Page:The Aborigines of Victoria and Riverina.djvu/168

163 course this implicit belief tends in a great measure towards a cure, whatever may be the ailment.

When a patient recovers the wise Bangal receives boundless credit, which he accepts with the becoming grace of a duly qualified professor, who is getting no more than his just meed. But, on the other hand, should grim death steal in, and snatch the poor victim from under the very eyes of the Bangal he gets no blame, as the death is certain to be attributed to the malign influence of magic practised by some Bukeen tribe to that end, of which he is ignorant, therefore unable effectually to cope with. On these occasions, however, he tells the assembled tribe that he will visit Konikatnie (water-spirit) down in the deep waters of the lake, or river, and from that spirit learn from whence the magic came which killed their brother, and then they can take ample and swift vengeance on the hidden foe.

When the curious ones of a tribe wish to discover that which is beyond aboriginal ken they depute the Bangal to arrive at the desired knowledge through the medium of the water-spirit. Thereupon the Bangal most mysteriously disappears from the tribe, and many days may elapse before he returns, in a manner equally mystic with that of his departure. On some of these occasions he brings the desired information; on others, again, he merely intimates that the matter sought for was not for them to pry into, therefore it had better be forgotten at once, and for good, as the Konikatnie bears but badly any opposition to his expressed wishes as rendered by the Bangal.