BY R. HAMLYN-HARRIS. 33 



(Hamlyu- Harris 41). The knockiiig out of teeth is practised 

 in the Peninsula, but finds its principal centre around 

 Princess Charlotte's Bay, and it is worthy of note that 

 amongst some tribes, only the males, in others only the 

 females, are operated upon. 



It might appear at first sight that the presence of a 

 primitive form of mummification in South Austraha would 

 contradict the idea I have sought to emphasise, but on 

 further consideration this is not so. Taplin (134) describes 

 the method of exposure of the body on platforms Avith the 

 ultimate object of burial amongst the Narrinyeri natives, 

 and this is the only approach to mummification in South 

 Australia ; so that the practice is evidently more 

 primitive because of its temporary and partial nature. 



The phallic aspect is, I understand, not an essential part 

 of " heliolithic " culture, and was originally insignificant in 

 its original home (Elliot Smith 122). This is interesting in 

 \\e\\ of the fact that Queensland has never virtually 

 indulged in such ritual, and although there have been 

 apparent examples (of stone) urged from time to time 

 as evidence to the contrary, I am convinced that those 

 can be satisfactorily explained and attributed to quite 

 natural causes. Two such specimens are in the possession 

 of Qaptain W. C. Thomson, One is, in my opinion, a 

 characteristic meahng stone worn right through from 

 constant usage, the other, ostensibly of the opposite sex 

 — is a water worn pebble deceivingly fashioned through 

 constant rotation in running water. I have personally 

 examined these with care in company of visiting 

 ethnologists, and opinion is invariably unanimous on this 

 point. Indirect evidence of the presence of such a cult, 

 however, is forthcoming in the curious phallocrypts of 

 ■Cape York, described by myself (42) as breast ornaments, 

 from the Pennefather R. District of Cape York. I even 

 then doubted their import and added a footnote suggesting 

 a phallic significance, since which I have received informa- 

 tion which proclaims these as curious emblems of phallicism, 

 and the objects need only to be examined in order to be 

 understood. All this is most instructive, but only 

 represents an isolated case, evidently of Papuan origin. 

 This, however, cannot be said of the peculiar cylindro- 



