NOllTH QUEENSLAND ETHNOOKAPHY — IJUTII. 57 



the most primitive form of artificial break-wind is to be 

 seen in the native camps scattered over the Wellesley Islands. 

 This is composed of bundles of grass (PI. xi., fig. 1 ; PI. 

 xii., fig. 1), cuscutii, leafy switches, or blood-wood boughs 

 with the stems outwards, just thrown on the ground and 

 arranged in such fashion as to form a seniicircuUir liedge up to 

 between eighteen inches and two feet high surrounding the cir- 

 cular excavation in which a couple or more blacks will be lying 

 curled round the central fire. The fact of these natives sleeping 

 without any hut or covering whatsoever may account for their 

 rising with the early dawn, a most unusual circumstance. It 

 was also strange that on the four or five occasions that I 

 examined this group of islands, no evidence was observable of 

 the apparently numerous pits described by Flinders, although it 

 is possible that in the interval between his visit and mine — 

 upwards of a century — the pits have become .shallower and 

 shallower until tliey are now repre.sented by the circular ex- 

 cavations referred to. 



Other early types are those wheie the ground or a ti-ee 

 convenient are utilised. Thus, instead of the bundles of leafy 

 switches being thrown down in a heap one on top of the other, 

 they are now fixed vertically into the soil, and inter-twined with 

 others, and with tussocks of grass maybe, placed cross-wise. 

 Such a break-wind for instance would be observed anywhere and 

 everywhere; in the Bonlia District where it is usually from 

 about two and a half to three feet high and known as a wallo-a 

 or yangko'^, it is often to be seen on one or both sides of the 

 hut-entrance so as to protect not only the fire itself but also the 

 individuals who may choose to be squatting down in the open 

 around it. Or again, as in the Lower Tully area, a stick or 

 sapling may be tied up at an angle to any convenient tree, and 

 some leafy switches leant up against it. A remaining early type 

 (PL xiii., fig. 1) is a sheet of bark fixed lengthways and edgeways 

 into the ground though even this apparently simple arrange- 

 ment means at least ability to climb a tree, the knowledge of 

 how to remove the bark, and the possession of special tools to 

 effect the purpose. 



Amongst more advanced varieties are the winji-winji of the 

 Boulia District, and the ridge-pole shelter of all the more 

 northern area of the Peninsula. Strictly speaking, the former 

 is any temporary bough-shed for protection from rain shoidd it 

 suddenly come up and is built of light sticks grass and bushes. 

 A very common arrangement* is to have it attached to the hut 



^ It is called rnyi-i on the Pennefuther River. 

 * Roth— Ethnol. Studies, etc., 1897, fig. 248. 



