ABORIGINAL TRIBES OF NEW SOUTH WALES AND VICTORIA. 349 



Some of the Wirraidyuri tribes had the following cere- 

 mony for making rain. An old man took the rump of an 

 emu, the bone of a kangaroo's leg and a white stone, all 

 tied together. He then dived into a hole of water, carry- 

 ing the parcel with him to the bottom, for the purpose of 

 saturating it with water. On coming to the surface again, 

 he swayed it backward and forward toward the west, 

 muttering incantations all the time. If he happened to see 

 a fragment of cloud coming up, he put the apparatus into 

 the waterhole near the bank, and waited for the rain. 



The Wongaibon people call the mirage kullugu-kulli, 

 literally, shingleback's water, because it is believed to be 

 a mythic or magical water which supports the kullu or 

 shingleback, a kind of lizard which always lives out on the 

 arid plains far from water. Some of the Wirraidyuri tribes 

 thought the mirage was the smoke made by the fires of 

 supernatural beings, when cooking their game out on the 

 plains. 



In the Thurrawal tribe the following observance was in 

 vogue for bringing down showers. A muyulu or doctor got 

 a piece of kurrajong bark, which he laid on a log and beat 

 with a stick till it became soft and flexible. Then he took 

 some stringybark and pounded it in the same way and 

 wrapped it around the kurrajong bark, and bound the whole 

 with string. This parcel was placed in a water hole, and 

 was believed to have the power of causing rain. 



Another superstition which is firmly rooted among all 

 Australian tribes, is that of transmigration or reincarna- 

 tion. Ever since the time when New South Wales was 

 first settled by Governor Phillip, we have heard of the 

 inveterate belief of the blacks that they would reappear in 

 the form of other men after death. Buckley, the white 

 man who spent so many years with the wild natives of 

 Port Phillip, Victoria, is said to have owed his life to their 



