Page:The Native Tribes of South Australia (1879).djvu/318

 240 THE PORT LINCOLN TRIBE. followed and overtook it on Mount Nilarro, situated about thirty miles from that place. Finding it asleep, they at once attacked it, but before they could quite kill it their spears became blunt; a disappointment that must have soured their tempers a good deal, as it caused a violent quarrel between them, in which Pilla stabbed his antagonist with one of the blunt spears in many places, while he himself received a severe blow over his nose with a midla: becoming reconciled, the friends again attacked and killed the Kupirri, and, on opening it, found to their utter astonishment the dead bodies of their comrades previously devoured by this monster kangaroo. But being no less skilled in the medical art than in hunting, they succeeded in reviving and healing these unfortunate men, and they all immediately betook themselves to roasting and devouring the Kupirri in return. The feast over, and their bodies comfortably greased with the fat of the animal, they proceeded in search of their mourning wives and families, to acquaint them with the happy termination of their disastrous adventures. The two heroes were afterwards metamorphosed into, and gave origin to two species of animals, the opossum and native cat, retaining as such not only their names, but also the scars of the wounds that they had inflicted on each other in the shape of a furrow down the former’s nose, and of a number of white dots sprinkled over the skin of the latter. III. Between Coffin’s and Sleaford Bays there is a line of bare, white sandhills, erroneously laid down in Flinders’ map as white cliffs. These masses of drifting sand have most probably been piled up by the westerly gales, which often now alter their shape and position; but, according to a tradition of the natives, they were raised by Marnpi and Tatta, two of their ancestors. A great fire, coming from the ocean, spread far and wide on the sea-coast, and seemed likely to envelop the whole country in its flames. Deliberating how to prevent such a calamity, it occurred to the abovementioned personages, that the best method of quenching the fire would be to bury it; they accordingly betook themselves to the task, and, in executing it, threw up