236 PRIMITIVE PATERNITY 



back to her native town. " Her parents were rejoiced 

 to see her again ; but they will not believe that she is 

 a human being and continue to treat her as the 

 departed spirit (chimbindi) of their daughter." 1 The 

 Andamanese recognise all natives of India and the 

 Far East as chauga, or persons endowed with the spirits 

 of their ancestors. 2 The belief thus widely diffused 

 does not involve new birth. But although the per- 

 sons returned are recognised by bodily features and 

 peculiarities, even by scars received in their previous 

 existence, it does involve Transformation after death, 

 or Transmigration into a new body, since the original 

 body has been under the eyes of the relatives not 

 merely buried (in which event resurrection may have 

 taken place) but frequently burnt or dismembered ac- 

 cording to custom. 



During the last decade of the nineteenth century 

 and since important discoveries have however been 

 made, especially of the ceremonies and beliefs of the 

 natives inhabiting the central, northern and north- 

 eastern districts of the Australian continent. Chief 

 among those to whom we are indebted for accessions 

 to our knowledge so great as almost to revolutionise 

 our view of the aboriginal culture, are Professor 

 Baldwin Spencer and Mr. F. J. Gillen, who have 

 published the results of their joint inquiries in two 

 elaborate volumes. The information thus obtained, 

 so far as it relates to the subject under immediate 

 consideration here, is to the following effect. The 

 central tribes are all divided, like those in other parts 

 of the continent, into totem-clans. Every tribe is also 

 divided into two exogamous intermarrying classes ; 



1 Dennett, F. L. Fjort, n. 2 Ind. Census, 1901, iii. 63. 



