facing the Australian magistrates in handling these cases, 
where subtle nuances in tribal customs must be taken 
into account. 
Little by little we begin to see clear: Miss Reay dis- 
cerned the truth when she wrote that the ‘mushroom 
madness’ had become institutionalized and that it served 
as a social catharsis. Is it possible that we are dealing 
here with a primitive phase in the evolution of the drama, 
a drama without stage or audience, in which the whole 
village takes part, the lead roles being assigned by he- 
redity to a few families, one to a family, the other roles 
falling into place as the simple drama unfolds? There is 
a tacit understanding on everyone’s part to make-believe, 
the ‘madmen’ that they are mad, whistling and roaring 
in maniacal fury, tearing up and down the mountain 
trails; others including the children running as if for 
their lives and hiding and peering out and pretending to 
taunt the maniacs, with a posse of men on hand, in ac- 
cordance with the prior tacit agreement, to stop the mad- 
men from the consequences of their act. Meanwhile the 
women who are ndaad/ dance in formations correspond- 
ing to their husband’s sub-clans, directly contrary to the 
rules that govern their behavior in normal times. The 
women wear their husbands’ finery, the best plumes and 
spears, a startling instance of transvestism in this primi- 
tive community. These married women boast of sexual 
adventures and irregularities in their own past, some of 
which at least are not true. Have these tales the elements 
of extempore verse about them? We are not told. 
Whaet torpid dolts and killjoys the Europeans must 
seem to the natives, when they fail to play the game 
according to the conventional rules! But how are two 
cultures, separated by millennia and yet co-existing, to 
communicate with each other? 
The fact is that the Kuropean cannot judge the whole 
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