THE BURBUNG OR INITIATION CEREMONY. 149 
also known as minbin mumbilla. A platform, (goolay), about a 
foot high, composed of pieces of bark laid on logs, is erected by 
the men somewhere near the women’s camp. The mothers of the 
novices, decorated as at the thurrawonga, and all the women of 
the tribe are present at this platform, but none of them are 
covered over on this occasion. Each boy’s mother lays on the 
platform a rug or blanket, beside which she inserts her yamstick 
in the ground, and sits down on the other side of the platform. 
All the mothers then commence to sing doleful chants, because 
their sons will not be allowed to camp with them any more, but 
must now stay with the single men, and take their part as men . 
of the tribe. 
When these preparations have been made, at a given signal the 
guardians and novices approach, followed by some of the kooringal 
beating boomerangs, but the mudjeegang is not sounded. On 
getting near the platform each guardian points out to the boy his 
mother’s yamstick, and directs him to sit down on the rug which 
is beside it.! The mothers, who are sitting down on the other side 
of the platform, immediately behind the boys, then put their arms 
around them for a few minutes. The guardians then catch the 
novices by the hand and lead them away to a camp in sight of 
the men’s quarters, all the women at the same time returning to 
their respective camps. From the time the novices were taken 
away from the Burbung their mothers have been required to carry 
@ piece of burning bark in their hands when travelling from place 
to place, but they are now released from this obligation, and these 
firesticks are left at the goolay. The next day the mothers of the 
novices go into a waterhole or running stream near the camp, and 
wash the paint off their bodies. 
Finishing Ceremonies.—As soon as all the fundamental rites 
ve been concluded, the strange tribes are eager to get back | 
to their own districts, and generally start away the next day, or ’ 
ae Farther north the men and neophytes are smoked on this ooomsidtt, 
instead of on the return to the thurrawonga.—Journ. Anthrop. Inst. : 
XXV., 312; Ibid., xxv1., 283. 
