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124 R. H. MATHEWS. 
from the Kamilaroi southerly, to Port Phillip in Victoria, 
and northeriy to the Mary River in Queensland. To Mr. 
Kar! and Mr. Ridley belong the honour of first discovering 
this peculiarity in. the naming of some of the Australian 
languages. It‘is worthy of note that from the most 
northerly of the tribes reported by Mr. Earl, to the southern 
limits of the tribes practising Mr. Ridley’s discovery, the 
distance is about 2,000 miles, which may be another link 
in the evidence of the common ancestry of Australian tribes. 
Between the two extreme points mentioned, there are 
extensive regions occupied by tribes whose dialects are 
not named in the manner referred to. 
In 1903 I reported some other methods adopted by cer- 
tain tribes of New South Wales and Victoria, in naming 
their dialects, to which the reader is referred.’ 
VIII. GURE OR AVENGING PARTY. 
Among the aboriginal tribes inhabiting that portion of 
the State of Victoria, watered by the Upper Murray, 
Mitta Mitta, Ovens, Upper Goulburn and Yarra Rivers, if 
one of their men had been slain by some person in a 
neighbouring tribe, the method of avenging the injury was 
known as ‘guré.’ It was believed that if a man’s death 
were not avenged, his spirit would saunter about and harass 
his relations. In consequence of this superstitious belief, 
the punishment of the offender was carried out at the 
earliest auspicious juncture. 
The following is an abbreviated account of the procedure 
of a guré expedition, as narrated to me orally by an 
aboriginal native of the Mitta Mitta River, in north-eastern 
Victoria. 
The brothers and friends of the murdered individual, 
accompanied by the elders or leading men, muster at the 
‘ngulubul,’ or private meeting place of the men, and discuss 
° This Journal, xxxvil., pp. 244 and 250. 
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