Lower Murray Aborigines. 23 



children, one two years old, and the other just born, she is 

 sure to destroy the youngest. 



In the traditions respecting their origin, they say that 

 they were all birds and beasts, and that there was no sun, 

 but darkness dwelt upon the land ; but a quarrel arising 

 between an emu and a native companion, the latter threw 

 an egg of the former up to the sky, when it broke on a pile 

 of wood seemly prepared for that purpose by the Good Spirit 

 (Gnawderoof) when the concussion produced fire, and the 

 earth was flooded with light, and the Good Spirit saw that it 

 was an improvement upon the darkness, therefore he has 

 continued to light it up every morning since that time. Im- 

 mediately upon the sun making his first appearance, those of 

 the birds and beasts who had been good, and had striven to 

 assist their fellows when in trouble, and looked after their 

 food, without reference to what their neighbours fed upon, 

 were at once converted into blackfellows, and had their 

 ancient fellows, who had been grumblers, given to them to 

 prey upon. This is one of the two only instances of rewards 

 and punishments for good and bad conduct on record. The 

 other one is in the use of a wicked old bustard, who lived 

 before the sun shone on the earth, and who used to kill and 

 feed upon his own species, dwelling upon the margin of a 

 nice plain, where delicious yams grew in abundance, and to 

 which plain bustards used to come from all quarters to feed 

 upon the milky roots. This wicked old wretch would watch 

 with impatience in the glowing afternoons until an unwary- 

 young bustard would single out from his fellows, to have his 

 siesta under some shady qundong tree, away from the tur- 

 moil and noise of the crowd, when he would never again 

 wake, but to find the death-grip of the ogre on his throat. 

 This ruthless old vagabond had continued this sort of thing 

 as long as the most ancient bustard could remember, but it 

 had now arrived at such a pitch that the bustard people 

 were everlastingly in mourning for their lost ones, and 

 nothing was heard but wailing in every corner of Bustardy. 

 At last two young bustards who had travelled in strange 

 lands, and lived amongst extraordinary beasts, returned 

 home just when the bustards were at their wit's end, and 

 seriously thinking of making a general exodus to other 

 countries, where they might feed in peace. On learning the 

 cause of all this wailing and misery, ,these two smart young 

 travellers laid their wise heads together to devise some 

 means of ridding the nation of this terrible pest. Hitting 



