Page:Native Tribes of South-East Australia.djvu/775

XII the adults on their own bodies. A woman kisses her children by placing her lips upon it and blowing, making a loud noise.

In hard summers the new-born children were all eaten by the Kaura tribe in the neighbourhood of Adelaide; this might be inferred from the remarkable gaps that appear in the ages of the children.

In the Tongaranka tribe the practice of infanticide was common, because a baby was frequently too much trouble to look after, and it was often the mother who killed it. But it was not done until the family consisted of three or four; but after that too much work in hunting had to be done to keep the family in food.

In the Wotjobaluk tribe infants were killed in the old times, no difference being made between boys and girls. If a couple had a child, either boy or girl, say ten years old, and a baby was then born to them, it might be killed and cooked for its elder brother or sister to eat, in order to make him or her strong by feeding on the muscle of the infant. The mother killed the infant by striking its head against the shoulder of its elder brother or sister.

In the Mukjarawaint tribe the children belonged to the grandparents, though the parents had the care of them. If, for instance, a boy was born and then a girl, the father's parents might take them, or the mother's parents, and so also with another couple of children. If then another child was born and one of the grandparents took it, it would be kept. If not, it was killed, there being too many children. The grandparents had to decide whether a child was to be kept alive or not. If not, then either the grandfather or the father killed it, by striking it against the mother's knee, and then knocking it on the head. Then the child was roasted and eaten by the grandparents, their brothers and grandchildren, but its parents did not eat of it. Occasionally friends were invited to join in the feast. The father could not order the child to be killed; for, if he did so, the grand-parents would raise a party against him and he would have to fight them.