Page:Native Tribes of South-East Australia.djvu/500

474 They cannot bear to hear the name of the dead mentioned, and to do so would cause violent quarrels and perhaps bloodshed.

The Dalebura sometimes bury the dead, sometimes place the body on a stage of wood, and covered with Ti-tree bark, tied on with cord. Later on, the friends return, and, having danced round the stage, bury the bones. The widow or the mother takes some of the finger bones, which she carries in her bag, especially if the deceased was a great fighting-man, or had any special virtues.

No one is believed by the tribes at the Herbert River to die from any cause but the magic of some one of a neighbouring tribe. A shallow grave is dug with pointed sticks close to water, and the father or brother of the deceased, if a man, or the husband if a woman, beat the body with a Mera or club, often so violently as to break the bones. Incisions are generally made in the stomach, on the shoulders, and in the lungs, and are filled with stones. After this, the body is placed in the grave, the knees drawn up to the chin, and laid on its side, or seated head erect. Weapons, ornaments, in fact everything which the deceased had used in life, are put with the body, the whole is covered up, and a hut is built on the top of the grave. A drinking-vessel is put inside the hut, and a path is made to the water for the spirit to use. The legs are generally broken to prevent the ghost from wandering at night. The beating is given in order to so frighten the spirit that it would be unlikely to haunt the camp, and the stones are put in the body to prevent it from going too far afield. Food and water are often put on the grave. After the burial the camp is shifted to a distance. The grave is visited and kept clean, often for years after. The spirits of the dead roam up and down for a time in the places they had frequented during life, but finally go to the Milky Way.

These burial customs not only confirm the conclusions deducible from the previous evidence, but show that the deceased might follow his kindred corporeally and injure others. Hence it is that the body is tied up tightly in its