380 RECORDS OF THE AUSTRALIAN MUSEUM. 



galmba bama niaiiaiia guia belumayar garka-ngun 



also men take and widow younger brother-by 

 niana. 

 taken. 



The following is the free rendering of the foregoing : — 



"Again, I will tell you about men's burials. When a man dies, 

 all the others set up a great crying and wailing. Especially do 

 the deceased's mother, elder and younger sister, father's sister, 

 mother's mother and father's mother lament very much. Further- 

 more, with their hands they violently beat their belly, lips, 

 cheeks and head. And they get down on the ground here and 

 there and throw themselves about, at the same time casting up 

 soil with their hands and kicking the ground. And vehemently 

 the}^ blame the person or persons whom they consider are guilty 

 of having killed him. The old men also cry very much but not 

 as continuously as the women and they do not scold anyone as 

 yet : neither do they throw themselves on the ground nor beat 

 their body with their hands, nor do they blame anyone while 

 crying : afterwards, of course, in a special kind of wail,-" they ciy 

 and blame the man who is believed to be the cause of deceased's 

 death — this they do for a long time When they have ceased 

 crjdng they haste to get white clay to smear over their body. 

 Only the dead man's father and mother continue crying, and for 

 them the others fetch clay, and they also smear it over their head 

 and bod3^ When one's elder brother dies the younger one 

 prepares to spear the wife of the deceased and pulls her about 

 before the others — because of the man's death : but one of them 

 gets hold of the spear and prevents him wounding the woman.-' 

 At sundown they dig a grave''" right in the centre of the camp, 

 and cut long wooden sticks, to make a platfoi-m with, by putting 

 them all in one line"-^" and spreading grass over them. They also 

 get some bark to cover this from above. After all that is done, 

 they fetch the corpse. The deceased's mother jumps crying into 

 the grave, whilst the elder and younger sister, daughter, father's 

 mother and father, and father's younger sister follow the corpse, they 



-^ Ganil -a sort of plaintive burial song. 



'■^' The idea of this is to sliew that during life, in their domestic quarrels, tlie 



wife may have oecasionally got the better of the deal, and accordingly 



the surviving brother by attempting to spear lier, shews that lie is 



getting even with her. 

 -** Face to the west, but reason for this observance is xinknown, and a fire kei;t 



alight in the close vicinity. 

 '^■> Lit — like the knee extended. 



