Page:Folk-lore - A Quarterly Review. Volume 20, 1909.djvu/394

340 children, one after the other, pointing to the fingers, and receives the stereotyped replies, and the fingers retire; finally the boys catch hold of each other's ears, and those of the matronly girl, and form a round group, sitting and exclaiming "Kia mia, Kia mia" (a favourite expression of children, devoid of meaning), accompanied with giggling laughter and movements of the bodies backwards and forwards; and thus the game ends.

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following are some superstitions and legendary stories current among the natives around Albany, Blackwood River, Mount Barker, and thence to Esperance Bay, which have been collected at my request by Mr. Thomas Muir, J. P., of Deeside Station. He has known the country between Perth and Esperance Bay since 1844, and has constantly employed some of the aborigines to work for him during that period.

Evil Spirits.—The natives believed that it was evil spirits who struck forest trees and splintered them during a thunderstorm. When they saw a small tree which had been shattered by lightning, they would laugh and say to each other that the spirit who had done that was only a slender fellow, because a powerful spirit would have practised his skill on a larger tree.

If an evil spirit, or wein, came to a man in the bush and he attempted to strike at it, he would only hit himself on whatever part of the body he tried to hit the spirit upon. His only means of escape from the attack of a wein was to run and get on top of the nearest white-ant hill; then he was just as safe as Tam o' Shanter when he had passed the keystone of the bridge.

Bird Myth.—A little bird known as the Flycatcher, or Fantail, was formerly a wicked man with a bushy beard, always going about doing mischief and carrying tales. When the blacks see one of these birds they kill it if they can. It still has whiskers as in times of yore, which are represented by a little bunch of greyish feathers on each jaw.

How Fresh Water was first Obtained.—In ancient times all