Page:Native Tribes of South-East Australia.djvu/728

702 mourner cuts himself with some sharp instrument, from Budagra, "to cut," e.g. Budagit-kalk, "cut the log." This is the top of the head. From this place the count follows the equivalents on the other side.

The message-stick, Fig. 43, No. 1, is one which Berak made to show what they were like as used by his tribe formerly. The explanation is as follows. The notches on the upper end at the left hand of the stick represent the sender and other old men with him. The remainder of the stick being notched along the whole of the two sides, means that all the men of both localities are to be present. The markings on the flat side, at the lower end, are only for ornament, as are also the crescent-shaped ends of the stick. This message is an invitation to some people at a distance to come to a corrobboree.

The Jajaurung counted the number of days or camps in the same manner as the Wotjobaluk and Wurunjerri, thus showing that this system was probably universal among the tribes of, at any rate, the Wotjo and Kulin nations. But the Wudthaurung tribe, about Geelong, with which Buckley lived for over thirty years, had, according to him, a different method. He says that a messenger came from another tribe saying they were to meet them some miles off. Their method of describing time is by signs on the fingers, one man of each party marking his days by chalking on the arm and then rubbing one off as each day passes. Elsewhere he says that before he left a certain place, a Bihar or messenger came to them. He had his arms striped with red clay to denote the number of days it would take them to reach the tribe he came from. On another occasion, when a large party left on a distant hunting excursion, they marked their arms in the usual manner with stripes to denote how many days they would be absent; and one of the men who remained did the same, rubbing off one mark each day, to denote the lapse of time.

I have seen counting done by the Kulin by the hand combined with the other method. The little finger being Kanbo or one, the third finger Benjero or two, the middle