HORN EXPEDITION—ANTHROPOLOGY. 
71 
or the desire to do honour to guests or visitors—springing, in fact, from very much 
the same motives as prompt civilised communities to dances, dine, or otherwise 
make merry togetlier ; and, on the other, certain performances whicli, although 
they include dancing and singing as part of the programme, yet have a higher 
significance, in that, they are ceremonies held of the highest impoidance, being 
designed cither as invocations to promote the supply of various sources of food, or 
serving the purpose of ceremonial functions attaching to their most sacred rites. 
Of the food-producing festivals, as illustrated by that in connection with the 
promotion of the supply of the “witchety” grubs, and of their important initiatory 
rites of circumcision and subincision, Mr. Gillen has given a very complete account 
from the point of view of an eye witness, and all T can add to his statement is that, 
so far as I can learn, ceremonies of the same class exist in connection with other 
sources of food supply. Whether, independently of food supplies, these ceremonies 
are held solely in honour of what I have considered to be a totem (see next section), 
I am unable to state, but some such motive seems postulated to account for such 
a function as the Mulga ceremony, a tree (Acacia anenra) which can hardly be 
regarded as a source of food, and which grows in unfailing abundance. Neverthe¬ 
less, the wood of this tree is largely used for a variety of purposes, and, in this 
respect, may rank with the necessary food articles as a suitable object of reverence. 
These are, at any rate, the ceremonies with which certain ceremonial sticks and 
stones are associated that will be referred to in the next section, and again by Mr. 
Gillen. The difference in the importance which is attached to these two classes of 
ceremonies, the corrobboree and the festival, is shown by the fact that, while no 
particular reticence exists about the former—indeed the offer of a few sticks of 
tobacco is sufficient to initiate preparations for a corrobboree—the latter is the 
subject of much seci’ecy and mystery, and there are some that even Mr. Gillen, who 
enjoys the confidence of the natives, has not been permitted to witness. 
Whilst I am unable to speak of the food-producing ceremonies with the author¬ 
ity of an observer, our party had opportunities of witnessing ordinary corrobborees 
wherever the blacks were collected together in any number, as at Grown Point, 
Tempo Downs and Alice Springs, and it may not be without interest to relate a 
short account of one of these which we had the opportunity of seeing from the very 
commencement of preparations. And it may perhaps be as well to mention, lest the 
statement of the inferior significance of these corrobborees should unduly minimise 
their importance, that even these are very elaborate performances. There are not 
only a great variety, each known by a specific name and requiring special and 
appropriate decorations and appurtenances, often of a very elaborate description. 
