MancJiester Memoirs, Vol lix. (191 5), No. 10. 97 



a small girl two or three years of age treated in a similar 

 way ; the incision for embalming is on the left side and 

 has been sewn up. 



"In 1845 Jukes saw on the lap of a woman of Darnley 

 Island the body of a child a few months old which seemed 

 to have been dead for some time. It was stretched on a 

 framework of sticks and smeared over with a thick red 

 pigment, which dressing she was engaged in renewing. 

 ("Voyage of the 'Fly,'" Vol. I., 1847, p. 246)" (p. 



138). 



" Macgillivray (" Voyage of the ' Rattlesnake,' " Vol. 

 II., 1852, p. 48) also refers to a mummy of a child in 

 Darnley Island. Sketches of the two Miriam mummies 

 in the Brisbane Museum will be found on Plate 94 of 

 Edge Partington and Heape's Ethnographical Album of 

 the Pacific Islands, third series. [Compare also Plate 2, 

 Figure 4, in Brockett's " Voyage to Torres Straits," 

 Sydney, 1836]" (p. 137). 



" On about the tenth day after death, when the hands 

 and feet have become partially dried, the relatives, using 

 a bamboo knife, remove the skin of the palms and soles,, 

 together with the nails, and then cut out the tongue, 

 which is put into a bamboo clamp so that it may be kept 

 straight while drying. These were presented to the 

 widow, who henceforth wore them" (p. 138). 



A great deal of further information in regard to this 

 practice is given by Haddoh and Myers in their impor- 

 tant monograph. Among other things they call attention 

 once more to the custom of preserving the skull in the 

 Torres Straits Islands where mummification is practised. 

 The use of masks and ceremonial dances to assist the 

 performers so as the more realistically to play the part 

 of the deceased is welcome confirmation of the conclusion 

 drawn from geographical distribution that such practices 



