Page:Native Tribes of South-East Australia.djvu/659

IX 1. To listen to and obey the old men.

2. To share everything they have with their friends.

3. To live peaceably with their friends.

4. Not to interfere with girls or married women.

5. To obey the food restrictions, until they are released from them by the old men.

Some of the rules which I heard impressed upon the Tutnurring are curious. They were not to use the right hand for anything, unless told to do so by the Bullawang. A breach of this rule, they were informed, would certainly cause Gumil, that is to say, some magical substance, such as Bulk, to get into the offending member, which would require the "doctor" to extract it. They were cautioned not to go near an woman, nor to let a woman's shadow fall across them, nor to permit a woman to make bread for them, under the certainty that such acts would cause them to become "thin, lazy, and stupid." But a woman might cook an opossum for the novice, provided it were a male and the entrails had been extracted before she touched it.

The rules as to food animals are as follows: The novice may not eat the female of any animal, nor the emu, the porcupine, the conger-eel, nor the spiny ant-eater; but he may eat the males of the common opossum, the ringtail opossum, the rock wallaby, the small scrub wallaby, the bush-rat, the bandicoot, the rabbit-rat, the brushtail, and the flying-mouse. He becomes free of the flesh of the forbidden animals by degrees. This freedom is given him by one of the old men suddenly and unexpectedly smearing some of the cooked fat over his face. The novice must not eat wattle-gum until some of the old men cook and give it to him. This is done soon after the ceremonies,