THE REGULATION OF NUMBERS 217 



among the Bangerang. . . . They themselves gave as their reason 

 for it the impossibihty of the woman carrying more than one ■^' 

 infant in their constant wanderings.' ^ ' Every child which was 

 born before the one which preceded it could walk was destroyed, 

 because the mother was regarded as incapable of carrying two,' - 

 says another observer of the Narrinyeri tribe. Considerable 

 information is given by Howitt for various Austrahan tribes. 

 * Infanticide is practised by the Mining to some extent, the mode 

 of killing being by starvation. After a few days of short commons 

 the child becomes peevish and troublesome, and in consequence 

 more neglected, being placed by itself away from the camp and 

 fires, and it is said to be afflicted with Mupurn (magic). When 

 death ends its sufferings Mupurn is the cause. The reason they - 

 give for this practice is that if their numbers increase too rapidly 

 there would not be enough food for everybody. Yet they are 

 very fond of their offspring, and very indulgent to those they keep, 

 rarely striking them, and a mother would give all the food she had 

 to her children, going hungry herself.' ^ ' In the Tongaranka tribe 

 the practice of infanticide was common, because a baby was 

 frequently too much trouble to look after, and it was often the 

 mother who killed it. But it was not done until the family 

 consisted of three or four ; but after that too much work in 

 hunting had to be done to keep the family in food. ... In the 

 Mukjarawaint tribe the children belonged to the grandparents, 

 though the parents had care of them. If, for instance, a boy was 

 born and then a girl, the father's parents might take them, or the 

 mother's parents, and so also with another couple of children. If, 

 then, another child was born and one of the grandparents took it, 

 it would be kept. If not, it was killed, there being too many 

 children. The grandparents had to decide whether a child was to 

 be kept alive or not. If not, then either the grandfather or father 

 killed it, by striking it against the mother's knee, and then knock- 

 ing it on the head. . . . According to Buckley, if a family increased 

 too rapidly in the Wadthawing tribe, as, for instance, when 

 a woman had a child within twelve months of the previous one, 

 there was a consultation in the tribe as to whether it should live 

 or not. . . . Infanticide in the Kurnai tribe arose through the 

 dif&culty of carrying a baby when there were other children, 



* Curr, Recollections, p. 263. - Taplin, loc. cit., p. 14. ^ Howitt, 



Native Tribes, p. 748. 



