AUSTEALIAN SONGS AND DANCES. 460 



ideas repeated over and over again. Is a native in a towering 

 passion, he sings to himself some such words as 



* I'll spear his liver, 

 I'll spear his lights, 

 I'll spear his heart,' &c., &c. 



while he sharpens the weapon intended to execute his menace, 

 and waxing more and more excited as he sings, quivers his 

 spear in the air, and, furiously gesticulating, imitates the 

 various incidents of a fight. His wives chime in from time to 

 time with a line or two expressive of their contempt for the 

 offender : 



* The bone-rumped, 

 Long-shinned, 

 Thin-thighed fellow.' 



the bystanders applaud, and the savage, having fairly sung the 

 wrath out of himself, assists in getting up a dance. Is a native 

 afraid, he sings himself full of courage ; is he hungry, he sings ; 

 if he is full (provided he is not so full as to be in a state of 

 stupor), he sings more lustily than ever ; in fact, under all cir- 

 cumstances he finds aid and comfort from singing. The 

 Australian songs are therefore naturally varied in their forms, 

 but their concision conveys in the simplest manner the impul- 

 sive idea. By a song or wild chant the women irritate the men 

 to acts of vengeance, and four or five mischievously-inclined old 

 women can soon stir up forty or fifty men to any deed of 

 blood by means of their chants, which are accompanied by 

 tears and groans, until the men are worked into a perfect state 

 of frenzy. 



Among the native dances, the Corribory is the most remark- 

 able. It is always performed at night, by the light of blazing- 

 boughs, to time beaten on a stretched skin. The dancers are 

 all painted white, and in such remarkably varied ways that not 

 two are alike. Darkness seems essential to the performance of 

 a corribory, and the white figures coming forward in mystic 

 order from an obscure background, while the singers and 

 tlie beaters of drums are invisible, produce a highly theatrical 

 effect. At first, two persons make their appearance, slowly 

 moving their arms and legs ; then others one by one join in, 

 each imperceptibly warming into the truly savage attitude of 



