one branch and incarnate\nthemselves in the same woman, who as result is the mother of twins, and\nthe object of much opprobrium in the camp. In fact, in the old days,\none of the twins would have been killed.\n\nOne of my Black-but-Comelys said, on hearing that a woman had twins:\n\n'If it had been me I would have put my fingers round the throat of one\nof them and killed it.' The woman who made this speech I had always\nlooked upon as the gentlest and kindliest of creatures.\n\nThe father of the twins has treated his wife with the utmost contempt\nsince their birth, and declines to acknowledge more than one of the\nbabies.\n\nThey say the first-born of twins is always born grinning with his\ntongue out, as if to say, 'There's another to come yet; nice sort of\nmother I have.'\n\nNo wonder the women cover themselves under a blanket when they see a\nwhirlwind coming, and avoid drooping Coolabah trees, believing that\neither may make them objects of scorn as the mother of twins.\n\nWhen a baby is born, some old woman takes the Coolabah leaf out of its\nmouth. Such a leaf is said always to be found there if the baby was\nincarnated from a Coolabah tree; should this leaf not be removed it\nwill carry the baby back to spirit-land. As soon as the leaf is taken\naway the baby is bathed in cold water. Hot gum leaves are pressed on\nthe bridge of its nose to ensure its flatness; the more bridgeless the\nnose the greater the beauty.\n\nWhen a baby clutches hold of anything as if to give it to some one, the\nbargie--grandmother--or some elderly woman takes what the baby offers,\nand makes a muffled clicking sort of noise with her tongue rolled over\nagainst the roof of her mouth, then croons the charm which is to make\nthe child a free giver: so is generosity inculcated in extreme youth. I\nhave often heard the grannies croon over the babies:\n\n  Oonahgnai Birrablee,\n  Oonahgnoo Birrahlee,\n  Oonahgnoo Birrahlee,\n  Oonabmillangoo Birrahlee,\n  Gunnoognoo oonah Birrahlee.\n\nWhich translated is:\n\n  'Give to me, Baby,\n  Give to her, Baby,\n  Give to him, Baby,\n  Give to one, Baby,\n  Give to all, Baby.'\n\nAs babies are all under the patronage of the moon, the mothers are very\ncareful every new moon to make a white cross-like mark on the babies'\nforeheads, and white dabs on cheeks and chins.\n\nAnd very careful are the mothers not to look at the full moon, nor let\ntheir babies do so; an attack of thrush would be the result.\n\nBahloo, too, has a spiteful way of punishing a woman who has the\ntemerity to stare at him, by sending her the dreaded twins.\n\nIf babies do not sleep well their mothers get the red powdered stuff\nlike pine pollen, from the joints of the Bingahwingul, or needlebush\ntree, and rub it on the babies' skulls and foreheads.\n\nIf the babies cry too much their mothers say evil spirits are in them,\nand must be smoked out. They make a smoke fire of Budtha twigs and hold\nthe baby in the thick of the smoke. I have seen the mother of a fretful\nchild of three or four years even, apply the smoke anodyne.\n\nWhenever the mother of a young child woke in the night, if well up in\nher mother duties, she was supposed to warm her hands, and rub her\nbaby's joints so that the child might grow lissome and a good shape,\nand she always saw that her baby's mouth was shut when the child was\nasleep lest an evilly disposed person should slip in a disease or\nevil-working spirit. For the same reason they will not let a baby lie\non its back unless they cover its head.\n\nIf a gilah flies over the camp crying out as it passes, it is a sure\nsign of 'debbil debbil'; the child, to escape evil consequences, must\nbe turned on to its left side.\n\nIf a gooloo, or magpie, did the same, the child had to be laid flat on\nher moobil--stomach: for the passing of a cawing crow, a child had to\nbe laid on the right side.\n\nAs these birds are not night birds, it is evident that they are evil\nspirits abroad in bird form, hence the precautions. As soon as a baby\nbegins to crawl, the mother finds a centipede, half cooks it, takes it\nfrom the fire, and catching hold of her child's hands beats them with\nit, crooning as she does so:\n\n  'Gheerlayi ghilayer,\n  Wahl munnoomerhdayer,\n  Wahl mooroonbahgoo,\n  Yelgayerdayer deermuldayer,\n  Gheerlayi ghilayer.'\n\nWhich means:\n\n  'Kind be,\n  Do not steal,\n  Do not touch what to another belongs,\n  Leave all such alone,\n  Kind be.'\n\nThe accompaniment being a muffled click of a rolled-up tongue against\nthe roof of a mouth.\n\nNo child must touch the big feathers of a goomblegubbon, or bustard's\nwings, nor any of its bones. At the age of about four, the mother takes\none of these wings and beats the child all over the shoulders and under\nthe arms with it. Again making the clicking noise, she croons:\n\n  'Goobean gillaygoo,\n  Oogowahdee goobolaygoo,\n  Wahl goonundoo,\n  Ghurranbul daygoo.'\n\nWhich charm means:\n\n  'A swimmer be,\n  Flood to swim against,\n  No water,\n  Strong to stop you.'\n  And so was a child made a good swimmer.\n\nThe wirreenuns would see that the septum of a child's nose was pierced\nat the right time, and their tribal marks cut on them. The nose was\npierced at midwinter when ice was about, with which to numb the place\nto be pierced; ice was held to the septum, then prod through it went a\nbone needle.\n\nAn old gin who worked about the station had a pierced nose, and often\nwore a mouyerh, or bone, through it. A white laundress wore earrings.\nShe said one day to the old gin:\n\n'Why you have hole made in your nose and put that bone there? No good\nthat. White women don't do that.'\n\nThe black woman looked the laundress up and down, and finally anchored\nher eyes on the earrings.\n\n'Why you make hole in your ears? No good that. Black gin no do that,\npull 'em down your ears like dogs. Plenty good bone in your nose make\nyou sing good. Sposin' cuggil--bad--smell you put bone longa nose no\nsmell 'im. Plenty good make hole longa nose, no good make hole longa\nears, make 'em hang down all same dogs.' And off she went laughing, and\npulling down the lobes of her ears, began to imitate the barking of a\ndog.\n\nThere is often a baby betrothal called Bahnmul.\n\nFor some reason or another it has been decided that a baby girl is to\nbe given to a man, perhaps because he has been kind to her mother,\nperhaps she is owed to his kin by her own; any way the granny of the\nbaby girl puts feathers, white swansdown, on the baby's head, and takes\nher over to the man when she is about a month old. Granny says to the\nbaby:\n\n'Look at him, and remember him, because you are promised to him.'\n\nThen she takes some feathers off the baby's head and puts them on to\nhis; that makes it a formal betrothal, binding to both sides.\n\nI have heard great camp rows because girls made a struggle for\nindependence, having found out they had only been promised, not\nformally betrothed, to some old chap whom they did not wish to marry.\nPerhaps the old fellow will already have a wife or so, a man can have\nas many as he pleases. I have heard of one with three; I have known\nsome with two; but the generality of them seem content with one.\n\nShould a young girl marry a man with an old wife, the old wife rules\nher to any extent, not even letting her have a say about her own\nchildren, and no duenna could be stricter. Should the young wife in the\nabsence of her husband speak to a young man, she will probably get a\nscolding from the old wife and a 'real hiding' from the old man, to\nwhom the old wife will report her conduct. Quite young men often marry\nquite old women; a reason sometimes given is that these young men were\non earth before and loved these same women, but died before their\ninitiation, so could not marry until now in their reincarnation.\n\nCertainly, amongst the blacks, age is no disqualification for a woman;\nshe never seems to be too old to marry, and certainly with age gains\npower.\n\nAt whatever age a girl may be betrothed to a man he never claims her\nwhile she is yet Mullerhgun, or child girl; not until she is\nWirreebeeun, or woman girl.\n\nA girl's initiation into womanhood is as follows. Her granny probably,\nor some old woman relation, takes her from the big camp into the scrub\nwhere they make a bough shade. As soon as this is made, the old woman\nsets fire to a thick heap of Budtha leaves and makes the girl swallow\nthe smoke. She then bids her lie down in a scooped-out hollow she has\nmade in the earth, saying to her, 'You are to be made a young woman\nnow. No more must you run about as you please. Here must you stay with\nme, doing as I say. Then in two moons' time you shall go and claim your\nhusband, to do for ever what he bids you. You must not sleep as you lie\nthere in the day time, nor must you go to sleep at night until those in\nthe camp are at rest. I will put food ready for you. Honey you must not\neat again for four moons. At first streak of day you must get up, and\neat the food I have placed for you. Then when you hear a bird note you\nmust shake yourself all over, and make a noise like this.'\n\nAnd the old woman makes a ringing noise with her lips.\n\n'That you must do every time you hear a fresh bird note; so too when\nyou hear the people in the camp begin to talk, or even if you hear them\nlaugh or sneeze. If you do not, then grey will your hair be while you\nare yet a young woman, dull will your eyes be, and limp your body.'\n\nGirls have told me that they got very tired of being away with only the\nold woman for so long, and were glad enough when she told them they\nwere to move to a new camp, nearer to the big one, which the women had\nprepared for them.\n\nWhen they reached this the old woman rubbed off the mud with which she\nhad plastered the girl's limbs when first they went away to camp, and\nwhich she had renewed from time to time. When this was all off she\npainted the girl in different designs with red ochre and white gypsum,\nprincipally in spots. She put on her head a gnooloogail, or forehead\nband, made of Kurrajong fibre, plaited and tied with some Kurrajong\nstring, from over the cars to the back of the head; in this band, which\nshe had painted white, she stuck sprays of white flowers. Sweetly\nscented Budtha and clustering Birah were the flowers most used for this\nceremony. Should neither of these be in bloom, then sprays of Collarene\nor Coolibah blossom were used. When the flowers were placed in the band\nthe old woman scattered a handful of white swansdown over the girl's\nhead. Next she tied round her a girdle of opossum's sinews with strands\nof woven opossum's hair hanging about a foot square in front. Round her\narms she bound goomils--opossum hair armlets--into which she placed\nmore sprays of flowers, matching those in the girl's hair.\n\nTo show that the occasion was a sacred one a sprig of Dheal tree was\nplaced through the hole in the septum of the nose. The toilet of a\nwirreebeeun was now complete.\n\nThe old woman gave her a bunch of smoking Budtha leaves to carry, and\ntold her what to do. Note here the origin of bridal bouquets.\n\nHaving received her instructions, the girl, holding the smoking twigs,\nwent towards the big camp.\n\nWhen the women there saw her coming they began to sing a song in, to\nher, a strange language.\n\nOn a log, with his back towards her--for he must not yet look on her\nface--sat the man to whom she was betrothed. The girl went up to him.\nAs the women chanted louder she threw the smoking Budtha twigs away,\nplaced a hand on each of his shoulders and shook him. Then she turned\nand ran back to her new camp, the women singing and pelting her with\ndry twigs and small sticks as she went. For another moon she stayed\nwith her granny in this camp, then the women made her another one\nnearer.\n\nIn a few weeks they made her one on the outskirts of the main camp.\nHere she stayed until they made her another in the camp, but a little\napart. In front of the opening of this dardurr they made a fire. That\nnight her betrothed camped on one side of this fire and she on the\nother. For a moon they camped so. Then the old granny told the girl she\nmust camp on the same side of the fire as her betrothed, and as long as\nshe lived be his faithful and obedient wife, having no thought of other\nmen. Should he ill-treat her, her relations had the power to take her\nfrom him. Or should he for some reason, after a while, not care for\nher, he can send her back to her people; should she have a child he\nleaves it with her until old enough to camp away from her, when it is\nreturned to him.\n\nThe wedding presents are not given to the bride and bridegroom, but by\nthe latter to his mother-in-law, to whom, however, he is never allowed\nto speak. Failing a mother-in-law, the presents are given to the\nnearest of kin to the wife. You can hardly reckon it as purchase money,\nfor sometimes a man gives no presents and yet gets a wife.\n\nIn books about blacks, you always read of the subjection of the women,\nbut I have seen henpecked black husbands.\n\nThere are two codes of morals, one for men and one for women. Old\nTestament morality for men, New Testament for women. The black men keep\nthe inner mysteries of the Boorah, or initiation ceremonies, from the\nknowledge of women, but so do Masons keep their secrets.\n\nAs to the black women carrying most of the baggage on march, naturally\nso; the men want their hands free for hunting en route, or to be in\nreadiness for enemies in a strange country.\n\nBlack women think a great deal of the Moonaibaraban, or as they more\noften call them, Kumbuy, or sister-in-law. These are spirit-women who\ncome a few days after the Boorah to bring presents to the women\nrelations of the boys who have been initiated. The Kumbuy are never\nseen, but their voices are heard--voices like dogs barking; on hearing\nwhich the women in the camp have to answer, calling out:\n\n'Are you my Kumbuy?'\n\nAn answer comes like a muffled bark, 'Bah! bah bah!'\n\nThen the old men--crafty old men--go out to where the 'bahing' comes\nfrom, and bring in the gifts, which take the form of food, yams, honey,\nfruit principally.\n\nThese Kumbuy are among the few beneficent spirits they never hurt any\none, simply supply the bereaved women with comfort in the shape of\nfood, for the temporary loss of their male relatives. Should an\nuninitiate have a wife, which of course is improper, the Kumbuy decline\nto recognise her; and should she presume to answer their spirit back,\nthey make in token of displeasure a thudding noise as if earth were\nbeing violently banged with a yam stick. She has encroached on the\nKumbuy preserves, for prior to his initiation a man should only have a\nspirit wife, never an incarnate one.\n\nIf you ask a black woman why the Kumbuy thud the earth in answer to an\ninitiate's wife, she will say:\n\n'Dat one jealous.' jealousy even in the spirit world of women!\n\nUnchaste women were punished terribly. After we went west even the\ndeath penalty for wantonness was enforced, though at the time we did\nnot know it.\n\nShould a girl be found guilty of a frailty, it being her first fault,\nher brothers and nearest male relations made a ring round her, after\nhaving bound her hands and feet, and toss her one from the other until\nshe is in a dazed condition and almost frightened to death.\n\nThe punishment over, she is unbound and given to her betrothed, or a\nhusband chosen for her.\n\nShould a woman have been discovered to be an absolute wanton, men from\nany of the clans make a ring round her, she being bound, and tossed\nfrom one to the other, and when exhausted is unbound and left by her\nrelations to the men to do as they please to her--the almost inevitable\nresult is death. With this terror before them, it is possible the old\nblacks are right who say that their women were very different in their\ndomestic relations in olden times.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER VIII\n\nTHE TRAINING OF A BOY UP TO BOORAH PRELIMINARIES\n\n\nAt the boy manufactory, Boomayahmayahmul, the wood lizard, was the\nprincipal worker, though Bahloo from time to time gave him assistance.\n\nThe little blacks throw their mythical origin at each other tauntingly.\nA little black girl, when offended with a boy friend, says:\n\n'Ooh, a lizard made you.'\n\n'Wah! wah! a crow made you,' he retorts.\n\nUp to a certain age boys are trained as are girls--charms sung over\nthem to make them generous, honest, good swimmers, and the rest; but\nafter that they are taken into the Weedegah, or bachelors' camp, and\ndeveloped on manly lines.\n\nWhen he is about seven years old, his mother will paint her son up\nevery day for about a week with red and white colourings. After that he\nwould go to the Weedegah Gahreemai, bachelors' camp. He would then be\nallowed to go hunting with boys and men. He would see, now when he was\nout with the men, how fire was made in the olden time, almost a lost\nart now when wax matches are plentiful.\n\nNo boy who had not been to a Boorah would dare to try to make fire.\n\nThe implements for fire-making are a little log about as thick as a\nman's arm, of Nummaybirah wood--a rather soft white wood--and a split\nflat piece about a foot long and three inches wide. The little log was\nsplit open at one end, a wedge put in it, and the opening filled up\nwith dry grass broken up. This log was laid on the ground and firmly\nheld there; the fire-maker squatted in front, and with the flat piece\nrubbed edgeways across the opening in the log. The sawdust fell quickly\ninto the opening. After about a minute and a half's rubbing a smoke\nstarted out. After rubbing on a little longer the fire-maker took a\nhandful of dry grass, emptied the smoking sawdust and dry grass into\nit, waved it about, and in three and a half minutes from starting the\nprocess I have seen a blaze. Sometimes it has taken longer, but just\nunder five minutes is the longest time I have ever seen it take.\n\nThey use pine too, I believe, but whenever I timed them it was\nNummaybirah they were using.\n\nThe boys pick up the woodcraft of the tribes when they begin going out\nwith the men. As the boys began to grow up, when a good season came\nround, and game and grass were plentiful, the old men were seen to draw\napart often and talk earnestly.\n\nAt length there came a night when was heard a whizzing, whirling boom\nfar in the scrub. As the first echo of it reached the camp, the women,\nsuch as were still young enough to bear children, stopped their ears,\nfor should any such hear the Gurraymi, the women's name for the\nGayandi, or Boorah spirit's voice, that spirit will first make them\nmad, then kill them.\n\nThe old women began to sing a Boorah song. To deaden the sound of the\ndreaded voice, opossum rugs were thrown over the children, none of whom\nmust hear, unless they are boys old enough to be initiated; the sound\nreveals the fact to such that the hour of their initiation is at hand.\n\nThe men all gathered together with the boys, except two old wirreenuns,\nwho earlier in the evening have seemingly quarrelled and gone away into\nthe scrub.\n\nThe men and boys in camp march up and down to some distance from the\ncamp. The old women keep on singing, and one man with a spear painted\nred with a waywah fastened on top, walks up and down in the middle of\nthe crowd of men, holding the spear, with its emblematic belt of\nmanhood, aloft; as he does so, calling out the names of the bends of\nthe creek, beginning with the one nearest to which they are camped.\nWhen he gets to the end of the names along that creek and comes to the\nname of a big river, all the men join him in giving a loud crow like\n\n'Wah! wah! wah!'\n\nThen he begins with the names along the next creek across the big\nriver, and so on; at the mention of each main stream the crowd again\njoin in the cry of\n\n'Wah! wah! wah!'\n\nAll the while, closer and still closer, comes the sound of the Gayandi,\nas the men call the Gurraymi, or bull roarer.\n\nAt length the two old wirreenuns come back to the camp and the noise\nceases, to recur sometimes during the night, when I expect, did any one\nsearch for them, the old wirreenuns would be found missing from the\ncamp.\n\nAfter the first whirling of the bull roarers and calling of the creek\nnames, the Gooyeanawannah, or messengers, prepare for a journey, and\nwhen ready, the wirreenuns start them off in various directions to\nsummon neighbouring tribes from hundreds of miles round to attend the\nBoorah. The messengers each carry a spear with a waywah (or belt of\nmanhood) on the top, seeing which no tribe, even at enmity with the\nmessenger, will molest him. When a messenger arrived at a strange camp,\nhe was not asked his business but left to choose his own time for\ntelling. He would squat down a little way from the strangers' camp,\nfood would probably be brought to him which he would cat.\n\nHe would find out who was the chief wirreenun of the tribe, then take\nhim apart, give to him his Boorah message-stick as guarantee of his\ngood faith, and tell him where and when the Boorah was to be held.\nAfter having given all necessary information, the Gooyeanawannah would\nreturn to his tribe; the wirreenun to whom he had given the\nDoolooboorah, or message-stick, would send it on by the messenger of\nhis tribe, and so with others, until all were summoned, each tribe\nletting it be known that a Boorah summons had been received by sounding\nthe Gayandi, which would carry its own tale to those in the camp.\n\nShould young boys be chosen as messengers, they were held in high\nhonour; Woormerh they were called.\n\nWhile the messengers were away, the old men of the tribe in whose\nNoorumbah, or hereditary hunting lands, the Boorah was to be held,\nprepared the sacred grounds.\n\nThey cleared a big circle, round which they put a bank of earth, and\nfrom the circle was cleared a path leading to a thick scrub; along this\npath were low earthen embankments, and the trees on both sides had the\nbark stripped off, and carved on them the various totems and multiplex\ntotems of the tribes. Such carvings were also put on the trees round\nthe Bunbul, or little Boorah ring, where the branches were also in some\ninstances lopped, and the trunks carved and painted to represent\nfigures of men, amongst whom were supposed to be the sons of Byamee's\nwives. Two of these sons had been made young men at the first Boorah\nByamee instituted in this district, the ground of which is pointed out\nto this day.\n\nIn the middle of the Bunbul a large heap of wood was placed ready for\nthe Yungawee, or sacred fire.\n\nWhen the preliminary preparations were over, the camps were moved to\njust outside the Boorah, or big Boorah ring. By that time the other\ntribes began to arrive. First came from each tribe the boys to be\ninitiated and the Munthdeeguns, or men in charge of them. The men were\npainted, and had leafy twigs tied round their wrists and ankles, as had\nthe boys also, and all carried in their hands small branches of green.\nThose especially in charge of boys held, too, a painted spear with a\nwaywah on top of it.\n\nAs they approached the place of gathering the head man, with the\npainted spear, began calling out all the names of the places along the\ncreeks from whence he came; at the name of each big watercourse they\nall cried together\n\n'Wah! Wah! wah!'\n\nThey were met at some distance from the camp by the men who had\nsummoned them, and who had made a round brush yard where they were to\nmeet them. Here the older women were singing Boorah songs. Some held\ntheir breasts as a sign they had sons among the initiates; others put\ntheir hands on their shoulders, which showed they had brothers going to\nbe made young men. All the women had leafy twigs tied round their\nwrists and ankles as the men had. The newcomers and the men who met\nthem walked round the yard at a measured beat, lifting one leg and\nthrowing up one arm each time the cry of 'Wah! wah! wah!' was given,\nfor here too the enumeration of geographical names went on.\n\nWhen the Boorah song was over, the men marched out of the yard; closely\nbehind them the two oldest men with the tufted spears; the Boorah boys\nclosely after them. The women followed, carrying bunches of leafy twigs\nwith which they pelted the boys until they reached the camp.\n\nMatah and I had been watching the whole performance, and followed in\nthe wake of the women.\n\nThe whole scene impressed us as picturesque--the painted figures of the\nmen and boys, with the peculiarly native stealthy tread, threading\ntheir way through the grey Coolabah trees; the decorated women throwing\ntheir leafy missiles with accurate aim into the ranks of the boys, who\ndid not dare to look at their assailants. A Boorah boy must give no\nevidence of curiosity; the NIL ADMIRARI attitude then begun clings to a\nblack man through life. The women of the tribe express voluble\nsurprise, but a black man never except by the dilation of his eyes.\n\nEvery night after this a corroboree was held. The fully initiated of\neach tribe, as they arrived, help in the preparation of the inner\nsacred ground, while the younger men collected game and other food.\n\nThe old men cut out of the ground along the narrow path leading to the\nBunbul, and round it, huge earthen animals, their various totems, such\nas crocodiles, kangaroos, emus and others, all of a colossal size.\nThese they plastered over with mud and painted in different colours and\ndesigns. On the right of the Bunbul they made an earthen figure of\nByamee--this figure was reclining holding in each hand a Boondee. On\nthe other side was the huge figure of a woman--this represented\nBirrahgnooloo, the favourite wife of Byamee; she held two spears. There\nwas a third figure not so large as the other two but like them, apart\nfrom the figures near the path and the Bunbul; this was Baillahburrah,\naccording to some, Dillalee according to others, the supernatural son\nof Byamee--or as some say, brother--not born of woman, having lived\nbefore the human race existed, before Byamee travelled as Creator and\nculture hero through Australia.\n\nOf the Gayandi, the Boorah spirit, sometimes called\nWallahgooroonboooan, there was no figure, because he was always present\nat Boorahs, though invisible. His voice only gave evidence of his\npresence.\n\nThe wirreenuns said it was he who had placed in the forks of trees\nround the big ring heaps of dry wood, which they said, when the\nceremonies began, he would light, making a dazzling illumination of the\nscene.\n\nIn the middle of the Boorah ring was placed a mudgee, a painted stick\nor spear, with a bunch of hawk's feathers on the top. Every night was\nheard at intervals the Gayandi, and immediately the younger women and\nchildren stopped their ears, while the old women shrieked their\nBRUMBOORAH.\n\nAs each fresh batch of blacks arrived the volume of sound was\nincreased, for the old men with their Gayandi would go into the scrub\nand whirl them. These bull roarers sound curiously uncanny--I did not\nwonder the uninitiated accepted the spirit theory as to their origin.\n\nThe bush of Australia is a good background for superstition; there is\nsuch a non-natural air about its Nature, as if it has been sketched in\nroughly by a Beardsley-like artist.\n\nThe function of the Gayandi is to inspire awe, and it fulfils it.\nByamee himself made the first. It was some time before he got quite the\neffect he wanted. At first he desired to give the Boorah spirit a form\nas well as a voice, to inspire awe; he also wished it to knock out the\nfront tooth of an initiate.\n\nHe made a stone figure in the image of man, having a voice. This\nspirit, known variously as Gayandi, or Darramulun, went to the Boorah,\nbut when he was to knock out the front tooth, he began to eat the boys'\nfaces. He was too strong; he would not do to preside over, Boorahs.\nByamee transformed him into a large piggiebillah-like animal, though\ninstead of being covered with spines, thick hair grew over him; he has\nsince been known as Nahgul. He went away into the bush, where he has\nbeen a dreaded devil ever since; for if he touches a man's shadow even,\nthat man will itch all over and nothing can cure him of it. He haunts\nBoorah grounds.\n\nNext Byamee made a stone bull roarer sort of thing, but this was too\nheavy to make the noise he wanted. One day he was chopping a big\nCoolabah tree close to Weetalibah water-hole, which tree, much to the\nhorror of our blacks, was burnt down a few years ago by travellers.\n\nAs Byamee chopped, out flew a big chip. He heard the whizzing sound it\nmade, gave another chop, out flew another; again the whizzing sound.\n\n'That is what I want,' he said I'll make a Gayandi of wood.'\n\nHe cut a piece of mubboo, or beefwood, and shaped it; he tied a piece\nof string to a hole in one end; he hung it up in the big Coolabah tree.\nThen he went and cut one out of Noongah or Kurrajong, tied a string on\nto that and put it beside the other on the tree, and left them swinging\nthere.\n\nOne day he came back and was camping near; his wives, came along to the\nbig tree. There the Gayandi swung, making a whirring noise.\n\n'What's that?' said the women. 'We'll have a look what it is.' Seeing\nByamee they said, 'We heard voices in that big tree over there.'\n\n'Whereabouts?' he said.\n\n'In that Coolabah tree. Such strange voices, such as we never heard.'\n\n'You two go' he said, 'to our camp and make a fire. I'll go and see\nwhat it is.'\n\nWhen the women were out of sight he went to the tree and took the\npieces of wood down. He was satisfied now they would answer his\npurpose. He carefully hid them until he made a Boorah. And since then\nsuch pieces of wood have been the medium for the Gayandi's voice, and\nare kept carefully hidden away from all but the eyes of wirreenuns.\n\nAt length all the expected tribes had arrived, preparations were\nfinished, and a signal was given for a move to be made that the real\nceremonies might begin.\n\nThe fully initiated men went away after their midday meal, and about\nsundown came in single file along the banked-in path each carrying a\nfirestick in one hand, a green switch in the other. When they reached\nthe mudgee in the middle of the big ring and corroboreed for a little\nround it, the old women answered with a Boorah song, and all moved to\nthe edge of the ring. At this stage men often tried to steal each\nother's boys, and great wrestling matches came off. One man would try\nto pull up the mudgee, out would rush one of another clan to wrestle\nwith him. First the boys would wrestle, then the elder men, each\ndetermined his clan should prove victorious at this great Boorah\nwrestling.\n\nThe skill of the eeramooun, or uninitiated boys, would be tried in sham\nfights too. They were given bark shields, and their attackers had bark\nboomerangs; great was the applause when the boys ably defended\nthemselves. Previously they have been tried with boomerang and boodthul\nthrowing, and other arts of sport and warfare, boys of each tribe\ntrying to excel those of the others. If a boy comes well out of these\ntrials the men say he is worthy to be a yelgidyi, or fully initiated\nyoung man.\n\nWhen the wrestling and sham fights are over, corroborees begin. All\nnight they are kept up, and sometimes there are day performances too.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER IX\n\nTHE BOORAH AND OTHER MEETINGS\n\n\nAt last would come the night when everything was ready. Sports and\ncorroborees would be held as usual, until, at a given signal, the\nyounger women were ordered into bough sheds which were round the ring.\n\nThe old women stayed on singing.\n\nThe boys, who are painted red, are beckoned into the middle of the\nring, where their respective Munthdeeguns daub them with white. That\ndone, each man seizing his charge, hoists him on to his shoulder, and\ndances round the ring with him. Then the old women are told to bid the\nboys good-bye.\n\nForward they come, singing each her own brumboorah, for every oldest\nwoman relation of each of the boys makes a song for him. They\ncorroboree a few steps behind the men, chanting a farewell, then\ncorroboree back a few steps, then hasten to join the younger women in\nthe bough sheds, which are now pulled down on top of them by the men,\nthat they may see nothing further. Then the Munthdeeguns disappear down\nthe track into the scrub.\n\nWhen they are out of sight the women are released, that they may get\nready to travel to where the Durrawunga, or Little Boorah, will be held\nin about four days' time, at about ten miles distance.\n\nAs the Munthdeeguns passed their totem-marked trees, or images, which\nwould be those of the boys in their charge--for each guardian was a\nrelation of the same totem as his charge--they would perform some\nmagical feat, such as producing gubberahs, charcoal, gypsum, and so on,\nuttering as they did so a little chant about that totem.\n\nThe boy's eyes are closed all this time and his head bent down.\n\nBoys at a Boorah always remind me of WILHELM MEISLER'S TRAVELS, where,\nat the school to which Wilhelm takes Felix, he learns, on inquiry as to\nthe three attitudes assumed by the pupils, that these gestures\ninculcate veneration, which also seems to be the keynote of the\neeramooun's instruction. The Boorah over, he too, 'Stands erect and\nbold, yet not selfishly isolated; only in an union with his equals (his\nfellow initiates) does he present a front towards the world.'\n\nAnd only when the fear, the abasement, is gone does the true reverence\ncome, which makes the most primitive creed a living religion.\n\nAs the Munthdeeguns pass the sacred fire they throw in a weapon each.\nThis done they place their charges in slightly scooped-out places,\nalready prepared in the inner ring.\n\nThen they bid them, on pain of death, not to look up whatever happens.\n\nSoon a great whirring is heard, telling that Gayandi, the Boorah\nspirit, is near.\n\nYudtha Dulleebah, one of the oldest black men in the district, said at\nthis stage once two boys did look up.\n\nThe wirreenuns saw them, though the boys did not know it and went on\nlooking. These boys saw the men advance each to the fire where they had\nthrown their weapons; chanting in a strange tongue, they corroboreed\nround the fire for some time.\n\nThen the wirreenuns snatched up the coals left from the weapons and\nrubbed them into their limbs, trampling as they did so on the edge of\nthe fire, which did not seem to burn them, rubbing and chanting until\nthe sacred coals were supposed to be absorbed by them, from which they\nwould derive new powers.\n\nThis over, the boys were all ordered to get up, and march round, hands\non thighs and heads abased, while they learnt a Boorah song, giving new\nwords for common things, which acted as pass-words hereafter for the\ninitiated. Into a slow chant these words were strung, as the men and\nboys passed round the ring, two of the oldest men standing beating time\nwith painted spears with tufted tops.\n\nThe two boys who had transgressed before looked up again, curious as to\ntheir surroundings. Suddenly the men with the spears roared at the boys\nto lower their heads.\n\nThe boys laughed. Their fates were sealed. Out flashed the sacred\ngubberahs of these two old men.\n\n'Dead is he,' they cried, 'who laughs in the Bunbul where yungawee\nburns more fiercely than Yirangal, the sun, where near lies the image\nof Byamee: Byamee, father of all, whose laws the tribes are now\nobeying.' Then the men chanted to the gubberahs and held them between\nthe fires and the boys, the light of the flames seemed to play on them\nand stretch its beams to the boys, who began to tremble. As louder grew\nthe chant an answer came from the scrub, the voice of Gayandi; shaking\nwith fear the boys fell to the ground, to all appearance lifeless. Then\nthe old men went forward, each with a stone knife in hand. Stooping\nover the two boys they opened veins in each, out flowed the blood, and\nthe other men all raised a death cry. The boys were lifeless. The old\nwirreenuns, dipping their stone knives in the blood, touched with them\nthe lips of all present. Then the bodies were put on the edge of the\nsacred fire and the other initiates taken a little further into the\nscrub. There they were tried in many ways.\n\nWith the Boorah spirits whistling and whizzing all round them, spears\nwere pointed at them. Their skins were scratched with stone knives and\nmussel shells. Hideously painted, fiendish-looking creatures suddenly\nrushed upon them. Should they show fear and quail at the Little Boorah\nthey would be returned to their mothers as cowards unfit for\ninitiation, and sooner or later sympathetic magic would do its work, a\npoison-stick or bone would end them. Or if one of the initiates was\nconsidered stupid and generally incapable, having been brought to the\nBoorah for that purpose, he was now, after having been made to suffer\nall sorts of indignities, such as eating filth and so on, bound to the\nearth, strapped down, killed, and his body burnt.\n\nWhen the trials were over and the old wirreenuns said to the boys who\nhad not quailed, 'You are brave; you shall be boorahbayyi first and\nafterwards yelgidyi, and carry the marks that all may know.'\n\nThen they made on the shoulder of each boy a round hole with a pointed\nstone; this hole they licked to feel no splinter of stone remained,\nthen filled it with powdered charcoal.\n\nAfter this, leaving the boys there, the men went back to the Bunbul\nring. The bodies of the Boorah victims were cooked. Each man who had\nbeen to five Boorahs ate a piece of this flesh, no others were allowed\neven to see this done. Then the bones and what was left of the bodies\nwere put into the middle of the fire, and all traces of the victims so\ndestroyed.\n\nThe men then sang a song, saying that so must always be served those\nwho scoffed at sacred things; that the strength they had wasted should\ngo into other men who would use it better; while the spirits of the\nvictims should wander about until reincarnated if the Boorah spirit\ngave them another chance. Perhaps he would only let them be\nreincarnated in animals.\n\nAfter another dance and chant round the yungawee, the men went and\nbrought the boys back again. They came with their hands on their\nthighs, and their heads abased; each was taken to his allotted place\nnear the outer edge of the ring. There each Munthdeegun told his boy he\ncould sleep that night; he would go to sleep the boy he had been, to\nwake in the morning a new man; his courage had now been tried, and in\nthe morning a new name and a sacred stone would be given to him. The\nGayandi would settle their names that night and tell the wirreenuns.\n\nThe next morning the boys were awakened by the Munthdeegun chanting and\ndancing before them. They stopped in front of the first boy, called him\nto rise by a new name; as he did so all the men clapped their thighs\nand shouted\n\n'Wah! wah! wah!'\n\nThen an old wirreenun gave him a small white gubberah, which he was\nbidden to keep concealed for ever from the uninitiated and the women,\nand he must be ready to produce it whenever called upon to do so. The\nresult of failure would be fatal to him. With the loss of the stone his\nlife spirit would be weakened, and the strength of the Boorah spirit,\nwith which he was now endowed, be used against him instead of for him,\nas would be the case as long as he kept the stone.\n\nThese stones seem somewhat in the way of 'Baetyli' of pagan antiquity,\nwhich were of round form; they were supposed to be animated, by means\nof magical incantations, with a portion of the Deity; they were\nconsulted on occasions of great and pressing emergency as a kind of\ndivine oracle, and were suspended either round the neck or some other\npart of the body.\n\nAs each boy received his stone another loud chorus of 'Wah! wah! wah!'\nwent up from that crowd, making the scrub ring with the sound.\n\nSome of those, of whose tribe it was the custom--it is not invariably\nso--now had a front tooth knocked off; this done a wirreenun chanted to\nthe boy, who had been blindfolded and almost deafened by the whirring\nof Gayandi.\n\nOne chant was as follows:--\n\n  Now you can meet the Boorah spirit,\n  Now will he harm you not.\n  He will know his spirit is in you.\n  For this is the sign,\n  A front tooth gone.\n  That is his sign,\n  He will know you by it.\n\nSome of the wirreenuns buried these teeth by the Boorah fire, others\ncarefully wrapped them up to keep as charms, or to send to other\ntribes, each according to the individual custom of his tribe.\n\nThis all over, once more there was a marching and chanting round the\nfire, then the boys were taken away and given food for the first time\nsince they left their mothers.\n\nNo wonder that the 'supernatural' was mixed up with their impressions\nof the Boorah: fasting nourishes hallucinations. While the boys were\neating, they could hear in the distance other chants, and knew that\nceremonies were going on to which they were not yet to be admitted,\nthere being degrees of initiation.\n\nOn the fourth day the men took them about ten miles, and camped with\nthem where they could hear faintly in the distance the noise of the\nmain camp; so they knew they were near the place chosen for the\nDurramunga, or Little Boorah.\n\nJust before dawn next morning each Munthdeegun took his Boorahbayyi, or\npartially initiated one, to the Durramunga. There was a Boorah ring,\nbut instead of earth grass was heaped all round it. No young women were\nvisible, only the old women, who sang and corroboreed towards the boys.\nSlowly they came forward, peered at their shoulders, and seeing there\nthe marks, embraced them, shrieking out cries of joy that their boys\nhad borne the tests. They danced round them, then at a sign from the\nold men embraced them again; and while, the women sang their brumboorah\nand danced, the boys were taken away by their guardians.\n\nFor two moons they remained away, learning much as to sacred things.\nThey were told that the oldest wirreenuns could see in their sacred\ncrystals pictures of the past, pictures of what was happening at a\ndistance in the present, and pictures of the future; some of which last\nfilled their minds with dread, for they said as time went on the\ncolours of the blacks, as seen in these magical stones, seemed to grow\npaler and paler, until at last only the white faces of the Wundah, or\nspirits of the dead, and white devils were seen, as if it should mean\nthat some day no more blacks should be on this earth.\n\nThe reason of this must surely be that the tribes fell away from the\nBoorah rites, and in his wrath Byamee stirred from his crystal seat in\nBullimah. He had said that as long as the blacks kept his sacred laws,\nso long should he stay in his crystal seat, and the blacks live on\nearth; but if they failed to keep up the Boorah rites as he had taught\nthem, then he would move and their end would come, and only Wundah, or\nwhite devils, be in their country.\n\nIt is said that this prophetic vision was the reason that so many of\nthe first-born half-caste babies were killed, the old wirreenuns seeing\nin them the beginning of the end.\n\nAt the end of two moons they make back towards the place where the\nBoorah had begun, and where preparations were now being made to receive\nthem.\n\nThey camped in the scrub near the old camp of the tribe who had started\nthe Boorah.\n\nThat night in the camp the Gayandi was heard again, another ceremony\nwas at hand.\n\nThe next day the women at the big camp made a big fire, a little\ndistance away. When this fire was nearly burnt out they covered it\nthickly with Budtha, Dheal, and Coolabah leaves to make a great smoke.\nOn the top of these leaves, which were piled about two feet high, logs\nwere placed; this fire was round a Dheal tree.\n\nWhen the thick smoke was seen curling up in a column, the Boorahbayyi\nwere brought out of the scrub by the Munthdeegun, while in the distance\nsounded the whizzing voice of the Boorah spirit. As it ceased, when the\nwomen's chanting rose above it, the painted boys came into the open. On\nthey came, heads down and hands on thighs, looking neither to the right\nnor to the left, but walking straight ahead until they stood on the\nlogs on the fire. They leaned over and placed a hand each on the tree\nin the centre, there they stood while the smoke curled all round them.\nThe women past child-bearing were singing all the time, while the men\ndanced outside the leaf-smoke, clicking boomerangs as they did so.\n\nFor some time this went on, then the men took the boys back into the\nscrub.\n\nIn about four moons' time another leaf-smoke was made ready, and the\nBoorahbayyi were again brought out and smoked. This time while chanting\na song the old women brought a big net and put it right over the boys.\nThen they stepped back and danced round to the clicking of boomerangs\nby the men. The boys were again taken away.\n\nBut after this they were allowed to camp nearer the general camp,\nthough they held no intercourse with the people of it. I have often met\nthese Boorah boys in the bush, and on sighting me they have fled as if\nI were a devil in petticoats.\n\nIn about another moon's time, the boys were painted principally white,\na waywah put on them, a yunbean--a piece of beefwood gum with two\nkangaroo teeth stuck in it, and a hole through it--was tied to their\nfront lock of hair. A number of these yunbean were tied to forehead\nbands, which they wore too. Armlets of opossum's hair string were put\non their arms, and feathers stuck in them. Feathers were also stuck\nupright in the forehead bands.\n\nSome of the old men added to their own decorations by putting on\nwongins, from which were hanging those most precious possessions to\ninland blacks--seaside shells. Some had fresh beads of gum fastened on\nto their hair, hanging round their heads in dozens.\n\nThe women, too, had coiffured themselves with fresh gum beads; the\nmothers of the Boorahbayyi were painted, too, in corroboree style. They\nhad made a smoke fire, but the logs instead of being put on it, were\nplaced at a little distance; on these the painted boys sat, the smoke\nenveloping them.\n\nAfter they had been seated there some time, their mothers came up\nbehind them, and put their hands on their sons' shoulders. Then they\nrubbed all the paint off the boys' bodies; the boys never once looking\nat them. When the paint was all off, the women sang and danced, until\nthe men in charge took the boys away again.\n\nAfter this, supervision was relaxed except at night. During the\nday-time the boys might wander at will, so as they kept clear of the\ngeneral camp. They might not receive food from nor speak to a woman for\ntwelve months, as if they were monks of Byamee in training.\n\nAt his second Boorah a young man was allowed to see the sacred fire\nceremony, throwing in of weapons, walking on burning coals, and the\nrest. He saw the huge earthen figures of Byamee, Birrahgnooloo, and\nBaillahburrah, or Dillalee, and was told all about them; that Byamee\nhaving initiated the Boorah, only such as have been through its rites\ncan go to his sky-camp.\n\nThree sins are unforgiveable, and commit a spirit of a guilty one to\ncontinual movement in the lower world of the Eleanbah Wundah, where,\nbut for big fires kept up, would be darkness.\n\nThere the guilty one had to keep his right hand at his side, never\nmoving it, but he himself perpetually moving. Those who know the blacks\nand their love of a 'dolce far niente,' will understand what a\nveritable hell this perpetual movement would make.\n\nThe three deadly sins were unprovoked murder, lying to the elders of\nthe tribe, or stealing a woman within the forbidden degrees--that is,\nof the same hereditary totem, i.e. of the same blood, or of the\nprohibited family name clan.\n\nBut by a curious train of reasoning two wrongs make a right. Should by\nany chance a man succeed in getting a wife he had no right to, having\nlived with her, he could keep her, if he came unhurt from the trial he\nhad to stand; he only having a shield to defend himself with, the men\nof the stolen woman's kin threw weapons at him. Only the men of her kin\nare assailants, not as in a murder trial, when the men of all kins can\nthrow at the guilty man. Should he defend himself successfully, he can\nkeep the woman on the understanding that a woman of his family is given\nto a man of hers, to square things. A man who stands his trial is\ncalled a Booreenbayyi.\n\nKindliness towards the old and sick is strictly inculcated as a command\nof Byamee, to whom all breaches of his laws are reported by the\nall-seeing spirit at a man's death, and he is judged accordingly. Sir\nThomas Mitchell, writing in 1837 his experiences of the blacks during\nhis explorations, notices as very striking their care and affection for\nthe aged of their race.\n\nAt his second Boorah a man is allowed to see the carvings on the trees\nand to hear the legends of them. Also to hear the Boorah song of\nByamee, which Byamee himself sang; and to hear the prayer of the oldest\nwirreenun to Byamee, asking him to let the blacks live long, for they\nhave been faithful to his charge as shown by the observance of the\nBoorah ceremony.\n\nThe old wirreenun says words to this effect several times imploringly,\nhis head turned to the east; facing this direction the dead are mostly\nburied.\n\nThough we say that actually these people have but two attempts at\nprayers, one at the grave and one at the inner Boorah ring, I think\nperhaps we are wrong. These two seem the only ones directly addressed\nto Byamee. But perhaps it is his indirect aid which is otherwise\ninvoked. Daily set prayers seem to them a foolishness and an insult,\nrather than otherwise, to Byamee. He knows; why weary him by\nrepetition, disturbing the rest he enjoys after his earth labours? But\na prayer need not necessarily be addressed to the highest god. I think\nif we really understood and appreciated the mental attitude of the\nblacks, we should find more in their so-called incantations of the\nnature of invocations. When a man invokes aid on the eve of a battle,\nor in his hour of danger and need; when a woman croons over her baby an\nincantation to keep him honest and true, and that he shall be spared in\ndanger, surely these croonings are of the nature of prayers born of the\nsame elementary frame of mind as our more elaborate litany. I fancy\ninherent devotional impulses are common to all races irrespective of\ncountry or colour.\n\nWhen the prayer was over the old men chanted Byamee's song, which only\nthe fully initiated may sing, and which an old black fellow chanted for\nus as the greatest thing he could do.\n\nThere seemed very little in this song, for no, one can translate it,\nthe meaning having been lost in the 'dark backward,' if it was ever\nknown to the Euahlayi.\n\n  'Byamee guadoun.\n  Byamee guadoun.\n  Byamee guadoun.\n  Mungerh wirree.\n  Mungerh wirree.\n  Mungerh wirree.\n  Birree gunyah, birrie gunyah.\n  Dilbay gooran mulah bungarn.\n  Oodoo doo gilah.\n  Googoo wurra wurra.\n  Bulloo than nulgah delah boombee nulgah.\n  Delah boombee. Nulgah delah boombee boombee.\n  Buddereebah . . . . . . Eumoolan.\n  Dooar wullah doo. Boombee nulgah delah.'\n\nThe old fellow said wherever Byamee had travelled this song was known,\nbut no one now knew the meaning of the whole, not even the oldest\nwirreenuns.\n\nAnother stone was given to a Boorahbayyi when he first heard this song.\n\nThe wirreenuns, they say, swallow their stones to keep them safe.\n\nAt each Boorah a taboo is taken off food. After a third Boorah a man\ncould eat fish, after a fourth honey, after a fifth what he liked. He\nwas then, too, shown and taught the meanings of the tribal\nmessage-sticks, and the big Boorah one of Byamee. As few men now have\never been to five Boorahs, few know anything about these last. At each\nBoorah a stone was given to a man, and when he had the five he could\nmarry.\n\nAfter each Boorah all the figures and embankments are destroyed.\n\nAfter the fifth Boorah the mystery of the Gayandi was revealed and the\nbull roarers shown--oval pieces of wood pointed at both ends, fastened\nto a string and swung round; but though this was shown, the wirreenuns\ntold them that the spirit's voice was really in this wood animating it.\nAfter a man has been to one Boorah he can have war weapons and is a\nwarrior, but not until he has been to five can he join or be one of the\ndorrunmai--sort of chiefs--who hold councils of war, but have few\nprivileges beyond being accepted authorities as to war and hunting.\nWith the wirreenuns rests the real power, by reason of their skill in\nmagic.\n\nBesides Boorahs are minor corroboree meetings where marriages are\narranged; meetings where the illegality of marriages is gone into, and,\nif necessary, exchanges effected or arranged; meetings where the\nwirreenuns of the Boogahroo produce the bags of hair, etc., and\nvendettas are sworn; meetings of Boodther, or giving, where each person\nreceives and gives presents. A person who went to a Boodther without a\ngoolay full of presents would be thought a very poor thing indeed.\n\nOf course every meeting has a corroboree as part of it.\n\nEvery totem even has its own special corroboree and time for having it,\nas the Beewees, or iguanas, when the pine pollen is failing and the red\ndust-storms come. And if you abused these dust-storms to a Beewee\nblack, you would insult him: it is not dust, it is the pollen off the\npines, and so a multiplex totem to him!\n\nThe winds belong to various totems, and the rains are claimed by the\ntotem whose wind it was that blew it up.\n\nIf a storm comes up without wind it belongs to Bohrah, the kangaroo.\n\nThe big mountainous clouds when they come from the south-west are said\nto be Mullyan, the eagle-hawk, who makes the south-west wind claimed by\nMaira, paddy melon totem, one of whose multiplex totems Mullyan is.\n\nThe crow keeps the cold west wind in a hollow log, as she was too fond\nof blowing up hurricanes; she escapes sometimes, but the crow hunts her\nback. But they say the log is rotting and she will get away yet, when\nthere will be great wreckage and quite a change in climates. [Here we see\nthe usual antagonism of crow and eagle-hawk.--A. L.]\n\nAway to the north-west a tribe of blacks have almost a monopoly in\nwind-making, holding great corroborees to sing these hurricanes up. One\nof this tribe came to the station once and wanted to marry a girl\nthere. She would not consent, and told him to go home. He went,\nthreatening to send a storm to wreck the station. The storm came; the\nhouse escaped, but stable, store, and cellar were unroofed. I told my\nBlack-but-Comelys to kindly avoid such vehemently revengeful lovers for\nthe future.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER X\n\nCHIEFLY AS TO FUNERALS AND MOURNING\n\n\nI was awakened one morning on the station by distant wailing.\n\nA wailing that came in waves of sound, beginning slowly and lowly, to\ngain gradually in volume until it reached the full height or limit of\nthe human voice, when gradually, as it had risen, it fell again. No\nshrieking, just a wailing inexpressibly saddening to hear.\n\nI lay for some minutes not realising what the sound was, yet penetrated\nby its sorrow. Then came consciousness. It was from the blacks' camp,\nand must mean death. Beemunny, the oldest woman of the camp, who for\nweeks had been ill, must now be dead.\n\nPoor old Beemunny, who was blind and used to get her\ngreat-granddaughter, little Buggaloo, to lead her up to the tree\noutside my window, under whose shade she had spent so many hours,\ntelling me legends of the golden age when man, birds, beasts, trees,\nand elements spoke a common language. But the day before I had been to\nthe camp to hear how she was. The old women were sitting round her; one\nof the younger ones told me her end had nearly come.\n\nThe Boolees, or whirlwinds, with the Mullee Mullees of her enemies in,\nhad been playing round and through the camp for days, they said,\nwatching to seize her fleeting spirit--a sure sign the end was near.\nThat night surely would come Yowee, the skeleton spirit, with the big\nhead and fiery eyes, whose coming meant death.\n\nLast night more than one of the blacks had dreamt of an emu, which\nmeant misfortune to one of that totem, which was Beemunny's.\n\nAs Yellen spoke in a hushed sad voice, suddenly, though no breath of\nwind was stirring, sprang up on the edge of the camp a boolee, rearing\nits head as if it were a living thing. Round it whirled, snatching the\ndead leaves of the Coolabahs, swirling them with the dust it gathered\ninto a spiral column, which sped, as if indeed a spirit animated it,\nstraight to the camp of the dying woman. Round and round it eddied, a\ndust-devil dancing a dance of death.\n\nThe watchers drew nearer to Beemunny, who was past heeding even the\nspirits of evil.\n\nThe women in other camps clutched their children to them, but spoke no\nword. All was silent but the swirling leaves as the column gathered\nthem. Finding the deathbed guarded, the boolee turned sharply from the\ncamp and sped away down the road, dissolving on the poligonum flat in\nthe distance.\n\nYellen gave a sigh of relief.\n\nBut now her fears were verified; Beemunny was dead.\n\nPoor old Beemunny! How the vanities of youth cling to one; how we are\n'all sisters under the skin.'\n\nShe was ever so old, she was blind, her face was scarred with wrinkles,\nyet one of her beauties remained, and she absolutely joyed in its\npossession: it was her hair. Her hair was thick and fuzzy, when combed\nwould stand nearly straight out, which is quite unusual with the native\nwomen's hair in that part. Beemunny one day asked one of the younger\nwomen if I had ever heard what a lot of lovers she had had in her\nyouth, what fights there had been over her, and all because of her\nbeautiful hair.\n\nPoor old Beemunny! Something in my own woman nature went out to her in\nsympathy. She was old, she was ugly, her husband was dead, as were all\nmen to her.\n\nPoor old Beemunny! Having once learnt her vanity, I never passed her\nwithout saying 'Gubbah Tekkul!' 'Beautiful hair!' at which she would\nbeam and toss her head.\n\nAt sunrise came again the wailing; the singing of the Goohnai, or\ndirge, wherein are enumerated all the multiplex totems of the deceased,\ncrooned in a wailing way, and each fresh person who comes to the camp\nsings this dirge again. In olden times all would have been painted in\nfull war paint, weapons in hand, to see the corpse.\n\nI was given permission to go to the funeral, old Bootha was to take me.\n\nI heard that Beemunny had died early in the night. Her daughter and\nnearest of kin had sat all night beside her body, with each a hand on\nit to guard her from the spirits. She was now in her bark coffin, round\nwhich were her own blankets to be buried with her. The coffin was made\nof bark cut off right round a tree, split on one side from end to end;\nthe body was placed in this, then the bark lapped over it, the ends\nwere blocked up with other pieces, the whole secured by ropes. All day\nuntil the burial some one of kin stayed beside the coffin, little fires\nof Budtha kept smoking all the while. In the afternoon old Bootha came\nfor me, and we set out.\n\nFirst in the procession marched two old men of the tribe, behind them\nsome young men, then those in charge of the coffin and the two nearest\nwomen relations, immediately behind them the old women, then the young\nwomen. No women with babies were allowed to go, nor any children. I\ncame last with old Bootha.\n\nThe procession moved along an old winding track on the top of a\nmoorilla, or pebbly ridge, pine-trees overarching in places carving the\nsky into a dome--a natural temple through which we walked to the\nburial-ground.\n\nEvery now and then we heard a bird note, which made the women glance at\neach other and say, first, 'Guadgee,' then 'Bootha,' as it came again,\nand a third time 'Hippitha.' To my uneducated ear the note seemed the\nsame each time. I asked Bootha what it was. She told me it was the note\nof a little bird, something like a wren, called Durrooee, in whose\nshape the spirits of dead women revisited the earth. It seems that\nNumbardee, the first woman, was, like Milton's Eve, a caterer; she\nacquired art in beating the roots of plants into flat cakes much\nesteemed; she was never to be met without some, carrying them always in\na bag across her shoulders.\n\nAnd Byamee was so pleased with her for always having food for the\nhungry that, when at length she died, he allowed her to revisit her old\ngahreemai, or camp, her spirit returning in the form of the little\nhoney-eater bird, Durrooee; and all women after her had a like\nprivilege if they had done their duty in life. These birds are sacred;\nno one must harm them, nor even imitate their cry. It would be hard to\nhurt them, for the spirit in them is so strong. If any one even takes\nup a stick or stone to throw at them, hardly is it raised from the\nground when the would-be assailant is forcibly knocked over, though he\nsees nothing but the little bird he was about to attack. Then he knows\nthe bird must be a spirit bird, and perhaps seeing him look at her, the\nbird calls a woman's name, then he knows whose spirit it is.\n\nA black boy on the station was badly hurt by a fall from a tree. It had\nseemed strange that such a good climber should fall. The blacks said it\nwas because there was a Durrooee's nest in that tree, the spirit had\nknocked him down, and for a time so paralysed the man with him that he\ncould not move to his assistance. Needless to say, they have avoided\nthat tree since.\n\nIn the distance we heard the sound of the grave being dug. None of the\nsame totem as the dead person must dig the grave. The coffin was put\ndown beside the grave, the daughter and other nearest women relations\nstayed with it, the other women went away into the bush in one\ndirection, some of the men in another.\n\nOld Hippi heaped up some Budtha twigs he had gathered, I noticed as we\ncame along; these he set fire to, and made a dense smoke which hung low\nover the open grave and spread over the old graves.\n\nHippi smoked himself in this smoke. The women came back with arms full\nof small branches of the sacred Dheal tree, these they laid beside the\ngrave, then sat down and broke them into small twigs; the old women had\ntwigs put through the bored hole in their noses.\n\nThe men came back with some pine saplings; two of these they laid at\nthe bottom of the grave, which was about five feet deep. On these pines\nthey spread strips of bark, then a thick bed of Dheal twigs; then a\nwoman handed a bag containing the belongings of the dead woman--boogurr\nthey were called--to the oldest male relative, who was standing in the\ngrave; he placed it as a pillow at one end. Then Hippi and the\ndaughter's husband took each an end of the coffin and lowered it into\nthe grave; the daughter cried loudly as they did so. Over the coffin\nthey laid a rug, and on the rug they placed Beemunny's yam stick. Hippi\nsignalled to the daughter, who then came with the other women close to\nthe edge of the grave. She sat at one end, looked over into the grave,\nand called out: 'My mother! Oh, my mother! Come back to me, my mother!\nMy mother that I have been with always, why did you leave me?' Then she\nwailed the death-wait, which the other women caught up. As the wail\ndied away, Hippi said:\n\n  'She has gone from us; never as she was will she return.\n  Never more as she once did will she chop honey.\n  Never more with her gunnai dig yams.\n  She has gone from us; never as she was to return.'\n\nAs he finished all the women wailed again, and loudest of all the\ndaughter. Then the old man in the grave said:\n\n  'Mussels there are in the creek and plenty,\n  But she who lies here will dig no more.\n  We shall fish as of old for cod-fish,\n  But she who lies here will beg no more oil,\n  Oil for her hair, she will want no more.'\n  Then again the women wailed.\n\nOld Hippi said, as the other man, in a sort of recitative\n\n  'Never again will she use a fire.\n  Where she goes fires are not.\n  For she goes to the women, the dead women,\n  And women can make no fires.\n  Fruit is there in plenty and grass seed,\n  But no birds nor beasts in the heaven of woman.'\n\nAgain the women wailed, wail after wail. Then they handed the remaining\ntwigs of Dheal to the men, who laid them on the top of the coffin, then\nbark again over the twigs, and pine saplings on them, on top some old\nrugs.\n\nWhile this was being done the old, old gins danced slowly a corroboree\nstep round the edge of the grave, crooning a Goohnai-wurrai or dirge.\n\nThen the men began to throw in the earth, the oldest male relative of\nthe deceased standing in the grave to guard the body until the earth\ncovered the coffin. As thud after thud went the earth in, the daughter\nshrieked and swayed over as if to fall into the grave, but her friend\ndrew her back. She called 'Mother! mother!' took a sharp stone which\nwas beside her and hit it against her head until the blood gushed out.\nThey took the stone from her. There she sat rocking her body to and\nfro, wailing all the time, the other women wailing too, until the grave\nwas quite covered in.\n\nWhen it was filled in Hippi made another big smoke, thoroughly smoked\nhimself, calling to all the men to do the same.\n\nAn old woman made a big smoke behind where the women were sitting; she\ncalled them one by one and made them stand in the thick of it for a\nwhile.\n\nHippi said something to her. I caught the word 'Innerah'--they called\nme Innerah, which meant literally a woman with a camp of her own. The\nold woman gave the smoke fire a stir, and out at once came a thick\ncolumn of smoke circling round my guest and myself.\n\nThey covered the grave with logs and boughs and then swept round it.\n\nAll was over, we turned homewards. As we did so a flock of screeching\ngilahs flew over, their bright rose colouring lighting up the sombre\nscene where the only colour was that of the dark pines silhouetted\nagainst a sky from which the blue had now faded. Going home Bootha told\nme that the smoking process was to keep the spirits away, and to\ndisinfect us from any disease the dead might have; and she said had we\nnot been smoked the spirits might have followed us back to the house.\n\nThey would at once change their camp; the old one would be gummarl--a\ntabooed place; but before they left it they would burn smoke fires\nthere to scare away the spirits.\n\nI asked her why they swept round the grave. She said, in case the dead\nperson had been poisoned or killed by magic; and, indeed, so little do\nthey allow the possibility of death from natural causes, they even said\nold Beemunny had been given poison in her honey by an old-time rejected\nlover. Well, by sweeping round the grave they would see what track was\non the swept place next morning, and according to that they would know\nto what totem the murderer belonged. If the track should be an\niguana's, then one of the Beewee, or iguana totem, was guilty; if an\nemu, then one of the Dinewan, or emu totem, and so on.\n\nOld Hippi joined me a little further on. He explained that the service\nwas not as it would have been some years ago. That I knew, because when\nI first went to the station I had seen them going to funerals all\ndecorated as if for corroborees. Round their waists, wrists, knees and\nankles had been twigs of Dheal, the sacred tree, and the rest of their\nbodies had been painted.\n\nHippi said a great deal more would have been spoken and sung at the\ngrave if the dead person had been a man. His spirit would have in a\nshort sort of prayer been commended to Byamee, who would have been\nintreated to let the dead enter Bullimah (heaven), as he had kept the\nBoorah laws--that is, of course, if he had been initiated: the spirits\nof the uninitiated wander until they are reincarnated, and never enter\nBullimah. One curious coincidence occurred in connection with this\nburial.\n\nSeeing the droughty desolation of the country, as we walked to the\ngrave, I asked old Bootha when she thought it would rain again. Coming\nvery close to me she half whispered:\n\n'In three days I think it; old woman dead tell me when she dying that\n\"'sposin\" she can send 'em rain, she send 'im three days when her Yowee\nbulleerul--spirit breath--go long Oobi Oobi.'\n\nBeemunny died on Wednesday night. On Saturday when we went to bed the\nskies were as cloudless as they had been for weeks. In the middle of\nthe night we were awakened by the patter of rain-drops on the iron\nroof. All night it rained, and all the next day.\n\nIt is said that a dead person always sends rain within a week of his\ndeath to wash out his tracks on earth.\n\nOne little black girl told me she always felt sad when she saw\nthunderclouds, because she thought some dead person had sent them.\n\nAs a rule, there is a good deal more shedding of blood over a grave\nthan I saw. This blood offering is said to please the dead, being a\nproof to them of the affection of the living. It is funeral etiquette\nto prepare yourself with a weapon with which to shed this blood, but\nlikewise etiquette for a friend to intervene and stop your\nself-mutilation.\n\nOn emerging from the grave the spirit finds the spirits of his dead\nrelations waiting to go with him to Oobi Oobi, that is, a sacred\nmountain whose top towers into the sky, nearly touching Bullimah. The\nnew spirit recognises his relations at once; they had, many of them,\nbeen round the death-bed visible at the last to the dying, though not\nto any of the watchers with him, though these are said sometimes to\nhear the spirit voices.\n\nThe spirit from the grave carried with him the twigs of the sacred\nDheal tree which were placed over and under his body; he follows his\nspirit relations, dropping these twigs as he goes along, leaving thus a\ntrail that those who follow may see. At the top of Oobi Oobi he finds\nthe spirits called Mooroobeaigunnil, whose business it is to bridge\nover the distance a spirit has to traverse between the top of the\nmountain and Bullimah, the great Byamee's sky-camp.\n\nOne of these Mooroobeaigunnil seizes him and hoists him on to his\nshoulders; then comes another and hoists the first; and so on, until\nthe one holding the spirit can lift him into Bullimah. As the spirit is\nhoisted in, one of the Mooroobeaigunnil, knocks the lowest one in the\nladder of spirits down; thud to the earth come the rest, making a sound\nlike a thunderclap, which the far away tribes hear, and hearing say:\n\n'A spirit has entered Bullimah.'\n\nShould a big meteor fall followed by a thunderclap, it is a sign that a\ngreat man has died. Should a number of stars shoot off from a falling\nstar, it is a sign that a man has died leaving a large family. When a\nstar is seen falling in the day-time, it is a sign that one of the\nNoongahburrah tribe dies.\n\nIn the olden time some of the tribes would keep a body at least five\ndays. Then they would rub the outside black skin off, make an opening\nin the side of the body, take out the internal parts, fill it up with\nDheal leaves. They would place the rubbed-off skin and internals in\nbark and put it in hollow trees. They would then bury the body, which\nthey said would come up white.\n\nSometimes they would keep their dead for weeks, that they might easily\nextract the small joint bones with which to make poison.\n\nA baby's body they would sometimes carry for years before burying, but\nit would usually have been well smoke-dried first, though not, I\nbelieve, invariably so.\n\nSometimes a body was kept so that relations from a distance might come\nand see for themselves the death was not the result of foul play.\n\nAfter the body was filled up with Dheal leaves it was put into its bark\ncoffin and smoke fires made round it.\n\nAs each relation arrived he was blindfolded and led up to the corpse,\nwhich was held up standing by some of the men. When the blindfolded\nrelation came near, the bandage was taken off him and before him he saw\nstanding his relation, whom he examined to see if wounds were visible.\nIf signs of violence were apparent, the murderer had to be discovered\nand stand his trial. He was given a shield to defend himself with.\nEvery man had a right to throw a weapon at him; should he manage to\ndefend himself successfully, as far as that crime was concerned he\nwould be henceforth a free man, no stigma attaching to him whatever. In\nwhich, I fancy, the blacks show themselves a larger-minded people than\ntheir white supplanters, who make this world no place for repentance\nfor wrong-doers, 'though they seek it with tears.' In the world's\nopinion there is no limit to a man's sentence. We read the letter of\nthe Gospel, and leave the spirit of it to the blacks to apply.\n\nShould there be a difficulty as to discovering the criminal, all the\nmen of the tribes amongst whom the murderer could be stand round the\ncoffin. A head man says to the corpse, 'Did such and such a man harm\nyou?' naming, one after another, all the men. At the guilty one's name\nthe corpse is said to knock a sort of rap, rap, rap.\n\nThat man has to stand his trial.\n\nBut as a rule the blacks like to bury their dead quickly, because the\nspirit haunts their neighbourhood or its late camp until the body is\nburied. Mysterious lights are said to be seen at night, and there is a\ngeneral scare in camp-land until a corpse is safely buried.\n\nThere are variations in the funeral rites of nearly every tribe. Even\nin our district the dead were sometimes placed in hollow trees. I know\nof skeletons in trees on the edge of the ridge on which the home\nstation was built. These are said to be for the most part the bodies of\nworthless women or babies.\n\nIn the coastal districts there are platforms in trees on which dead\nbodies were laid. In some places corpses are tied up in a sitting\nposture. The tying, they say, is to keep them secure when spirits come\nabout, or body-snatchers for poison bones.\n\nIn some places the graves are covered with a sort of emu egg-shaped and\nsized lumps of copi; and also, when a widow's term of mourning was\nover, she would take the widow's cap--which was a sort of copi or gypsum\ncovering put on wet to her head--and place it on the grave of her\nhusband.\n\nOn the Narran the widows plaster their heads with copi or bidyi, as\nthey call it, but so thinly that it cakes off. They renew it, and keep\ntheir heads covered with it for the allotted term of mourning, then\njust let it gradually all wear off.\n\nThose widows' caps, having the imprint of nets inside them, are very\nold; for hair nets have been out of fashion for very many years in\ncamp-land, so such rank as antique curios.\n\nI don't think the small girl who thought when she grew up she'd choose\nto be a widow, would have thought so if she had been born black.\n\nWhen a black woman's husband dies she has to cover herself with mud,\nand sleep beside a smouldering smoke all night. Three days afterwards,\nblack fellows go and make a fire by the creek. They chase the widow and\nher sisters, who might have been her husband's wives, down to the\ncreek. The widow catches hold of the smoking bush, puts it under her\narm, and jumps into the middle of the creek; as the smoking bush is\ngoing out she drinks some of the smoky water. Then out she comes, is\nsmoked at the fire; she then calls to those in the camp, and looks\ntowards her husband's grave and calls again; his spirit answers, and\nthe blacks call to her that they have heard him.\n\nAfter that she is allowed to speak; she had been doomed to silence\nsince his death, but for lamentations. She goes to the new camp, where\nanother big smoke is made. She puts on her widow's cap, which, as it\nwears out, has to be renewed for many months; for some months, too, she\nkeeps her face daubed with white.\n\nEvery time a stranger comes to the camp the widow has to make a smoke\nand smoke the camp again. The nearest of kin to her husband has a right\nto claim her as wife when her mourning is over.\n\nShould a woman be left a widow two or three times there are sinister\nwhisperings about her. She is spoken of as having a 'white heart'; and\nno man can live long, they say, with a woman having a 'white heart.'\n\nThe graves in some parts of Australia are marked by carved trees; only\na few painted upright posts marked them on the Narran.\n\nA tabooed camp has always a marked tree--just a piece of bark cut off\nand some red markings made on the wood, which indicate that the place\nis gummarl.\n\nAny possessions of the dead not buried with them are burnt, except the\nsacred stones; they are left to the wirreenun nearest of kin to the\ndead person.\n\nLately a case came under my notice of the taboo extended to the\npossessions of dead people.\n\nA black man having two horses died. Neither his widow nor her mother\nwould use those horses, even when he had been dead over a year. They\nwould walk ten or twelve miles for their rations and carry them back,\nrather than use those horses before the term of mourning was over.\n\nThe widow was one of my particular friends, but she would not come to\nsee me because her husband had been at the house shortly before he\ndied. She camped nearly a mile away, and I went to see her there. After\nhe had been dead about a year, she came to see me; but before she did\nso her mother walked all round the out-buildings, garden, yards, etc.,\nwith a bunch of smoking Budtha, crooning little spirit songs.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XI\n\nSOMETHING ABOUT STARS AND LEGENDS\n\n\nVenus in the Summer evenings is a striking object in the western sky.\nOur Venus they call the Laughing Star, who is a man. He once said\nsomething very improper, and has been laughing at his joke ever since.\nAs he scintillates you seem to see him grinning still at his\nRabelais-like witticism, seeing which the {aborigines} say:\n\n'He's a rude old man, that Laughing Star.'\n\nThe Milky Way is a warrambool, or water overflow; the stars are the\nfires, and the dusky haze the smoke from them, which spirits of the\ndead have lit on their journey across the sky. In their fires they are\ncooking the mussels they gather where they camp.\n\nThere is one old man up there who was once a great rainmaker, and when\nyou see that he has turned round as the position of the Milky Way is\naltered, you may expect rain; he never moves except to make it.\n\nA waving dark shadow that you will see along the same course is\nKurreah, the crocodile.\n\nTo get to the Warrambool, the Wurrawilberoo, two dark spots in Scorpio,\nhave to be passed. They are devils who try to catch the spirits of the\ndead; sometimes even coming to earth, when they animate whirlwinds and\nstrike terror into the blacks. The old men try to keep them from racing\nthrough the camp by throwing their spears and boomerangs at them.\n\nThe Pleiades are seven sisters, as usual, the dimmed ones having been\ndulled because on earth Wurrunnah seized them and tried to melt the\ncrystal off them at a fire; for, beautiful as they were with their long\nhair, they were ice-maidens. But he was unsuccessful beyond dulling\ntheir brightness, for the ice as it melted put out the fire. The two\nice-maidens were miserable on earth with him, and eventually escaped by\nthe aid of one of their 'multiplex totems,' the pine-tree. Wurrunnah\nhad told them to get him pine bark. Now the Meamei--Pleiades--belong to\nthe Beewee totem, so does the pine-tree. They chopped the pine bark,\nand as they did so the tree telescoped itself to the sky where the\nfive other Meamei were, whom they now joined, and with whom they have\nremained ever since. But they who were polluted by their enforced\nresidence with the earth-man never shone again with the brightness of\ntheir sisters. This legend was told emphasising the beauty of chastity.\n\nMen had desired all the sisters when once they travelled on earth, but\nthey kept themselves unspotted from the world, with the exception of\nthe two Wurrunnah captured by stratagem.\n\nOrion's Sword and Belt are the Berai-Berai--the boys--who best of all\nloved the Meamei, for whom they used to hunt, bringing their offerings\nto them; but the ice-maidens were obdurate and cold, disdaining lovers,\nas might be expected from their parentage. Their father was a rocky\nmountain, their mother an icy mountain stream. But when they were\ntranslated to the sky the Berai-Berai were inconsolable. They would not\nhunt, they would not eat, they pined away and died. The spirits pitied\nthem and placed them in the sky within sound of the singing of the\nMeamei, and there they are happy. By day they hunt, and at night light\ntheir corroboree fires, and dance to the singing in the distance. Just\nto remind the earth-people of them, the Meamei drop down some ice in\nthe winter, and they it is who make the winter thunderstorms.\n\nCastor and Pollux, in some tribes, are two hunters of long ago.\n\nCanopus is Womba, the Mad Star, the wonderful Weedah of long ago, who,\non losing his loves, went mad, and was sent to the sky that they might\nnot reach him; but they followed, and are travelling after him to this\nday, and after them the wizard Beereeun, their evil genius, who made\nthe mirage on the plains in order to deceive them, that they and Weedah\nmight be lured on by it and perish of thirst.\n\nWhen they escaped him Beereeun threw a barbed spear into the sky, and\nhooked one spear on to another until he made a ladder up which he\nclimbed after them; and across the sky he is still pursuing them.\n\nThe Clouds of Magellan are the Bralgah, or Native Companions, mother\nand daughter, whom the Wurrawilberoo chased in order to kill and eat\nthe mother and keep the daughter, who was the great dancer of the\ntribes. They almost caught her, but her tribe pursued them too quickly;\nwhen, determined that if they lost her so should her people, they\nchanted an incantation and changed her from Bralgah, the dancing-girl,\nto Bralgah, the dancing-bird, then left her to wander about the plains.\nThey translated themselves on beefwood trees into the sky, and there\nthey are still.\n\nGowargay, the featherless emu, is a debbil-debbil of water-holes; he\ndrags people who bathe in his holes down and drowns them, but goes\nevery night to his sky-camp, the Coalpit, a dark place by the Southern\nCross, and there he crouches. Our Corvus, the crow, is the kangaroo.\n\nThe Southern Crown is Mullyan, the eagle-hawk. The Southern Cross was\nthe first Minggah, or spirit tree a huge Yaraan, which was the medium\nfor the translation of the first man who died on earth to the sky. The\nwhite cockatoos which used to roost in this tree when they saw it\nmoving skywards followed it, and are following it still as Mouyi, the\npointers. The other Yaraan trees wailed for the sadness that death\nbrought into the world, weeping tears of blood. The red gum which\ncrystallises down their trunks is the tears.\n\nSome tribes say it was by a woman's fault that death came into the\nworld.\n\nThis legend avers that at first the tribes were meant to live for ever.\nThe women were told never to go near a certain hollow tree. The bees\nmade a nest in this tree; the women coveted the honey, but the men\nforbade them to go near it. But at last one woman determined to get\nthat honey; chop went her tomahawk into that hollow trunk, and out flew\na huge bat. This was the spirit of death which was now let free to roam\nthe world, claiming all it could touch with its wings.\n\nOf eclipses there are various accounts. Some say it is Yhi, the sun,\nthe wanton woman, who has overtaken at last her enemy the moon, who\nscorned her love, and whom now she tries to kill, but the spirits\nintervene, dreading a return to a dark world. Some say the enemies have\nmanaged to get evil spirits into each other which are destroying them.\nThe wirreenuns chant incantations to oust these spirits of evil, and\nwhen the eclipse is over claim a triumph of their magic.\n\nAnother account says that Yhi, the sun, after many lovers, tried to\nensnare Bahloo, the moon; but he would have none of her, and so she\nchases him across the sky, telling the spirits who stand round the sky\nholding it up, that if they let him escape past them to earth, she will\nthrow down the spirit who sits in the sky holding the ends of the\nKurrajong ropes which they guard at the other end, and if that spirit\nfalls the earth will be hurled down into everlasting darkness.\n\nSo poor Bahloo, when he wants to get to earth and go on with the\ncreation of baby girls, has to sneak down as an emu past the spirits,\nhurrying off as soon as the sun sinks down too.\n\nBahloo is a very important personage in legends.\n\nWhen the blacks see a halo round the moon they say,\n\n'Hullo! Going to be rain. Bahloo building a house to keep himself dry.'\n\nAll sorts of scraps of folk-lore used to crop out from the little girls\nI took from the camp into the house to domesticate. When storms were\nthreatening, some of the clouds have a netted sort of look, something\nlike a mackerel sky, only with a dusky green tinge, they would say:\n'See the old man with the net on his back; he's going to drop some\nhailstones.'\n\nMeteors always mean death; should a trail follow them, the dead person\nhas left a large family.\n\nComets are a spirit of evil supposed to drink up the rain-clouds, so\ncausing a drought; their tails being huge families all thirsty, so\nthirsty that they draw the river up into the clouds.\n\nEvery natural feature in any way pronounced has a mythical reason for\nits existence, every peculiarity in bird life, every peculiarity in the\ntrees and stones. Besides there are many mythical bogies still at\nlarge, according to native lore, making the bush a gnome-land.\n\nEven the winds carry a legend in their breath.\n\nYou hear people say they could have 'burst with rage,' but it is left\nto a black's legend to tell of a whole tribe bursting with rage, and so\noriginating the winds.\n\nThere was once an invisible tribe called Mayrah. These people, men and\nwomen, though they talked and hunted with them, could never be seen by\nthe other tribes, to whom were only visible their accoutrements for\nhunting. They would hear a woman's voice speak to them, see perhaps a\ngoolay in mid-air and hear from it an invisible baby's cry; they would\nknow then a Mayrah woman was there. Or a man would speak to them.\nLooking up they would see a belt with weapons in it, a forehead band\ntoo, perhaps, but no waist nor forehead, a water-vessel invisibly held:\na man was there, an invisible Mayrah. One of these Mayrah men chummed\nwith one of the Doolungaiyah tribe; he was a splendid mate, a great\nhunter, and all that was desirable, but for his invisibility. The\nDoolungaiyah longed to see him, and began to worry him on the subject\nuntil at last the Mayrah became enraged, went to his tribe, and told\nthem of the curiosity of the other tribes as to their bodily forms. The\nothers became as furious as he was; they all burst with rage and rushed\naway roaring in six different directions, and ever since have only\nreturned as formless wind to be heard but never seen. So savagely the\nMayrah howled round the Doolungaiyah's camp that he burrowed into the\nsand to escape, and his tribe have burrowed ever since.\n\nThree of the winds are masculine and three feminine. The Crow,\naccording to legend, controls Gheeger Gheeger, and keeps her in a\nhollow log. The Eagle-hawk owns Gooroongoodilbaydilbay, and flies with\nher in the shape of high clouds. Yarragerh is a man, and he has for\nwives the Budtha, Bibbil, and Bumble trees, and when he breathes on\nthem they burst into new shoots, buds, flowers, and fruits, telling the\nworld that their lover Yarragerh, the spring, has come.\n\nDouran Doura woos the Coolabah, and Kurrajong, who flower after the hot\nnorth wind has kissed them.\n\nThe women winds have no power to make trees fruitful. They can but moan\nthrough them, or tear them in rage for the lovers they have stolen,\nwhom they can only meet twice a year at the great corroboree of the\nwinds, when they all come together, heard but never seen; for Mayrah,\nthe winds, are invisible, as were the Mayrah, the tribe who in bursting\ngave them birth.\n\nYarragerh and Douran Doura are the most honoured winds as being the\nsurest rain-bringers. In some of the blacks' songs Mayrah is sung of as\nthe mother of Yarragerh, the spring, or as a woman kissed into life by\nYarragerh putting such warmth into her that she blows the winter away.\nBut these are poetical licences, for Yarragerh is ordinarily a man who\nwoos the trees as a spring wind until the flowers are born and the\nfruit formed, then back he goes to the heaven whence he came.\n\nThen there are the historical landmarks: Byamee's tracks in stone, and\nso on, and the battle-fields, too, of old tribal fights. Just in front\nof our station store was a gnarled old Coolabah tree covered with warty\nexcrescences, which are supposed to be seats for spirits, so showing a\nspirit haunt.\n\nIn this particular tree are the spirits of the Moungun, or armless\nwomen, and when the wind blows you could hear them wailing. Their cruel\nhusband chopped their arms off because they could not get him the honey\nhe wanted, and their spirits have wailed ever since.\n\nAcross the creek is another very old tree, having one hollow part in\nwhich is said to be secreted a shell which old Wurrunnah, the traveller\nof the tribes, and the first to see the sea, brought back. No one would\ndare to touch the shell. The tribe of a neighbouring creek, when we\nwere first at the station, used to threaten to come and get it, but the\nmen of the local tribe used to muster to protect it from desecration\neven at the expense of their lives.\n\nThe Minggah by the garden I have told you of before. Further down the\ncreek are others.\n\nAt Weetalibah was the tree from which Byamee cut the first Gayandi.\nThis tree was burnt by travellers a few years ago. The blacks were\nfurious: the sacred tree of Byamee burnt by the white devils! There are\ntrees, too, considered sacred, from which Byamee cut honey and marked\nthem for his own, just as a man even now, on finding a bee's nest and\nnot being able to stay and get it, marks a tree, which for any one else\nto touch is theft.\n\nA little way from the head station was an outcrop of white stones.\nThese are said to be fossilised bones of Boogoodoogahdah's victims. She\nwas a cannibal woman who had hundreds of dogs; with them she used to\nround up blacks and kill them, and she and her dogs ate them. At last\nshe was outwitted and killed herself, and her spirit flew out as a bird\nfrom her heart. This bird haunts burial grounds, and if in a drought\nany one can run it down and make it cry out, rain will fall.\n\nDuring a drought one of these birds came into my garden, hearing which\nthe blacks said rain would come soon, and it did. In another drought\nwhen the rainmakers had failed, some of the old blacks saw a rain-bird\nand hunted it, but could not get it to call out.\n\nGeologists say there should be diamonds along some of the old\nwater-courses of the Moorilla ridges. Perhaps the white stone that the\nblacks talk about, which shows a light at night, and has, they say, a\ndevil in it, is a diamond. Ruskin rather thought there was a devil in\ndiamonds, making women do all sorts of evil to possess them. The blacks\ntold me that a Queensland tribe had a marvellous stone which at great\ngatherings they show. Taking those who are privileged to see it into\nthe dark, there they suddenly produce it, and it glows like a star,\nthough when looked closely at in daylight seems only like a large drop\nof rain solidified. This stone, they said, has to be well guarded, as\nit has the power of self-movement, or rather, the devil in it can move\nit.\n\nThe greatest of local landmarks is at Brewarrina; this is the work of\nByamee and his giant sons, the stone fisheries made in the bed of the\nBarwon.\n\nAt Boogira, on the Narran Lake, is an imprint in stone of Byamee's hand\nand foot, which shows that in those days were giants. There it was that\nByamee brought to bay the crocodiles who had swallowed his wives, from\nwhich he recovered them and restored them to life.\n\nAt Mildool is a scooped-out rock which Byamee made to catch and hold\nwater; beside it he hollowed out a smaller stone, that his dog might\nhave a drinking-place too. This recurrence of the mention of dogs in\nthe legends touching Byamee looks as if blacks at all events believed\ndogs to have been in Australia as long as men.\n\nAt Dooyanweenia are two rocks where Byamee and Birrahgnooloo rested,\nand to these rocks are still sticking the hairs he pulled from his\nbeard, after rubbing his face with gum to make them come out easily.\n\nAt Guddee, a spring in the Brewarrina district, every now and then come\nup huge bones of animals now extinct. Legends say that these bones are\nthe remains of the victims of Mullyan, the eagle-hawk, whose camp was\nin the tree at the foot of which was the spring. This tree was a tree\nof trees; first, a widely spreading gum, then another kind, next a\npine, and lastly a midgee, in which was Mullyan's camp, out of which\nthe relations of his victims burnt him and his wives, and they now form\nthe Northern Crown constellation. The roots of this gigantic tree\ntravelled for miles, forming underground water-courses. At Eurahbah and\nelsewhere are hollowed-out caves like stones; in these places\nBirrahgnooloo slept, and near them, before the stock trampled them out,\nwere always to be found springs made at her instigation for her\nrefreshment; she is the patroness of water.\n\nAt Toulby and elsewhere are mud springs. It is said that long ago there\nwere no springs there, nor in the Warrego district, and in the droughts\nthe water-courses all dried up and the blacks perished in hundreds.\nTime, after time this happened, until at last it seemed as if the\ntribes would be exterminated. The Yanta--spirits--saw what was\nhappening and felt grieved, so they determined to come and live on the\nearth again to try and bring relief to the drought-stricken people.\nDown they came and set to work to excavate springs. They scooped out\nearth and dug, deeper and deeper, until at length after many of them\ngave in from exhaustion, those that were left were rewarded by seeing\nsprings bubble up.\n\nThe first of those that they made was at Yantabulla, which bears their\nname to this day.\n\nThe blacks were delighted at having watering-places which neither a\ndrought nor the fiercest sun could dry up. The Yantas were not\ncontented with this nor with the other springs they made. They\ndetermined to excavate a whole plain, and turn it into a lake so deep\nthat the sun could never dry it, and which would be full of fish for\nthe tribes.\n\nThey went to Kinggle and there began their work. On they toiled\nunceasingly, but work as they would they could not complete their\nscheme, for one after another wearied and died, until at last nothing\nwas left on the plain but the mud springs under the surface and the\ngraves of the Yantas on top. No blacks will cross Kinggle plains lest\nsome of these spirits arise through the openings of their graves.\n\nThis legend shows what a disheartening country the West is in a\ndrought. When even the spirits gave in, how can ordinary men succeed?\nBut indeed it is not ordinary men who do, but our 'Western heroes,' as\nWill Ogilvie calls them, who wear their cross of bronze on neck and\ncheek in the country where 'the green fades into grey.'\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XII\n\nTHE TRAPPING OF GAME\n\n\nSome of the blacks' methods of catching game I have seen practised,\nsome have long since died out of use.\n\nOf course the sportsmen knew the favourite watering-holes of the game.\nAt such a place they made a rough break at each side, leaving an\nopening where the track was. Along this track they would lay a net with\none end on the edge of the water; in the water they put sticks on the\nends of which the birds rest to drink, the other ends are out in the\ntrap. They would make a hole low down on each side of the net, and a\nman would hide in each.\n\nA bird's watering-place, where the blacks trap them, is called\nDheelgoolee. When the Dheelgoolee trapping begins, on the first day\nthose who go out hunting must bring home their game alive to give the\nman at the Dheelgoolee luck. Then they never try to catch an emu or\nkangaroo, only iguana, opossum, piggiebillah, paddy melon, or\nbandicoot, all of which could be brought home alive. But after the\nfirst day they can kill as they go along.\n\nAll day some birds come to the Dheelgoolee-pigeons, gilahs, young\ncrows, and others, and the man watching catches them. When the game was\nthick on the net, the men in the holes would catch hold of the ends of\nthe sticks in the net and quickly turn them over the lower ends, thus\nentrapping all on the net. In the evening turkeys and such things as\nwater at night-time, amongst which are opossums and paddy melons, would\nbe trapped.\n\nDucks were trapped, too, by making bough breaks across the shallow part\nof the creek, with a net across the deep part from break to break. A\ncouple of the men would go up stream to hunt the ducks down, and some\nwould stay each side of the net armed with pieces of bark. The two\nhunters up stream frightened the ducks off the water, and sent them\nflying down stream to the trap. Should they seem flying too high as if\nto pass, the blacks would throw the pieces of bark high in the air,\nimitating, as they did so, the cry of hawks. Down the ducks would fly\nturning back; some of the men would whistle like ducks, others would\nthrow bark again, giving the hawk's cry, which would frighten the\nbirds, making them double back into the net, where they were quickly\ndespatched by those waiting.\n\nMurrahgul is another trap. This is a yard made all round a waterhole\nwith one opening; about this opening they will fasten, from stumps or\nlogs, strong strings with a slipping knot. The game, emu or kangaroo,\nwould probably step into one of these string nooses, would try to pull\nits leg out; the harder it pulled the tighter the knot. Or the blacks\nmight have put a sort of cross-bar overhead at the entrance, with\nhanging strings having a slip knot; in would go an emu's head, the bird\nwould rush on and be strangled.\n\nBoobeen is a primitive cornet, a hollowed piece of Bibbil wood, one end\npartially filled up with pine gum, and ornamented outside with\ncarvings. To blow through it is an art, and the result rather like a\nbig horn. The noise is said to be very like an emu's cry, and this emu\nbugle will certainly, they say, draw towards it a gundooee, or solitary\nemu.\n\nThe blacks used on the sandhills to make a deep hole to hide themselves\nin, usually only one though. From this hole they would run out a drain\nfor about thirty yards. The man with the Boobeen would have a little\nbreak of bushes round him; scattered over the leaves he'd have emu\nfeathers, and then he would have a strong string, on the end of which\nhe would have a small branch with this he would place about midway emu\nfeathers on it; down the drain.\n\nWhen the emu answers the Boobeen's call, the bugler gets lower and\nslower with his call. The emu sees the feathered thing in the drain,\ncomes inquisitively up and sniffs at it. The man in the hole pulls in\nthe string slowly; the emu follows, on, on, until heedlessly he steps\non a Murrahgul, or string trap, and is caught. The hunters would\nsometimes stalk kangaroo, holding in front of them boughs of trees or\nbushy young saplings, closing silently in and in, until at last the\nkangaroo were so closely surrounded by men armed with boondees and\nspears that there was no escape for them.\n\nFor catching emu they had a net made of string as thick as a\nclothes-line. These nets were made either of Kurrajong (Noongah) bark,\nor of Burraungah grass. The Kurrajong bark is stripped off the trees,\nbeaten, chewed, and then teased. Then it was taken and rubbed,\nprincipally by the women on their legs, into strands.\n\nThe grass was used preferably to Kurrajong bark, as it was easier to\nwork. The process of preparation was as follows:--\n\nA hole was dug in the ground, some fire put in it, a. quantity of\nordinary grass was put on the top of the coals, and on top of that a\nheap of Burraungah grass, that topped with ordinary grass.\n\nWater was sprinkled over it all and the hole earthed up.\n\nWhen it had been in long enough the earth was cleared away, and the\ngrass, which was quite soft, taken out. It was then chewed and worked\nlike the Kurrajong bark, than which it was much more pliable.\n\nString was made of various thicknesses according to what it was\nrequired for.\n\nFishing nets were always smoked before being used, and all nets had\nlittle charm songs sung over them. In netting, their only implement was\na piece of wood to wind their string on. An emu net was about five feet\nhigh, and between two and three hundred yards long.\n\nWhen any one discovered a setting emu, they used not to disturb her at\nonce and get her eggs, but returned to the camp, singing as they neared\nit a song known as the Noorunglely, or setting emu song; those in camp\nwould recognise it, and sing back the reply. The black fellows having\nlearnt where the nest was, would get their net and go out to camp near\nit. All that evening they would have an emu-hunting corroboree. The\nnext morning at daylight they would erect their net into a sort of\ntriangular-shaped yard, one side open. Black fellows would be stationed\nat each end of the net, and at stated intervals along the mirroon, as\nthe net was called. When the others were all ready some of the blacks\nwould make a wide circle round the emu, leaving open the side towards\nthe net; they would close in gradually until they frightened the emu\noff her nest; she would run in the direction where she saw no black\nfellows and where the net was; the black fellows closing in behind,\nfollowed quickly. Poor Noorunglely floundered into the net, up rushed a\nblack fellow and, seizing her, wrung her neck. Having secured her, they\nwould next secure her eggs; that they might be a trifle stale was a\nmatter of indifference to them.\n\nAnother old method was by making sort of brush yards and catching the\nemus in these.\n\nOne modern way is to run them down with kangaroo dogs, the same way\nwith kangaroo; but at one time still another method obtained. A black\nfellow would get a long spear and fasten on the end a bunch of emu\nfeathers. When he sighted an emu he would climb a tree, break some\nboughs to place beneath him, if the trees were thinly foliaged, to hide\nhim from the emu, then he would let his spear dangle down. The emu, a\nmost inquisitive bird, seeing the emu feathers, would investigate.\nDirectly the bird was underneath the tree, the black fellow would grip\nhis spear tightly and throw it at the emu, rarely, if ever, failing to\nhit it, though the emu might run wounded for a short distance, but the\nblack fellow would be quickly after it to give it happy despatch.\n\nIf the emu got a good start even, it was easily tracked by the trail of\nblood. It has happened that a black fellow has not found his emu until\nthe next day, when it was dead and the spear still in it; but usually\nvery soon after the wounded birds start running the spear is shaken\nout.\n\nSometimes the blacks killed birds with their boomerangs, ducks in\nparticular. I fancy this killing of ducks by a well-thrown boomerang is\none of the feats that black fellows allow themselves to blow about.\nEvery man has usually one subject, a speciality he considers of his\nown, and on that subject he waxes eloquent.\n\nPigeons, gilahs, and plains turkeys are also killed with boomerangs.\nBlacks' fishing-nets are about ten feet by five, a stick run through\neach end, for choice of Eurah wood. Eurah is a pretty drooping shrub\nwith bell-shaped spotted flowers, having a horrible smell. The wood is\nvery pliable. It is sometimes used instead of the sacred Dheal at\nfunerals.\n\nTwo of the fishermen take the net into the creek, one at each end; they\nstand in a rather shallow place, holding the net upright in the water.\nSome other blacks go up stream and splash about, frightening the fish\ndown towards the net. When those holding the net feel the fish in it,\nthey fold the two sticks together and bring the net out.\n\nTo catch fish they also make small weirs and dams of stones, with\nnarrow passages of stones leading to them. The fish are swept by the\ncurrent into these yards, and there either caught by the blacks with\ntheir hands, or speared. The most celebrated of these stone fish-traps\nis at Brewarrina on the Barwon. It is said to have been made by Byamee,\nthe god and culture-hero of these people, and his giant sons. He it was\nwho established the rule that there should be a camping-ground in\ncommon for the various tribes where, during the fishing festival, peace\nshould be strictly kept, all meeting to enjoy the fish, to do their\nshare towards preserving the fisheries.\n\nEach tribe has its particular yards; for another to take fish from\nthese is theft. Each tribe keeps its yards in repair, replacing stones\nremoved by floods, and so on.\n\nThese stony fish mazes are fully two hundred yards in length,\nsubstantially built; some huge boulders are amongst the stones which\nform these most intricate labyrinthine fish yards, which as traps are\neminently successful, many thousands of Murray cod and other fish being\ncaught in them.\n\nDingo pups, in the days when dingoes were plentiful, were a most\nesteemed delicacy. To eat dog is dangerous for a woman, as causing\nincreased birth-pangs; that suggests dog must be rather good eating,\nsome epicure wirreenun scaring women off it by making that assertion.\n\nAnt larv', a special gift from some spirit in the stars, and frogs, are\nalso thought good by camp epicures.\n\nThe blacks smear themselves over with the fat of fish or of almost any\ngame they catch. It is supposed to keep their limbs supple, and give\nthe admired ebony gloss to their skins which, by the way, are very fine\ngrained. After a flood, when the water is running out of the\ntributaries of the creek, the blacks make a bough break beginning on\neach bank and almost meeting in the middle; across the gap they place a\nfishing-net which folds in like a bag, thus forming a fish-trap in\nwhich are caught any number of fish. Crayfish and mussels they caught\nby digging down their holes in the mud for them. Their mode of catching\nshrimps was very (with all apologies to scientists for using the word)\nprimitive. Quite nude, the women sit down in the water, let the shrimps\nbite them; as they nip, seize them.\n\nIguanas burrow into the soft sand ridges and there remain during the\nwinter, only coming out after the Curreequinquins--butcher birds--one\nof their sub-totems, sing their loudest to warn them that the winter is\ngone, calling Dooloomai, the thunder, to their aid lest their singing\nis not heard by their relations, who after the storms come out again in\nas good condition as when they disappeared.\n\nBlack men do not approve of women cooks. At least the old men, under\nthe iron rule of ancient custom, will not eat bread made by gins, nor\nwould they eat iguana, fish, piggiebillah, or anything like that if the\ninside were removed by a woman, though after themselves having prepared\nsuch things, they allow the gins to cook them--that is, if they have\nnot young children or are enceinte; under those conditions they are\nunclean.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XIII\n\nFORAGING AND COOKING\n\n\nIt is very strange to me to hear the average white person speak of the\nblacks collectively as having no individuality, for really they are as\ndiverse in characteristics as possible; no two girls I had in the house\nbut were totally different.\n\nThere has been too much generalisation about the blacks. For instance,\nyou hear some people assert all blacks are trackers and good bushmen.\nThat there are some whose tracking power is marvellous is true, but\nthey are not the rule, and a black fellow off his own beat is often\nuseless as a bushman.\n\nSo with their eyesight; what they have been trained to look out for\nthey see in a marvellously quick way, or so it seems to us who have not\nin their lines the same aptitude. Of course, for seeing things at a\ndistance a black has the advantage, unless the white has had the same\nopen-air life. Some white bushmen are as good as any blacks.\n\nNimmaylee, a little black girl who lived in the house, used to tell me\nall sorts of bush wonders, as we went in the early summer mornings for\na swim in the river. She was a great water-baby, with rather a contempt\nfor my aquatic limitations. Then she thought it too idiotic to want to\ndry yourself with a towel,--just like a mad white woman!\n\nWhite people were an immense joke to Nimmaylee. She conformed to their\nrules as one playing a new game. She has a little brother as black as\nherself. She has a substantial pair of legs, but his are so thin and\nhis little body so round that he looks like a little black spider.\n\nNimmaylee is quite an authority on corroborees, knowing ever so many\ndifferent steps, from the serpentile trail of the codfish to the mimic\nfight. The songs she knows too. She used, when she lived in the camp,\nto marshal in a little crowd of camp children, and put them through a\nvaried performance for my benefit.\n\nThese performances were of daily occurrence when the fruit was ripe,\nfor Nimmaylee's capacity for water-melon was practically unlimited.\n\nNimmaylee was a wonderful little fisherwoman; she delighted in a\nfishing expedition with me. Off we used to go with our lines, worms or\nfrogs for bait, or perhaps shrimps or mussels if we were after cod. If\nwe were successful, Nimmaylee would string the fish on a stick in a\nmost professional manner, and carry them with an air of pride to the\ncook. She attributes her fishing successes to a charm having been sung\nover her to that end as a baby.\n\nAccompanied by some reliable old 'gins' and ever so many piccaninnies,\nI used to take long walks through the 'bush.'\n\nHow interesting those blacks made my bush walks for me! Every ridge,\nplain, and bend had its name and probably legend; each bird a past,\nevery excrescence of nature a reason for its being.\n\nThose walks certainly at least modified my conceit. I was always the\ndunce of the party--the smallest child knew more of woodcraft than I\ndid, and had something to tell of everything. Seeing Oogahnahbayah, a\nsmall eagle-hawk, flying over, they would say, 'He eats the emu eggs.'\nHe flies over where the emu is sitting on her eggs and makes a noise\nhoping to frighten the bird off; having done so, he will drop a stone\non the eggs. If the emu is not startled off the nest, the hawk will fly\non, alight at some distance, and walk up like a black fellow, still\nwith the stone in his beak, to the nest; off the emu will go, then the\nhawk bangs the eggs with the stone until he breaks them. He throws the\nstone on one side, has a feed of emu eggs, and goes off, leaving poor\nMoorunglely, the sitting emu, to come back and find her eggs all\ndestroyed. As the narrative ended, the little {aborigines} would look\nquite sad, and say 'Nurragah!' 'Poor thing!' at the thought of the\ndomestic tragedy in bird life.\n\nI had to hear the stingless little native bees humming before I could\nsee them; and as to knowing which tree had honey in it, unless I saw\nthe bees, that was quite beyond me, while a mere toddler would point\ntriumphantly to a 'sugar-bag' tree, recognising it as such by the wax\non its fork, black before rain, yellowish afterwards.\n\nThis honey is good strained, but as the blacks get it, it is all mixed\nup with dirty wax and dead bees.\n\nI deplored the sacrifice of the bees one day, but was told it was all\nright. Whoever had chopped the nest out would take home the waxy stick\nthey had used to help get the honey out; they would throw the stick in\nthe fire, then all the dead bees would go to a paradise in the skies,\nwhence next season they would send Yarragerh Mayrah, the Spring Wind,\nto blow the flowers open, and then down they would come to earth again.\nOne year the manna just streamed down the Coolabah and Bibbil trees; it\nran down like liquid honey, crystallising where it dropped.\n\nThe old blacks said, 'It is a drought now, but it will be worse. Byamee\nhas sent the manna by the little Dulloorah birds and the black ants,\nbecause there will be no flowers for the bees to get honey from, so he\nhas sent this manna.' Each time he has done so, a great drought has\nfollowed, and indeed it was followed by one of the worst droughts\nAustralia has ever known. Byamee, it is said, first sent them the manna\nbecause their children were crying for honey, of which there was none\nexcept in the trees that Byamee, when on earth, had marked for his own.\nThe women had murmured that they were not allowed to get this; but the\nmen were firm, and would neither touch it nor let them touch it, which\nso pleased Byamee that he sent the manna, and said he always would when\na long drought threatened.\n\nA great chorus of 'My Jerhs' would tell something was sighted.\n\nIt might be the track of a piggiebillah porcupine. This track was\nfollowed to a hollow log; then came the difficulty, how to get it out,\nfor porcupines cling tightly with their sharp claws, and all a dog can\ndo where a piggiebillah is concerned is to bark, their spines are too\nmuch to tackle at close quarters. But the old gins are equal to the\noccasion: a tomahawk to chop the log, and a yam-stick to dislodge the\nporcupine, who takes a good deal of killing before he is vanquished.\n\nThey say a fully initiated man can sing a charm which will make a\npiggiebillah relax his grip and be taken captive without any trouble.\nThe piggiebillahs burrow into the sand and leave their young there as\nsoon as the faintest feel of a spine appears. The baby piggiebillahs\nlook like little indiarubber toys.\n\nThe opossums all disappeared from our district. When we were first\nthere they were very numerous and used to make raids at night to my\nrose-bushes--great havoc the result. It is said a very great\nwirreenun--wizard--willed them away so that his enemy, whose yunbeai, or\npersonal totem, the opossum was, should die. This design was frustrated\nby counter magic; two powerful wizards appeared and, acting in concert,\nput a new yunbeai into the dying man; he recovered.\n\nWhen the opossums were about the blacks used to see their scratched\ntracks on the trees, and chop or burn them out. They miss the opossums\nvery much, for not only were they a prized food, but their skins made\nrugs, their hair was woven into cords of which were made amulets worn\non the forearm or head against sickness, and with no modern instrument\ncan they so well carve their weapons, as with an opossum tooth.\nNaturally their desire is to see Moodai, the opossum, return; to that\nend a wirreenun is now singing incantations to charm him back.\n\nOpossum hunters had a way of bringing them home strung round their\nnecks; very disagreeable, I should think, but custom, that tyrant,\nrules it so. The old gins dug out yams vigorously; some were eaten raw,\nothers were kept for cooking.\n\nTo cook them they dug out a hole, made a fire in it, put some stones on\nthe fire, then, when the stones were heated and the fire burnt down,\nthey laid some leaves and grass on the stones, sprinkled some water,\nthen put on the yams, on top of them more grass, sprinkled more water,\nthen more grass and a. thick coating of earth, leaving the yams to\ncook.\n\nSeveral other roots they cooked and ate. Raw they ate thistle tops,\npigweed, and crowfoot, with great relish. Their game they cooked as\nfollows. Kangaroo were first singed, cleaned out, and filled with hot\nstones, then put on the top of a burnt-down fire, hot ashes heaped all\nover them. The blacks like their meats with the gravy in, very\ndistinctly red gravy. Emu were plucked, the insides taken out, and the\nbirds filled up with hot stones, box leaves, and some of their own\nfeathers. A fire was made in a hole; when it was burnt down, leaves and\nemu feathers were put in it, on top of these the bird, on top of it\nleaves and feathers again, then a good layer of hot ashes, and over all\nsome earth.\n\nThe piggiebillahs were first smoked so that their quills might be\neasily knocked off. This done, the insides were taken out, then the\npiggiebillahs were put in little holes made beside the fire, and\ncovered over with hot ashes, as were also opossums, ducks and other\nbirds, iguanas and fish.\n\nDucks were plucked by our tribe, but in some places they were encased\nthickly in mud, buried in the ashes to cook, and, when done, the\nplaster of mud would be knocked off, and with it would come all the\nfeathers.\n\nThe insides of iguanas and fish are taken out all in one piece. Each\nfish carries in its inside a representation of its Minggah--spirit\ntree; by drying the inside and pressing it you can plainly see the\nimprint of the tree.\n\nWhen we go bathing, the blacks tell me that the holes in the creek\nfilled with gum leaves are codfish nests. They say too, that when they\nbeat the river to drive the fish out towards the net waiting for them,\nthat they hear the startled cod sing out.\n\nMussels and crayfish are cooked in the ashes.\n\nThe seagulls, which occasionally we used to see inland, are said to\nhave brought the first mussels to the back creeks.\n\nEmu eggs the blacks roll in hot ashes, shake, roll again; shake once\nmore, and then bury them in the ashes, where they are left for about an\nhour until they are baked hard, when they are eaten with much relish\nand apparently no hurt to digestion, though one egg is by no means\nconsidered enough for a meal in spite of its being equal to several\neggs of our domestic hen.\n\nNot only are the blacks very particular in the way their game is carved\nor divided, but also in the distribution of the portions allotted to\neach person. The right to a particular part is an inherited one. No\npolite offering of a choice to an honoured guest, no suggestion of the\nleg or wing. You may loathe the leg of a bird as food, but at a black\nfellow's feast, if convention ordains that as your portion, have it you\nmust; just as each rank in society had its invariable joint in early\nmediaeval Ireland.\n\nThe seeds of Noongah--a sterculia--and Dheal, were ground on their flat\ndayoorl-stones and made into cakes, which they baked, first on pieces\nof bark beside the fire to harden them, then in the ashes. These\ndayoorl, or grinding-stones, are handed down from generation to\ngeneration, being kept each in the family to whom it had first\nbelonged. Should a member of any other use it without permission, a\nfight would ensue. Some of these stones are said to have spirits in\nthem; those are self-moving, and at times have the power of speech. I\nhave neither seen them move nor heard them speak, though I have a\ncouple in my possession. I suppose the statement must be taken on\nfaith; and as faith can move mountains, why not a dayoorl-stone?\n\nThe so-called improvident blacks actually used to have a harvest time,\nand a harvest home too. When the doonburr, or seed, was thick on the\nyarmmara, or barley-grass, the tribes gathered this grass in\nquantities.\n\nFirst, they made a little space clear of everything, round which they\nmade a brush-yard. Each fresh supply of yarmmara, as it was brought in\nby the harvesters, was put in this yard. When enough was gathered, the\nbrush-yard was thrown on one side, and fire set to the grass, which was\nin full ear though yet green. While the fire was burning, the blacks\nkept turning the grass with sticks all the time to knock the seeds out.\nWhen this was done, and the fire burnt out, they gathered up the seed\ninto a big opossum-skin rug, and carried it to the camp.\n\nThere, the next day, they made a round hole like a bucket, and a square\nhole close to it. These they filled with grass seed. One man trampled\non the seed in the square hole to thresh it out with his feet; another\nman had a boonal, or stick, about a yard long, rounded at one end, and\nnearly a foot broad; with this he worked the grass in the round hole,\nand as he worked the husks flew away.\n\nIt took all one day to do this. The next day they took the large bark\nwirrees, canoe-shaped vessels, which when big like these are called\nyubbil. They put some grain in these, and shook it up; one end of the\nyubbils being held much higher than the other, thus all the dust and\ndirt sifted to one end, whence it was blown off. When the grain was\nsufficiently clean, it was put away in skin bags to be used as\nrequired, being then ground on the large flat dayoorl-stones, with a\nsmaller flat stone held in both hands by the one grinding; this stone\nwas rubbed up and down the dayoorl, grinding the seed on it, on which,\nfrom time to time, water was thrown to soften it.\n\nWhen ground, the grain was made into little flat cakes, and cooked as\nthe tree-seed cakes were. When the harvesting of the yarmmara was done,\na great hunt took place, a big feast was prepared, and a big corroboree\nheld night after night for some time.\n\nThe two principal drinks were gullendoorie--that is, water sweetened\nwith honey; and another made of the collarene, or flowers of the\nCoolabah (grey-leaved box), or Bibbil (poplar-leaved box) flowers,\nsoaked all night in binguies (canoe-shaped wooden vessels) of water.\nJust about Christmas time the collarene is at its best; and then, in\nthe olden days, there were great feasts and corroborees held.\n\nThe flat dayoorl-stones on which the seeds are ground with the smaller\nstone, are like the 'saddle-stone querns' occasionally found in\nancient British sites. These primitive appliances preceded the circular\nrotatory querns in evolution, and as the monuments prove were used in\nancient Egypt. I cannot say whether, amongst the Euahlayi, there was a\nrecognised licence as to exchange of wives on these festal occasions,\nor at boorahs. If the custom existed, I was not told of it by the\nblacks; but it is quite possible that, unless I made inquiries on the\nsubject, I would not be told.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XIV\n\nCOSTUMES AND WEAPONS\n\n\nI have seen a coloured king simply smirking with pride, in what he\nconsidered modern full dress--a short shirt and an old tall hat.\n\nAnd I suppose, as far as actual clothing went, it was an advance on the\nold-time costume of paint and feathers. A black woman's needle was a\nlittle bone from the leg of an emu, pointed. Her thread was sinews of\nopossums, kangaroos, and emus; that was all that was necessary for her\nplain sewing, which was plain indeed.\n\nHer fancy work consisted of netting dillee, goolays, or miniature\nhammocks to sling her baby across her back, or, failing a baby, her\nmixed possessions, from food to feathers; her larder and wardrobe in\none.\n\nHer costume being simple in the extreme did not require much room. It\nconsisted of a goomillah, which was a string wound round the waist,\nmade of opossum sinews, and in front, hanging down for about a foot,\nwere twisted strands of opossum hair. A bone, or on state occasions a\ngreen twig, stuck through the cartilage of her nose, a string net over\nher hair, or perhaps only a fillet, or a kangaroo's tooth fastened to\nher front lock, gum balls dried on side-locks, an opossum's hair\narmlet, and perhaps a reed bead necklet and a polished black skin,\ntoilette complete, unless for certain ceremonies a further decoration\nof flowers or down feathers was required.\n\nThe principal article of the man's dress was called waywah. It was a\nbelt, about six inches wide, made of twisted sinews and hair, with four\ntufts about eighteen inches long hanging back and front and at each\nside from it, made of narrow strips of kangaroo or paddy melon skins.\n\nFor warmth in winter they would wrap themselves in their opossum-skin\nrugs. Sometimes both sexes adorned themselves with strings of kangaroo\nteeth fixed into gum, in which a little hole was made, round their\nheads and necks--yumbean they called them; or forehead bands with\nhanging kangaroo teeth, which were called gnooloogail.\n\nPine gum they rolled into small egg-shaped balls, warmed them and stuck\nthem in dozens all over their heads, where they would be left until\nthey wore off, hairdressings being only an occasional duty. The gum\nthey used for sticking the kangaroo's teeth was that of the Mubboo, or\nbeefwood tree.\n\nSometimes wongins were worn; they consisted of cords round the neck and\nunder the arms, crossing the chest with a shell pendant at the centre\nof the cross. A shell is still a most prized ornament.\n\nThe corroboree dress is one of paint; the feature of it being its\ndesign, a man can gain quite a tribal reputation for being an\noriginator of decorative designs.\n\nTheir original paint colourings were white, red, and yellow;\noccasionally they said they got some sort of blue by barter, but very\noccasionally, as it came from very far. White was from Gidya ash, or\ngypsum; red and yellow, ochre clay; but they also got both red and\nyellow from burning at a certain stage certain trees, gooroolay for\nred; the charcoal, instead of being black, having red and yellow\ntinges. But since the white people came the blue bag has put yellow out\nof fashion, and raddle is used for the red.\n\nTheir opossum rugs used to have designs scratched on the skin sides and\nalso painted patterns, some say tribal marks, others just to look\npretty and distinguish each their own.\n\nFeathers tied into little bunches and fastened on to small wooden\nskewers were stuck upright in the hair at corroborees, also swansdown\nfluffed in puff balls over the heads.\n\nThe Gooumoorh, or corroboree, is a sort of black fellow's opera; as to\nthe musical part, rather, as some one found an oratorio, a thing of\nhigh notes and vain repetition.\n\nThe stage effects of corroborees are sometimes huge sheets of bark\nfastened on to poles; these sheets of bark are painted in different\ndesigns and colours, something like Moorish embroideries. Sometimes\nthere is a huge imitation of an alligator made of logs plastered over\nwith earth and painted in stripes of different colours, a piece of wood\ncut open stuck in at one end as a gaping mouth. This alligator\ncorroboree is generally indicative of a Boorah, or initiation ceremony,\nbeing near at hand. Sometimes the stage effects are high painted poles\nmerely.\n\nAt the back of the goomboo, or stage, are large fires; in the front, in\na semicircle, sit the women as orchestra, and the audience; a fire at\neach end of the semicircle, as a sort of footlights. The music of the\norchestra is made by some beating time on rolled-up opossum rugs, and\nsome clicking two boomerangs together. The time is faultless. The tunes\nare monotonous, but rhythmical and musical, curiously well suited to\nthe stage and layers. These last have a very weird look as they steal\nPout of the thick scrub, out of the darkness, quickly one after\nanother, dancing round the goomboo in time to the music, their\ngrotesquely painted figures and feather-decorated heads lit up by the\nflickering lights of the fires around.\n\nAs the dancing gets faster the singing gets louder, every muscle of the\ndancers seems strained, and the wonder is the voices do not crack. Just\nas you think they must, the dancing slows again; the voices die away,\nto swell out once more with renewed vigour when the fires are built up\nagain and again; the same dance is gone through, time after time--one\nnight one dance, or, for that matter, many nights one dance.\n\nThe dancers sometimes make dumb-show of hunts, fights, slaughters, the\nwomen sometimes translating the actions in the songs; sometimes the\nwords seem to have nothing to do with them, and the dances only a\nseries of steps illustrating nothing.\n\nCorroborees seem to fit in with the indescribable mystery of the bush.\nThat the spirit of the bush is mystery makes it so difficult to\ndescribe beyond bald realism, otherwise it seems an effort to seize the\nintangible. Poor Barcroft Boake got something of the mystery into\nwords.\n\nIf an Australian Wagner could be born we might hope for a musical\nadaptation of corroborees. Wagner was essentially the exponent of\nfolk-lore music, wherein must be expressed the fundamentals of human\npassion unrefined.\n\nThe most celebrated weapon is probably the boomerang the most\ncelebrated kind to whites, though not most useful to blacks, is the\nBubberab, or returning boomerang. These are made chiefly of Gidya and\nMyall. Here these 'Come backs' are never carved, are more curved than\nthe ordinary boomerang, and were greased, rubbed with charred grass,\nand warmed before being used, so that the slightest warp would be\nstraightened. It is marvellous the accuracy with which an adept can\nthrow one of these weapons, locating it on the exact place to which he\nwishes it to return.\n\nGidya is the favourite wood for boomerangs. They are first roughly\nshaped, then thrown into water and soaked for two or three days; taken\nout and made into the proper shape, rubbed with charred grass, greased\nwell, and carved in various designs with an opossum's tooth.\n\nBoomerangs have many uses--in peace two clicked together as a musical\ninstrument, as a war weapon, and as a weapon in the chase. Its last and\nrapidly approaching use will be as a curio for collectors.\n\nBillah, or spears, are made of Belah (swamp oak) or Gidya. These too\nare cut roughly first and thrown into water, then cut a little more,\nthrown into water again, and so day after day until finished. Sometimes\nthey are carved with a running featherstitch-like pattern from end to\nend, sometimes have bingles, or barbs, cut down one or both sides; some\nbarbarous things with barbs pointing both ways, so that they could be\nneither pushed out nor drawn through a wound; some are plain, painted\nat each end or darkened with poison tips.\n\nBillah are war weapons; a larger kind called Moornin are used for\nspearing emu.\n\nWoggarahs, the hatchet-shaped weapons, were made of Myall, Gidya, and\nother woods, carved as were boomerangs, each carver usually having a\nfavourite design by which his weapons were recognised.\n\nBooreens, or shields, were of three kinds: a narrow kind made of\nhardwood, a broad flat kind of Kurrajong, and a medium-sized one of\nBirah, or whitewood, all painted in coloured designs. It is wonderful\nthe way a man can defend himself single-handed against a number of men,\nhe having only a narrow shield, the only defence he is allowed when he\nhas to stand his trial for a breach of the laws.\n\nTheir tomahawks, or Cumbees, were of dark-green stone, of which there\nis none in this district, so it must have been obtained by barter, as\nin the first instance were the flat, light Booreens from the Queensland\nside, and the grass-tree gum from the Narrabri mountains side, for\nwhich Gidya boomerangs were given in exchange.\n\nThe stone tomahawks have a handle put over one end of the stone, gummed\non with beefwood gum, then drawn together under the stone, crossed, and\nthe two ends tied together as a handle, with sinews of emus, opossums,\nor kangaroos.\n\nMuggils, or stone knives, are just sharpened pieces of stone.\n\nMoorooleh are plain waddies used in war and for killing game; a smaller\nkind called Boodthul are thrown for amusement.\n\nBoondees are heavy-headed clubs used in war.\n\nThe black fellow won't allow his womenkind a heaven of rest, for the\nspirit women are supposed to make weapons which the wirreenuns journey\ntowards the sunset clouds to get--the women's heaven is in the\nwest--giving in exchange animal food and opossum rugs, no animals being\nthere.\n\nFor carrying water they used to make bags of opossum skins. To prepare\nthe skins they would pluck the hair off, and, after cleansing them\nwell, sew up the skins with sinews, leaving only the neck open. They\nwould fill this vessel with air and hang it out to dry.\n\nAs, a water vessel, to mix their drinks and medicines in, they used\nBinguies or Coolamons, a deep, canoe-shaped vessel cut out of solid\nwood, carved sometimes and painted, a string handle to it. They used\nlittle bark vessels to drink out of, like shallow basins, cut from\nexcrescences on eucalyptus trees; these were called wirree. A larger\nbark vessel they used for holding water, honey, or anything liquid.\n\nWhile on the subject of personal decoration I forgot the Moobir, or\ncuts on the bodies, some of which are tribal marks, some marks of\nmourning, some merely of ornamentation. Both men and women are seen\nwith these marks in the Narran district; some huge wales on the skin\nfrom the shoulders half-way down the back, some on the chest and the\nforepart of the arms. They are cut with a stone knife, licked along by\nthe medicine man, filled in with charcoal, and the skin let grow over.\n\nVarious reasons are given for these marks: some say they are to give\nstrength, others as a tribal sign, others just to took pretty. Some\ngive the final reason for everything, 'Because Byamee say so.'\n\nIn summer the blacks are great bathers, and play all sorts of games in\nthe water. Their soap is clay; they rub themselves with that, the women\nplastering it under their arms again and again; the little children rub\nthemselves all over with it, then tumble into the water to wash it off.\n\nIn winter they forgo bathing, and rub themselves with liberal\napplications of grease.\n\nThe old blacks used to have very good teeth; they never ate without\nafterwards rinsing out their mouths, and sometimes munched up charcoal\nto purify them. But the younger generation have discarded the\nmouth-rinsing habit, and not yet attained to a tooth-brush: result,\ngradual deterioration in teeth, a deterioration probably helped by the\ndrinking of hot liquids. Blacks of the old time drank nothing hot.\nPerhaps, too, their tough meats gave muscular strength to their jaws.\n\nTo blacks, kissing is a 'white foolishness,' also handshaking; in olden\ntimes even to smell a stranger was considered a risk.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XV\n\nTHE AMUSEMENTS OF BLACKS\n\n\nA very favourite game of the old men was skipping--Brambahl, they\ncalled it.\n\nThey had a long rope, a man at each end to swing it. When it is in full\nswing in goes the skipper. After skipping in an ordinary way for a few\nrounds, he begins the variations, which consist, amongst other things,\nof his taking thorns out of his feet, digging as if for larv' of ants,\ndigging yams, grinding grass-seed, jumping like a frog, doing a sort of\ncobbler's dance, striking an attitude as if looking for something in\nthe distance, running out, snatching up a child, and skipping with it\nin his arms, or lying flat down on the ground, measuring his full\nlength in that position, rising and letting the rope slip under him;\nthe rope going the whole time, of course, never varying in pace nor\npausing for any of the variations.\n\nThe one who can most successfully vary the performance is victor. Old\nmen of over seventy seemed the best at skipping.\n\nThere is great excitement over Bubberah, or come-back boomerang\nthrowing.\n\nEvery candidate has a little fire, where, after having rubbed his\nbubberah with charred grass and fat, he warms it, eyes it up and down\nto see that it is true, then out he comes, weapon in hand. He looks at\nthe winning spot, and with a scientific flourish of his arm sends his\nbubberah forth on its circular flight; you would think it was going\ninto the Beyond, when it curves round and comes gyrating back to the\ngiven spot. Here again the old ones score.\n\nWungoolay is another old game.\n\nA number of black fellows arm themselves with a number of spears, or\nrather pointed sticks, between four and five feet long, called\nwidyu-widyu. Two men take the wungoolays, which are pieces of bark,\neither squared or roughly rounded, about fifteen inches in diameter.\nThese men go about fifty yards from each other; first one and then\nanother throws the wungoolays, which roll swiftly along the ground past\nthe men with the spears, who are stationed midway between the other two\na few yards from the path of the wungoolays, which, as they come\nrolling rapidly past, the men try to spear with their widyu-widyu; he\nwho hits the most, wins the game. It looks easy enough, but here again\nthe old men scored.\n\nFor Gurril Boodthul, if a bush is not at hand, a bushy branch of a tree\nis stuck up. The men arm themselves with small boodthuls, or miniature\nwaddies, then stand a few feet behind the bush, which varies from five\nto eight feet or so in height at competitions. They throw their\nboodthuls in turn; these have to skim through the top of the bush,\nwhich seems to give them fresh impetus instead of slackening them. The\ndistance they go beyond is the test of a good thrower; over three\nhundred yards is not unusual. As practice in this game is kept up, the\nyoung men hold their own.\n\nThere is another throwing stick somewhat larger than the gurril\nboodthul, which only weighs about three ounces, and is about a foot in\nlength. The other stick is thrown to touch the ground, then bound on,\nsometimes making one high long leap, sometimes a series of jumps, as a\nflat pebble does when thrown along the water in the game children call\n'ducks and drakes.'\n\nYahweerh is a sort of sham trial fight. One man has a bark shield, and\nhe has to defend himself with it from the bark toy boomerangs the\nothers throw. Here again the old men win. Their games, which old and\nyoung alike play, are distinctly childish.\n\nBoogalah, or ball, is one. In playing this all of one Dhe, or totem,\nare partners. The ball, made of sewn-up kangaroo skin, is thrown in the\nair; whoever catches it goes with his or her division--for women join\nin this game--into a group in the middle, the other circling round. The\nball is thrown in the air, and if one of the circle outside the centre\nring catches it, then his side namely, all his totem--go into the\nmiddle, the others circling round, and so on. The totem keeping it\nlongest wins.\n\nGoomboobooddoo, or wrestling, is a great Boorah-time entertainment.\nFamily clan against clan. Kubbee against Hippi, and so on. A Hippi, for\nexample, will go into a ring and plant there a mudgee, or painted stick\nwith a bunch of feathers at the top. In will run a Kubbee and try to\nmake off with the stick; Hippi will grapple with him, and a wrestling\nmatch comes off. Into the ring will go others of each side wrestling in\ntheir turn. The side that finally throws the most men, and gets the\nmudgee, wins. Before wrestling matches, there is much greasing of\nbodies to make them slippery.\n\nWimberoo was a favourite fireside game. A big fire was made of leafy\nbranches. Each player got a dry Coolabah leaf, warmed it until it bent\na little, then placed it on two fingers and hit it with one into where\nthe current of air, caused by the flame, caught it and bore it aloft.\nThey all jerked their leaves together, and anxiously watched whose\nwould go the highest. Each watched his leaf descend, caught it, and\nbegan again. So on until tired.\n\nWoolbooldarn is an absolutely infantile game. A low, overhanging branch\nof a tree is chosen, and as many as it will bear, old and young, men\nand women, straddle it; and, holding on to the higher overhanging\nbranches, they swing up and down with as much spring as they can get\nout of the branch they are on.\n\nWhagoo is just like our I hide and seek.'\n\nGooumoorhs, or corroborees, are of course their greatest entertainment,\ntheir opera, ballet, and the rest; only they reverse the usual order of\nthings obtaining elsewhere. The women form the orchestra, the men are\nthe dancers, as a rule, though women do on occasions take part too. The\ndancers rarely sing while performing their evolutions, though they will\nend up a measure at times with a loud 'Ooh! Ooh!' or 'Wahl Wah!'\n\nThere are two dances they think very clever: one a sort of in and out\nmovement with the knees, while keeping the feet close together.\nAnother, which they called I shivering of the chest,' a sort of drawing\nin and out of their breath, causing a vibratory motion.\n\nThen they give a sort of Sandow performance all in time to the music.\nThey first start the muscles of their legs showing, then the arms, and\ndown the sides of the chest. I am afraid I was not educated up to be\nappreciative of any of these special wonders, though Matah and others\nsaid their muscular training was marvellous.\n\nFrom a spectacular point of view I thought much more interesting a\ncorroboree illustrating the coming of the first steamer up the Barwon.\n\nThe steamer was made--for the corroboree, I mean--of logs with mud\nlayered over them, painted up, a hollow log for a funnel in the middle.\nThere was a little opening in the far side of the steamer in which a\nfire was made, the smoke issuing through the hollow log in the most\nrealistic fashion. The blacks who first came on the stage were all\nsupposed to represent various birds disturbed by this strange\nsight--cranes, pelicans, black swans, and ducks. The peculiarities of\neach bird were well imitated; and as each section in turn was startled,\ntheir cries were realistically given. Hearing which, on the scene came\nsome armed black fellows, who, seeing what the birds had seen, started\nback in astonishment, seemed to have a great dumb-show palaver, then\none by one, clutching their weapons, they came forward to more closely\nexamine the new 'debbil debbil.' Here some one would stoke the fire,\nout would belch through the funnel a big smoke and a lapping flame,\naway went the blacks into the bush as if too terrified to stay. But you\ncan't describe a corroboree, it wants the scenic effects of the grim\nbush: tapering, dark Belahs, Coolabahs contorted into quaint shapes and\nexcrescences by extremes of flood and drought, and their grotesqueness\nlit up by the flickering fires, until the trees themselves look like\ndemons of the night, and the painted black fellows their attendant\nspirits stealing into the firelight from what seems a vast, dark,\nunknown Beyond.\n\nThe sing-song seems to suit it, and the well-timed clicking of the\nboomerangs and thudding of the rolled-up rugs. The blacks are great\npatrons of art, and encourage native talent in the most praiseworthy\nway; although, judging from one of their legends, you might think they\nwere not.\n\nThis legend tells how Goolahwilleel had the soul of an artist, and when\nhis family sent him out to hunt their daily dinner, he forgot his quest\nand perfected his art, which was the modelling of a kangaroo in gum.\nWhen his work was finished, with the pride of a successful artist he\nreturned for applause.\n\nHis family demanded of him meat; he showed his kangaroo.\n\nHis masterpiece was unappreciated. Even as did Palissy's--of pottery\nfame--wife, so did Goolahwilleel's family revile him.\n\nHis freedom to wander at will, seeking inspiration and giving it form,\nwas taken from him. He was driven out: daily to slay, that his family\nmight feed, and never again was he let go alone--a crowd of relations\nwent with him!\n\nFigure to yourself what a damper to inspiration must have been that\ncrowd of relations; how it must have slain the artist in Goolahwilleel.\n\nHow the old legend repeats itself, and now as then, how often the\nartist is woman--slain that she by the caterer may live. Surely in the\ninterests of intellect was the prayer made: 'Give us our daily bread.'\n\nPerhaps the old legend of Goolahwilleel was originally told with a\nmoral, and that may be: why black artists are so well treated now.\n\nA maker of new songs or corroborees is always kept well supplied with\nthe luxuries of life; it may be that such an one is a little feared as\nbeing supposed to have direct communication with the spirits who teach\nhim his art. A fine frenzy is said to seize some of their poets and\nplaywrights, who, for the time being, are quite under the domination of\nthe spirits--possessed of devils, in fact. When the period of mental\nincubation is over and the song hatched out, the possessed ones return\nto their normal condition, the devils are cast out, and the songs are\nall that remain in evidence that the artist was ever possessed.\n\nSome songs do not require this process of fine frenzy they come along\nin the course of barter, handed from tribe to tribe.\n\nGhiribul, or riddles, play a great part in their social life, and he\nwho knows many is much sought after.\n\nMost of these ghiribul are not translatable, being little songs\ndescribing the things to be guessed, whose peculiarities the singer\nacts as he sings--a sort of one-man show, pantomime in miniature, with\na riddle running through it.\n\nSome which I will give indicate the nature of others.\n\nWhat is it that says to the flood-water, 'I am too strong for you; you\ncan not push me back'? ANS. Goodoo, the codfish.\n\nWhat is it that says, 'You cannot help yourself; you will have to go\nand let me take your place; you cannot stay when I come'? ANS. The grey\nhairs in a man's beard to the black ones.\n\n'If a man hide himself so that his wife could not see him, and he\nwanted her to know where he was, yet had promised not to speak, laugh,\ncry, sneeze, cough, nor move his hands nor feet, how could he do so?'\nANS. Whistle.\n\n'The strongest man cannot stand against me. I can knock him down, yet I\ndo not hurt him. He feels better for my having knocked him down. What\nam I?' ANS. Sleep.\n\n'I am not water, yet all who are thirsty, seeing me, come toward me to\ndrink, though I am no liquid. What am I?' Ans. Mirage.\n\n'What is it that goes along the creek, across the creek, underneath it,\nand along it again, and yet has left neither side?' ANS. The\nyellow-flowering creeping water-weed.\n\n'Here I am, just in front of you. I can't move; but if you kick me, I\nwill knock you down, though I will not move to do it. Who says this?'\nANS. A stump that any one falls over.\n\n'You cannot walk without me, yet you grease your body and forget me and\nlet me crack, even though but for me you could neither walk nor run.\nWho says that?' ANS. A black fellow's feet, which he neglects to grease\nwhen doing the rest of his body.\n\nWith riddles ends, I think, the list of the blacks' amusements, unless\nyou count fights. The blacks are a bit Celtic in that way; some are\nreal fire-eaters, always spoiling for a row. But in most everyday rows\nthe feelings are more damaged than the bodies.\n\nAn old gin in a rage will say more in a given time, without taking\nbreath, than any human being I have ever seen; it is simply\nphysiologically marvellous. From the noise you would think murder at\nleast would result. You listen in dread of a tragedy; you hear the\ntotem and multiplex totems of her opponent being scoffed at, strung out\none after another, deadly insult after deadly insult. The insulted\nreturns insult for insult; result, a lively cross fire.\n\nIt lulls down; the insults are exhausted, quietude reigns. Some one\nmakes a joke, all are laughing together in amity. From impending\ntragedy to comedy the work of a few minutes. A mercurial race indeed,\nbut not a forgetful one. A black fellow never forgives a broken\npromise, and he can cherish a grudge from generation to generation as\nwell as remember a kindness.\n\nThough, when high pitched in quarrels, their voices lose their natural\ntones, as a rule those of the blacks are remarkably sweet and soft,\nquite musical; their language noticeable for its freedom from harsh\nsounds.\n\n\n\n\nCHAPTER XVI\n\nBUSH BOGIES AND FINIS\n\n\nWeeweemul is a big spirit that flies in the air; he takes the bodies of\ndead people away and eats them. That is why the dead are so closely\nwatched before burial.\n\nGwaibooyanbooyan is the hairless red devil of the scrubs, who kills and\neats any one he meets, unless they are quick enough to get away before\nhe sees them, as one woman of this tribe is said to have done on the\nEurahbah ridge. It would really seem as if there were a debbil debbil\non that ridge; every boundary rider who lives there takes to drink. I\nthink the red spirit must be rum.\n\nMarahgoo are man-shaped devils, to be recognised by the white swansdown\ncap they wear, and the red rugs they carry. Red is a great devil's\ncolour amongst blacks some will never wear it on that account.\n\nThese Marahgoo always have with them a mysterious drink, which they\noffer to any one they meet. It is like drinking dirt, and makes the\ndrinker dream dreams and see visions, in which he is taken down to the\nunderground spirit-world of the Marahgoo, where anything he wishes for\nappears at once. The entrance to this world is said to be near a\nnever-drying waterhole, in a huge scrub, near Pilliga. If a man drinks\nthe draught, unless he is made Marahgoo, he dies.\n\nEach totem is warned by its bird sub-totems of the coming of Marahgoo,\nand after such a warning tribes take care, if wise, to stay in camp; or\nshould a man go out, he will smear his face with black, and put rings\nof black round his wrists and ankles, and probably have a little charm\nsong sung over him.\n\nBirrahmulgerhyerh are blacks with devils in them, who, armed with bags\nfull of poison-sticks, or bones--called gooweera--are invisible to all\nbut wirreenuns or wizards. Others are warned of their coming by hearing\nthe rattle of the gooweeras knocking together. When the Birrahmulgerhyerh\nare about, all are warned not to carry firesticks, which at other times\nafter dark they are never without in order to scare off spirits, but now\nsuch a light would show the Birrahmulgerhyerh where to point their\ngooweeras. They are said only to point these poison-sticks at\nlaw-breakers, and even then only against persons in a strange country.\nTheir own land is down Brewarrina way, but there they make no punitive\nexpeditions, travelling up the Narran and elsewhere for that purpose.\n\nThe Euloowayi, or long-nailed devils, are spirits which live where the\nsun sets. Just as the afterglow dies in the sky, they come out\nvictim-hunting. These Euloowayi demand a tribute of young black men\nfrom the camp, to recoup their own ranks.\n\nWhen this tribute has to be paid, the old men get some ten or so young\nones, and march them off to a Minggah at about ten or fifteen miles\nfrom the camp. There they make them climb into the Ming-ah, to sit\nthere all day. They must not move, not even so much as wink an eyelid.\nAt night time they are allowed to come down, and are given some meat,\nwhich they must eat raw.\n\nThe old men from the camp go back leaving their victims with the\nEuloowayi, who keep the boys up the tree for some days, bringing them\nraw meat at night. At last they say:\n\n'Come and try if your nails are long and strong enough. See who can\nbest tear this bark off with them.'\n\nThey all try, and if all are equally good, the old Euloowayi say:\n\n'You are right. How do you feel?'\n\n'Strong,' they answer.\n\nThey are kept on the tree about a month, then taken into the bush to\nhunt human beings, to deceive whom they take new forms at times. A\ncouple of blacks may be hunting--one will be after honey, another after\nopossums. The one after opossums will go to a tree, see an opossum,\nchop into the tree, seize the opossum by the tail as usual. He cannot\nmove him. He'll seize him by the hind legs, still he cannot move him.\nThen he will hear a voice say, 'Leave him alone, you can't move him.'\n\nThe hunter will look down, see nothing but a rainbow at the foot of the\ntree. Wonderingly he'll come down, and immediately the Euloowayi, who\nhave been in the form of the opossum in the tree and the rainbow on the\nground, seize him, tear him open with their long nails, take out all\nhis fat, stuff him up again with grass and leaves, and send him back to\nthe camp. When he reaches there, he starts scolding every one. Probably\nthey guess by his violent words and actions that he is a victim of the\nEuloowayi. If so, they are careful not to answer him; were they to do\nso he would drop dead. Any way, he will die that night. When the\nmagpies and butcher-birds sing much it is a sign the Euloowayi are\nabout.\n\nGineet Gineet, so called from his cry, is the bogy that black children\ndread. He is a black man who goes about with a goolay or net across his\nshoulders, into which he pops any children he can steal.\n\nSeveral waterholes are taboo as bathing-places. They are said to be\nhaunted by Kurreah, which swallow their victims whole, or by Gowargay,\nthe featherless emu, who sucks down in a whirlpool any one who dares to\nbathe in his holes.\n\nNahgul is the rejected Gayandil who was found by Byamee too destructive\nto act as president of the Boorahs.\n\nHe principally haunts Boorah grounds. He still has a Boorah gubberrah,\na sacred stone, inside him, hence his strength.\n\nHe sets string traps for men, touching which they feel ill, and\nsuddenly drop down never to rise again. The wirreenuns know then that\nNahgul is about. They find out where he is. Circling, at a good\ndistance, the spot he is on, they corroboree round it. Hearing them,\nNahgul comes out. They close in and seize him, kill him, drink his\nblood, and eat him; by so doing gaining immense additional strength.\n\nMarmbeyah are tree spirits, somewhat akin to the Nats of Burmah. One, a\nhuge, fat spirit--if you can imagine a fat spirit--carried a green\nboondee, or waddy, with which he tapped people on the backs of their\nnecks: result, heat apoplexy. A few years ago, an old black fellow laid\nwait for him and 'flattened him out,' since which there has been no\nheat apoplexy. We think it is because the bad times have made people\ntoo poor to overheat themselves with bad spirits of a liquid kind. The\nblacks differ, and certainly there were some cases of even total\nabstainers falling victims to the heat wave.\n\nHatefully frequent devil visitors are those who animate the boolees, or\nwhirlwinds. If these whirl near the house they smother everything with\ndebris and dust.\n\nThe Black-but-Comelys say, as they clear the dirt away: 'I wish whoever\nin this house those boolees are after would go out when they come, not\nlet 'em hunt after 'em here and make this mess.'\n\nThe Wurrawilberos chiefly animate these. But sometimes the wirreenuns\nuse whirlwinds as mediums of transit for their Mullee Mullees, or dream\nspirits, sent in pursuit of some enemy, to capture a woman, or\nincarnate child spirit; women dread boolees, more even than men, on\nthis account. Great wirreenuns are said to get rid of evil spirits by\neating the form in which they appear. I'm sure we all swallowed a good\nshare of the dust devils, but still they came; evidently we were not\nwizards or witches.\n\nThe plain of Weawarra is haunted. Once long ago there was a fight\nthere. Two young warriors but lately married were slain. As their\nbodies were never recovered, they were supposed to have been stolen and\neaten by the enemy. Their young widows spent days searching for them,\nafter the tribe had given up hope of finding them. At last the\nwidows--who had refused to marry again, declaring their husbands yet\nlived, and that one day they would find them--disappeared.\n\nTime passed; they did not return, so were supposed to be dead too. Then\narose the rumour that their ghosts had been seen, and to this day it is\nsaid the plain of Weawarra is haunted by them.\n\nShould men camp there at night, these women spirits silently steal into\nthe camp. The men, thinking they are women from some tribe they do not\nknow, speak to them; but silently there they sit, making no answer, and\nvanish again before the dawn of day, to renew their search night after\nnight.\n\nThe high ridges above Warrangilla are haunted by two women, who\ntradition says were buried alive. Their spirits have never rested, but\ncome out at all times from the huge fissure in the ridges where their\nbodies were put. Their anguished cries as the stones and earth fell on\nthem are still to be heard echoing through the scrub there; and\nsometimes it is said one, keener sighted than his fellows, sees their\nspirit forms flitting through the Budtha bushes, and hears again their\ntragic cries, as they disappear once more into the fathomless fissure.\n\nThere is a tradition--common, I believe, to many black tribes, even\noutside Australia--that, long before the coming of the white people\ninto this country, two beautiful white girls lived with the blacks.\nThey had long hair to their waists. They were called Bungebah, and were\nkilled as devils by an alien tribe somewhere between Noorahwahgean and\nGooroolay. Where their blood was spilled two red-leaved trees have\ngrown, and that place is still haunted by their spirits.\n\nAmid the Cookeran Lake still wanders the woman who arrived late at the\nbig Boorah, having lost her children one by one on the track, arriving\nat last with only her dead baby in the net at her back. As she died she\ncursed the tribes who had deserted her, and turned them into trees.\nSome of the blacks were in groups a little way off; those, too, she\ncursed, and they were changed into forests of Belah, which look dark\nand funereal as you drive through them; and the murmuring sound, as the\nwind wails through their tops, has a very sad sound. She wanders\nthrough these forests and round the lake, the dead baby still in the\ngoolay on her back, and sometimes her voice is heard mingling with the\nvoices of the forest; and as the shadows fall, she may be seen flitting\npast, they say.\n\nNoorahgogo is a very handsome bronze and peacock-blue beetle, said to\nembody a spirit which always answers the cry of a Noongahburrah in the\nbush. The bright orange-red fungi on the fallen trees are devils'\nbread, and should a child touch any he will be spirited away.\n\nVery mournful are the bush nights if you happen to be alone on your\nverandah. Away on the flat sound the cries of curlews; past flies a\nnight heron; then the discordant voice of a plover is heard. In all\nthese birds are embodied the spirits of men of the past; each has its\nlegend.\n\nPerhaps some passing swans will cry 'Biboh, biboh,' reminding in vain\nthe camp wizards that they too were once men, and long to be again.\nPoor enchanted swans! to whose enchantment we owe the lovely flannel\nflowers of New South Wales, and the red epacris bells.\n\nBut in spite of their sadness the bush nights are lovely, when the\nlandscapes are glorified by the magic of the moon. Even the gum leaves\nare transmuted into silver as the moonlight laves them, making the\nblacks say the leaves laugh, and the shimmer is like a smile.\n\nNo wonder trees have such a place in the old religions of the world,\nand wirreenuns, even as do Buddhists, love to linger beneath their\nbranches--the one holding converse with his spirit friends, the other\ncultivating the perfect peace.\n\nThere would not be much perfect peace about a wirreenun's communing\nwith the spirits if it happened to be in mosquito time. The blacks say\na little grey-speckled bird rules the mosquitoes, and calls them from\ntheir swamp-homes to attack us. In the mythological days this bird--a\nwoman--was badly treated by a man who translated her sons to the sky;\nhaving revenged herself on him, she vowed vengeance on all men, and in\nthe form of the mosquito bird wreaks that vengeance. Her mosquito\nslaves have just the same spots on their wings as she has.\n\nI dare say little with an air of finality about black people; I have\nlived too much with them for that. To be positive, you should never\nspend more than six months in their neighbourhood; in fact, if you want\nto keep your anthropological ideas quite firm, it is safer to let the\nblacks remain in inland Australia while you stay a few thousand miles\naway. Otherwise, your preconceived notions are almost sure to totter to\ntheir foundations; and nothing is more annoying than to have\nelaborately built-up, delightfully logical theories, played ninepins\nwith by an old greybeard of a black, who apparently objects to his\nbeliefs being classified, docketed, and pigeon-holed, until he has had\nhis say.\n\nAfter all, when we consider their marriage restrictions, their totems,\nand the rest, what becomes of the freedom of the savage? As with us, as\nMontague says, 'Our laws of conscience, which we pretend to be derived\nfrom Nature, proceed from custom.'\n\nI have often thought the failure of the generality of missionaries lay\nin the fact that they began at the wrong end. Not recognising the\ntyranny of custom, though themselves victims to it, they ignore, as a\nrule, the religion into which the black is born, and by which he lived,\nin much closer obedience to its laws than we of this latter-day\nChristendom. It seems to me, if we cannot respect the religion of\nothers we deny our own. If we are powerless to see the theism behind\nthe overlying animism, we argue a strange ignorance of what crept over\nother faiths, in the way of legends and superstitions quite foreign to\nthe simplicity of the beginnings.\n\nTo be a success, a missionary, I think, should--as many do,\nhappily--before he goes out to teach, acquaint himself with the making\nof the world's religions, and particularly with the one he is going to\nsupplant. He will probably find that elimination of some savageries is\nall that is required, leaving enough good to form a workable religion\nunderstanded of his congregation.\n\nIf he ignores their faith, thrusting his own, with its mysteries which\npuzzle even theologians, upon them, they will be but as whited\nsepulchres, or, at best, parrots.\n\n\n\n\nGLOSSARY\n\n  Bahloo, moon (masculine).\n  Bibbil, poplar-leaved box-tree. An Eucalyptus.\n  Byamee, their god; culture hero 'Great One.'\n  Boorak, initiation ceremony.\n  Boonal, a sort of flail.\n  Boobeen, wooden cornet.\n  Bootha, woman's name; divisional family name.\n  Boahdee, sister.\n  Beealahdee, father and mother's sisters' husbands.\n  Bargie, grandmother on mother's side.\n  Boothan, last possible child of a woman.\n  Beewun, motherless girl,\n  Boomerang, weapon.\n  Bubberah, a 'come-back' boomerang.\n  Billah, spear.\n  Belah, swamp oak.\n  Booreen, shield.\n  Birah, whitewood tree.\n  Boodthul, toy waddy.\n  Boondee, heavy-headed club.\n  Binguie, Coolamon; canoe-shaped wooden vessel.\n  Beewee, brown and yellow iguana.\n  Bunbul, little boorah ring.\n  Boormool, shrimps.\n  Boolooral, a night owl.\n  Byahmul, a black swan.\n  Beerwon, bird like a swallow.\n  Bunnyal, flies.\n  Binnantayah, big saltbush.\n  Bohrah, kangaroo.\n  Boogodoogadah, rainbird.\n  Buln Buln, green parrot.\n  Boogahroo, a tree where poison-sticks are kept.\n  Boondurr, wizard's bag of charms.\n  Budtha, shrub EREMOPHILA.\n  Bumble, shrub CAPPARIS MITCHELLIENSIS.\n  Brambahl, skipping.\n  Boogalah, ball.\n  Bayarrh, green-head ants.\n  Bingahwingul, shrub needlebush.\n  Boondoon, kingfisher.\n  Bilber, sandhill rat.\n  Boothagullagulla, bird like seagull.\n  Booroorerh, bulrushes.\n  Burrengeen, peewee; white and black bird.\n  Bouyoudoorimmillee, grey cranes.\n  Bouyougah, centipede.\n  Bubburr, large brown and yellow snake.\n  Beeargah, crane.\n  Buggiloo, girl's name; little yam.\n  Boolee, whirlwind.\n  Boogurr, things belonging to a dead person.\n  Bullimah, sky-camp; heaven.\n  Bulleerul, breath.\n  Boorboor, come down.\n  Boyjerh, father, or relation of father.\n  Brigalow, an acacia.\n  Birroo Birroo, bird; sand-builders.\n  Booloon, white crane.\n  Boonburr, poison tree.\n  Boorgoolbean, a shrub with creamy flowers.\n  Birrahlee, baby.\n  Bahnmul, betrothal of babies.\n  Boomayahmayahmul, a wood lizard.\n  Brewarrina, name of place; place of Myall trees.\n  Boorool, big, great, many.\n  Birrahgnooloo, woman's name meaning hatchet-faced.\n  Booloowah two emus.\n  Bibbilah, belonging to the Bibbil country.\n  Barahgurree, girl's name; a kind of lizard.\n  Bogginbinnia, girl's name; a kind of lizard.\n  Billai, crimson-wing parrot.\n  Birriebunger, small diver-bird\n  Burrahwahn, a rat now extinct.\n  Bralgah, bird; native companion.\n  Bean, Myall tree; a weeping acacia.\n  Beebuyer, yellow flowering broom, shrub.\n  Beeleer, black cockatoo.\n  Bibbee, woodpecker,\n  Bullah Bullah, butterfly.\n  Beeweerh, bony bream.\n  Buggila, leopard wood.\n  Bunbundoolooey, a little brown bird.\n  Brumboorah, boorah song.\n  Boorahbayyi, boy undergoing initiation.\n  Boodther, a meeting where presents are exchanged.\n  Berai Berai, the boys; Orion's sword and belt.\n  Beereeun, lizard.\n  Birrahmulgerhyerh, devils with poison-sticks.\n  Byjerh, expression of surprise.\n  Buckandee, native cat.\n  Coolabah, flooded box; Eucalyptus.\n  Curreequinquin, butcher-bird; piping shrike.\n  Cumbee, stone tomahawk.\n  Cocklerina, a rose and yellow crested cockatoo. (Major Mitchell.)\n  Carbeen, an Eucalyptus.\n  Collarene, Coolabah blossom.\n  C-ngil, ugly, nasty, bad.\n  Cunnumbeillee, woman's name meaning pigweed root.\n  Dhe, hereditary totem.\n  Dheal, sacred tree.\n  Dayoorl, grinding-stone.\n  Doonburr, grass seed.\n  Dheelgoolee, a bird-trapping place.\n  Dardurr, a camp shelter of bark.\n  Dheala, girl's name.\n  Dayadee, half-brother.\n  Dadadee, grandfather on mother's side.\n  Doore-oothai, a lover.\n  Dillahga, an elderly man of same totem as person speaking of or to him.\n  Dooloomai, thunder.\n  Dillee, treasure bag.\n  Deenyi, ironbark.\n  Doowee, any one's dream-spirit.\n  Dinahgurrerhlowah, death-dealing stone.\n  Dumerh Dumerh, smallpox.\n  Dumerh, brown pigeon.\n  Doolungaiyah, sandhill rat, bilber.\n  Douyougurrah, earthworms.\n  Deereeree, willy wagtail.\n  Durrooee, spirit-bird.\n  Dinewan, emu.\n  Dunnia, wattle tree.\n  Deenbi, diver.\n  Deegeenboyah, soldier-bird.\n  Dayahminyah, small carpet snake.\n  Douyouie, ants.\n  Dulibah, bald.\n  Dulleerin, a lizard.\n  Douran Douran, north wind.\n  Dunnee Bunbun, a very large green parrot.\n  Dibbee, sort of sandpiper.\n  Durrahgeegin, green frog.\n  Dooroongul, hairy caterpillar.\n  Durramunga, little boorah.\n  Doolooboorah, boorah message-stick.\n  Dulloorah, tree manna-bringing birds.\n  Eerin, little night owl.\n  Euloowayi, long-nailed devils.\n  Euahlayi, name of the Narran tribe.\n  Euloowirree, rainbow.\n  Eeramooun, uninitiated boy.\n  Eleanbah wundah, spirits of the lower world.\n  {One page missing from the scanned edition}\n  Hippi, man's divisional family name\n  Hippitha, woman's divisional family name.\n  Inga, crayfish.\n  Innerah, a woman with a camp of her own.\n  Illay, hop bush.\n  Kumbo, man's divisional family name\n  Kubbee, man's divisional family name\n  Kubbootha, woman's divisional family name.\n  Kummean, father's sister.\n  Kurreah, crocodile.\n  Kumbuy, sister-in-law.\n  Kamilaroi, name of a tribe.\n  Kurrajong, tree; a sterculia.\n  Moodai, an opossum.\n  Minggah, spirit tree.\n  Murrahgul, a bird string trap.\n  Murree, man's divisional family name.\n  Matha, woman's divisional family name\n  Mullayerh, a temporary companion.\n  Moothie, a friend of childhood in afterlife.\n  Mirroon, emu net.\n  Mubboo, beefwood tree.\n  Myall, a drooping acacia; violet-scented wood.\n  Moornin, emu spears.\n  Muggil, stone knife.\n  Moorooleh, plain waddy.\n  Moogul, only child.\n  Mah, hand or totem.\n  Moograbah, big black and white magpie.\n  Mirrieh, poligonum.\n  Mullee Mullee, dream spirit of a wizard.\n  Mullowil, shadow spirit.\n  Moolee, death-dealing stone.\n  Moondoo, wasps.\n  Murgahmuggui, spider.\n  Mayamah, stones.\n  Munggheewurraywurraymul, seagulls.\n  Matah, corruption of master.\n  Mooroobeaigunnil, spirits on the sacred mountain.\n  Midjeer, an acacia.\n  Mulga, an acacia.\n  Mooregoo Mooregoo, black ibis.\n  Mooloowerh, a shrub with cream coloured flowers.\n  Muddurwerderh, west wind.\n  Mungghee, mussels.\n  Millanboo, the first again.\n  Moobil, stomach.\n  Mouyerh, bone through nose.\n  Moonaibaraban, spirit sister-in-law.\n  Mayamerh, Gayandi's camp.\n  Mullyan, eagle-hawk.\n  Mirriehburrah, belonging to poligonum country.\n  Millan, small water yam.\n  Mooregoo, swamp oak; belah,\n  Mouyi, white cockatoo.\n  Maira, a paddy melon.\n  Mouninguggahgul, mosquito bird.\n  Maira, wild currant bush.\n  Mungoongarlee, Largest iguana.\n  Mooregoo, mopoke.\n  Mounin, mosquito.\n  Mungahran, hawk.\n  Mien, dingo.\n  Munthdeegun, man in charge of initiate at boorah.\n  Meamei, the girls; Pleiades.\n  Mayrah, wind.\n  Marahgoo, man-shaped devil.\n  Marmbeyah, tree spirits.\n  Moorilla, pebbly ridge.\n  Mahmee, old woman.\n  Nimmaylee, girl's name; young porcupine.\n  Nurragah, an exclamation of pity.\n  Noongah, Kurrajong.\n  Numbardee, mother and mother's sisters.\n  Niune, wild melon.\n  Noongahburrah, belonging to the country of the Noongah.\n  Noorumbah, hereditary bunting ground.\n  Noodul Noodul, whistling duck.\n  Nummaybirrah, wild grape; Namoi.\n  Narahdarn, bat.\n  Noorunglely, a setting emu.\n  Nahgul, a devil haunting boorah grounds.\n  Oganahbayah, a small eagle-hawk.\n  Ooboon, blue-tongued lizard.\n  Oobi Oobi, sacred mountain.\n  Oonahgnai, give to me.\n  Oonahgnoo, give to her or him.\n  Oonahmillangoo, give to one.\n  Oogowahdee goobelaygoo, flood to swim against.\n  Oogle oogle, four emus.\n  Oonaywah, black diver.\n  Ouyan, curlew.\n  Piggiebillah, porcupine.\n  Quarrian, yellow and red breasted grey parrot.\n  Tuckandee, a young man of the same totem reckoned a kind of brother.\n  Tekel barain, large white amaryllis.\n  Tekkul, hair.\n  Talingerh, native fuchsia.\n  Tucki, a kind of bream.\n  Wirreenun, medicine man, wizard.\n  Wunnarl, food taboo.\n  Wirreebeeun, young woman.\n  Wirree, canoe-shaped bark vessel for drinking from, or holding things in.\n  Wambaneah, full brother.\n  Wulgundee, uncle's wife.\n  Woormerh, a boorah boy messenger.\n  Waywah, man's belt.\n  Wongin, a string breastplate.\n  Wogarrah, hatchet-shaped weapon,\n  Wi, clever.\n  Weedah, bower-bird.\n  Wundah, white devil.\n  Wi-mouyan, magic stick.\n  Wungoolay, a game with discs and spears.\n  Widyu Widyu, toy-spear.\n  Wahl, no.\n  Wa-ah, shells.\n  Woggoon, scrub turkey.\n  Wimberoo, game with leaf and fire.\n  Woolbooldarn, game; riding on bent branch.\n  Whagoo, game; hide-and-seek.\n  Wahn, crow.\n  Wurrawilberoo, the whirlwind devils.\n  Waddahgudjaelwon, a birth-presiding spirit.\n  Wahl nunnoomahdayer, do not steal\n  Wahl goonundoo, no water.\n  Weedegah, bachelor's camp.\n  Wir djuri, name of a tribe.\n  Waggestmul, kind of rat.\n  Wungghee, white night owl.\n  Willerhderh, north wind.\n  Wi, small fish.\n  Wayarah, wild grapes.\n  Womba, mad, deaf.\n  Weeweemul, a body-snatching spirit.\n  Wayambah, turtle.\n  Yhi, the sun (feminine).\n  Yarragerh, spring wind, north-east.\n  Yunbeai, individual totem.\n  Yarmmara, barley grass.\n  Yubbil, large bark vessel.\n  Yungawee, sacred fire.\n  Yumbean, kangaroo teeth fixed in grim, ornaments.\n  Yumbui, fatherless boy.\n  Yaraan, an Eucalyptus.\n  Yowee, a soul equivalent.\n  Yahweerh, sham fight.\n  Youayah, frogs.\n  Yelgayerdayer deermuldayer, leave all such alone.\n  Yudthar, feather.\n  Yubbah, carpet snake.\n  Yelgidyi, fully initiated young man.\n  Yowee bulleerul, spirit breath.","title":"The Euahlayi Tribe: A Study of Aboriginal Life in Australia","tradition":"myth-cosmogony","translated_text":null,"word_count":52049}