Page:Native Tribes of South-East Australia.djvu/653

IX instructed by two of the Bullawangs, all of whom take this duty in turn. A camp is formed in which the Tutnurring sit, or sleep, and which they are not allowed to leave unless accompanied by a Bullawang. So strictly are the novices looked after and drilled, even as to the manner in which they are to sit in their camp, "covered with their blankets like men, and not behaving like boys," that an old man of the now almost extinct Wurunjerri tribe, who attended this Jeraeil with me, after seeing this going on all day, said confidentially to me, "This one all the same like it Lockup." This part of the ceremonies being satisfactorily concluded, the men went away to their camps to get their breakfasts, to rest and to sleep, or to go out hunting till the afternoon.

During the morning an incident occurred which was very significant of the profound feeling of secrecy in regard to the central mysteries which is felt by the Kurnai. One of the Headmen came to me, and intimated that the old men, before proceeding further, desired to be satisfied that I had in very deed been fully initiated by the Brajerak blackfellows in their Kuringal. I caused them all to come to me in the recesses of a thick scrub, far from the possibility of a woman's presence, and I there exhibited to them the bull-roarer, which had been used at the "Brajerak" initiations previously attended by me, and which I had brought back with me. After I had shown them the Murring bull-roarer, I also produced the smaller one of two which are used by the Chepara tribe. They at once pointed out to me, after inspecting it, that there ought to be another, and a larger one; and they seemed much pleased when I informed them that they were correct in their surmise, and that I had both. I also fully satisfied them that I had witnessed all the ceremonies of the Kuringal. It was remarkable that, long as the Kurnai had known me, and intimately as I had known some of them, especially the Headman Tulaba, these special secrets of the tribe had been kept carefully concealed from me by all but two, one of whom was now dead, and the other absent from the Jeraeil, ostensibly through sickness, but really from consciousness of tribal treachery, and fear of the consequences if it were brought home to him. The