MODE OF WAKFAEE ILLUSTRATED. 5 



bouring- tribes^ when incursions are made into each 

 other's territories^ and reprisals follow. Although 

 timely notice is usually given prior to an ag-gression 

 being' made by one tribe upon another^ yet the most 

 profound secrecy is afterwards practised by the in- 

 vaders. As an illustration of their mode of warfare^ 

 in which treachery is considered meritorious in pro- 

 portion to its success, and no prisoners are made, 

 except occasionally, when a woman is carried off, — 

 consisting chiefly in a sudden and unexpected attack, 

 a short encounter, the flight of one party and the 

 triumphant rejoicings of the other on their return — 

 I may state the following on the authority of Gi'om. 

 About the end of 1848, an old Kowrarega man 

 went by himself in a small canoe to the neighbom*- 

 hood of Cape Cornwall, while the men of the tribe 

 were absent turtling at the eastern end of Endea- 

 vour Strait. He was watched by a party of Gomo- 

 kudin blacks or Yigeiles, who, guided by his fire, 

 surprised and speared him. Immediately returning 

 to the mainland, the perpetrators of this savage 

 deed made a great fire by way of exultation. Mean- 

 while the turtling party returned, and when it became 

 known that the old man had been missing for seve- 

 ral days, they were induced by his two sons to search 

 for him, and found the body horribly mutilated, with 

 many spears stuck into it to shew who had been the 

 murderers. Tliis explained the fire, so another was 

 lit in reply to the challenge, and at night a party of 

 Kowraregas in six canoes, containing all the men 



