Page:Native Tribes of South-East Australia.djvu/449

VII

There is a curious instance in Umbara's song of the manner in which English words may become engrafted on the native language. Winbelow is really "the wind blows." This song may be freely but yet not incorrectly translated much as Umbara himself explained it to me, "Between the furious wind and the dashing waves of the long-stretched sea I was nearly upset."

I have mentioned songs which are accompanied by rhythmical gestures or by pantomime, which greatly adds to the effect. A favourite one which I have seen describes the hunting of an opossum, and its extraction from a hollow log by the hunter, who is the principal singer, and his assistants. Every action of finding the animal—the ineffectual attempt to poke it out of its retreat, the smoking it out with fire, and the killing of it by the hunters as it runs out—is rendered, not only by the words of the song, but also by the concerted actions and movements of the performers in their pantomimic dancing.

A very favourite song of this description has travelled in late years from the Murring to the Kurnai. It was composed by Mragula, who, it may be mentioned, was a song-maker in his tribe, the Wolgal, describing his attempt to cross the Snowy River in a leaky canoe during flood. The pantomimic action which accompanies this song is much fuller than the words, and is a graphic picture of the pushing off in the canoe, the paddling into the stream, the gaining of the leak, and after an ineffectual attempt to bale the water out by hand, a hurried return to shore. Then the hole being carefully stopped with adhesive mud, the performers again put off and paddle across. The words are in the