318 K. H. MATHEWS. 



and give her food. This guardian is generally one of the 

 sisters of her husband, or one of her own sisters. Each 

 mother has a small fire which she keeps alight all the time, 

 and she heaps the soil or sand up around it so that it cannot 

 be seen at a distance. 



We will now resume the account of the proceedings in 

 the bush at the point where the novices were shown the 

 bullroarers, as described a few pages back. Next morning 

 the neophytes are taken to a place where there is a patch 

 of open and moderately level ground, from which the grass 

 has been removed. Within this space is a sheet of bark, 

 stripped from a gum tree, on which is cut the rude outline 

 of a man about half life-size, representing Dharamulan, a 

 mystic personage connected with the initiatory rites. 

 Sometimes this figure is formed by heaping up the loose 

 earth into the required shape ; and in portions of the region 

 herein dealt with there are other drawings on the ground, 

 some being heaped up, whilst others are cut into the soil. 



Lying on the top of the human figure are two real bull- 

 roarers, 1 one being the muddy igang or larger kind, and the 

 other the yirraga-minnunga, which is supposed to be the 

 wife of Muddyigang. The novices are brought up and shown 

 the image of Dharamulan, with his two descriptions of 

 bullroarers, and are invited to carefully observe them. The 

 men then dance round and sing : — 



Dharamulan ngunning-a-wa 

 Nundhunna, yen ! yeh ! yeh ! 



After this exhibition, the youths are warned against 

 revealing anything which has been said or done in the bush, 

 under terrible penalties of being cruelly murdered, or being 



1 Among the Yarra and Saltwater River blacks— the Wurrundyirra- 

 balnk— where the Wonggoa Ceremony also extends, the bullroarer is 

 called berberogan. I got this name from " Billy Berak," a Woiwurrung 

 blackfellow. 



