1 84 PRIMITIVE PATERNITY 



person takes the form of the animal to which it is akin 

 and in that guise appears to the survivors. Usually it 

 is the eponymous animal of a group with an animal 

 name that appears on the death of a male member. 

 Women are represented by flying animals, bats and 

 birds, but no relation was indicated between groups of 

 women and particular birds." l In Raiatea, one of the 

 Society Islands, the destiny of the soul was deter- 

 mined by various circumstances. The souls of ship- 

 wrecked persons enter trepang-fish. Those who fall 

 in, battle take the shape of sea-birds and frighten the 

 living by their nightly cries. 2 On the continent of 

 Australia some of the blackfellows of the Namoi and 

 Barwon rivers in New South Wales " say that human 

 beings on dying pass into the form of the turuwun, 

 a little bird with a very cheerful note." 3 Among the 

 Kurnai " the birds bullawang, yeering and djeetgun are 

 said to be three of the leen muk-kurnai (real Kurnai 

 ancestors)." 4 The Euahlayi hold that the spirits of 

 dead women return in the form of the little honey-eater 

 bird which they call durrooee? The spirit of Eerin, 

 a man who was a very light sleeper, is in the little grey 

 owl. The bird is called Eerin too, and by its cries it 

 ever warns its old tribe at night of any danger threat- 

 ening them. 6 The Narrinyeri suppose nearly all 

 animals to have been originally men who performed 

 great prodigies and at last transformed themselves ; 



1 Haddon, Ty lor Essays, 178. 



2 Arch. Religionsw. x. 534, citing Huguenin, Bull. Soc. Neuchat. 

 Geog. xv. 



3 Ridley,/. A. I. ii. 269. 



4 Howitt, /. A. I. xiv. 304 note. As to the Muk-Kurnai, see 

 Howitt, 487. 



Mrs. Parker, 85. 6 Mrs. Parker, Tales, ii. 98. 



