NORTH QUEENSLAND ETHNOGRAPHY — ROTH. 7 



back he continues to send the little girl various presents of food, 

 etc., she being even allowed to go to his camp provided he 

 happens to have anything particularly good to eat, and help him 

 partake of it. On the other hand, he is not allowed to visit his 

 betrothed's camp, or speak to her mother, always sending his 

 presents through a third person, or giving them to her personally 

 should he happen to meet her unaccompanied by her mother. 

 When the girl's father and her mother's brothers consider her 

 old enough for the marriage to be consummated, they tell the 

 bridegroom so, but never a word to the girl. The future husband 

 thereupon paints himself up, takes all 4 his fighting weapons with 

 him, and tells the news to the other men of his own exogamous 

 group. He next watches his opportunity to find the girl away 

 from her parents or out in the bush with the women, approaches 

 her as silently as he can, and seizes her by the wrist. The other 

 females will try and help her to get away, but he will call upon 

 his group-mates for assistance to keep them off. Whether she 

 approves or not, she will scream and exert her utmost to free 

 herself, even biting his hand to make him let go, and provided 

 she can release her wrist she has a chance of escape ; her 

 endeavours, however, invariably prove futile : she is dragged by 

 him to his camp and the marriage consummated, after which any 

 of her husband's group-mates who have rendered assistance may 

 claim the temporary loan of her. Being thus proclaimed his 

 wife, she lives with him at his camp, although he will probably 

 take her away from the neighbourhood of her parents for some 

 little time to come. 



14. In the North-West, though I cannot find any traces of the 

 practice in the Boulia District, a form of betrothal takes place 

 at the first male initiation ceremony on the Upper Georgina 

 River, certainly among the Yaro-inga, 8 and perhaps, indepen- 

 dently of initiation, in the Leichhardt-Selwyn District among 

 the Kalkadun. 



15. Throughout the Boulia District, each male can have at least 

 two wives, an official one supplied him as a member of the com- 

 munity by the Camp-council, and an unofficial one of his own choice, 

 whose love, such as it is, he finds reciprocated ; the former woman 

 is known as the no-po, the latter as the pandira, though both share 

 equal rights and responsibilities. Supposing that the Camp- 

 council consider a man fit and suitable to have a wife, he has to 

 take whomsoever is assigned to him thus: — The brothers, or 

 mother's brothers, of the young woman talk among themselves 



8 Eoth— Ethnol. Studies, etc., 1S97— Sect. 302. 



