Page:Native Tribes of South-East Australia.djvu/465

VIII a boy sleeping in the camp of his parents, he was awoke by the outcries of his father, and starting up, found him partly out of the camp, on his back kicking, while his mother held him by the shoulders. His father said that while lying by the fire a Mrart came up with a bag, and tried to pull him out of the camp by the foot. He then cried out and his wife caught hold of him, and the Mrart vanished. In this account an evil Mrart represents the nightmare of our own people. Another instance is that of a ghost which, though not related to the sleeper, was not inimical to him. Tulaba, when mustering wild cattle for a settler near the Mitchell River in Gippsland, dreamed one night that two Mrarts were standing by his fire, and were about to speak to him, or he to them, I forget which. When he awoke they had vanished, but on looking at the spot where they had stood, he saw a bulk (magic-stone), which he kept, and valued much, for its magical powers. Tankowillin and Turlburn, were once walking past a fenced-in garden, when they were much alarmed by seeing what seemed to be a fiery eye watching them between two of the palings. Believing that a Mrart was there in hiding on the watch for them, they were afraid and ran off to their camp.

The Kamilaroi believe that the spirit of a man when he dies goes to the dark patch in the Magellan clouds, which they call Maianba, meaning endless water or river.

The Wiradjuri believed that the ghost (Jir) still haunted the place where it had lived, and took up its abode in some large tree. It might be seen sitting at the grave, by those who possessed the faculty of seeing such things, that is medicine-men, or by a boy who, having the power, would in time grow up to be one of them. A ghost which took up its abode at a grave was believed to be able to injure strangers who incautiously came near to it. By the Gringai also it was thought that the ghost haunted the grave for a time. The Bigambul belief was that people after death went to and fro, the shadows of what they were in life, and these ghosts they called Matu.

It is evident from these facts that there is a universal