Volume II Part 26 (2/2)

MOURNING WOMEN. THEIR SONGS AND CEREMONIES.

June 15.

Soon after daybreak I reached the entrance of Mulligo's hut: he was alive but his respiration was scarcely visible. His head rested on his mother's knees, and her withered b.r.e.a.s.t.s now rested on his lips as she leant crying over him; other women were seated round, their heads all verging to a common centre over the wasted frame of the dying man; they were crying bitterly and scratching their cheeks, foreheads, and noses with their nails until the blood trickled slowly from the wounds. The men in the front of the huts were busied in finis.h.i.+ng off their spears, ready for the coming fight.

I stood for some time watching the mournful scene, but other native females soon began to arrive; they came up in small parties, generally by threes, marching slowly forward with their wan-nas (a long stick they use for digging up roots) in their hands; the eldest female walked first, and when they approached within about thirty or forty yards of the hut in which the dying man lay they raised the most piteous cries, and, hurrying their pace, moved rapidly towards the point where the other women were seated, recalling the custom alluded to by Jeremiah (9:17, 18) Call for the wailing women that they may come, and let them make haste, and take up a wailing for us, that our eyes may run down with tears, and our eyelids gush out with waters.

CEREMONY ON MULLIGO'S DEATH.

As they came up to the bark hut many of them struck it violently with their wan-nas, producing by the blow a dull hollow sound; they then seated themselves in the circle, scratching their faces and joining in mournful chants, of which the one already given above was that most frequently uttered, and which, as I sat by the young men's fire, they slowly repeated to me.

The female relatives standing in the relation of mothers to Mulligo, sang:

Mam-mul, Mam-mul, My son, my son.

Those in the relation of sister, sang:

Kar-dang, kar-dang.

And the next part was sung indifferently by both of them:

Garro. Nad-joo, Meela, Nung-a-broo.

Again, I shall Not see in future.

Then one of the women, having worked herself to a pitch of frenzy, would now and then start up and, standing in front of the hut whilst she waved her wan-na violently in the air, would chant forth dire imprecations against certain boyl-yas, or magicians, or rather wizards, who she believed to be the cause of the death of poor Mulligo. Whilst thus chanting she faced and addressed her words to the men who were grouped around their huts, and it was strange to see the various effects produced on their minds by these harangues working in their savage countenances: one while they sat in mournful silence; again they grasped firmly and quivered their spears; and by-and-bye a general ”Ee-Ee” (p.r.o.nounced in their throat with the lips closed) burst forth as sign of approbation at some affecting part of the speech.

Time wore on. Each withered beldame by turns addressed the party, whilst the poor wretch, the tranquillity of whose dying moments was interrupted by these scenes, gradually sank. At last the vital spark departed, and that moment an old woman started up, mad with grief and rage, tore the hut in which he had lain to atoms, saying, ”this is now no good;”* and then poured forth a wild strain of imprecations against the before-mentioned boyl-yas.

(*Footnote. Burckhardt remarked a similar custom among the Bedouin Arabs.

He says: If the deceased have not left any male heir, or that the whole property is transferred to another family, or if his heir is a minor, and goes to live with his uncle or some other relative, the tent posts are torn up immediately after the man has expired, and the tent is demolished. Travels in Arabia page 58.)

As she proceeded the men became more and more excited, and at last Moondee, the most violent of them, started forward and was on the point of spearing one of Mulligo's wives; none of the men attempted to interfere with him; but, as I antic.i.p.ated, the women seized him, and held him, so as to prevent him from executing his purpose. This conduct on his part at first appeared to me to arise from pa.s.sion alone, but the reason of it was soon explained.

SUPPOSED CAUSE OF HIS DECEASE.

It appears that some two or three months before this period Weenat, a native of the upper part of the Swan, had stolen a cloak belonging to Miago, Mulligo's brother, and had, according to their belief, from malicious motives given this cloak to one of the native sorcerers, or boyl-yas, who by this means acquired some mysterious power over either Miago or his brother, but selected the latter for his victim, when he fell and broke his back. Another of these boyl-yas (according to the usual custom) was called in to give his advice, and he applied fire to the injured part. This treatment not succeeding, and the poor fellow wasting daily away, the natives became convinced that the unfriendly boyl-yas were in the habit of rendering themselves invisible, and nightly descending for the purpose of feasting on poor Mulligo's flesh whilst he slept, and being under the influence of a charm he was not aware of what was taking place; but Moondee chose to imagine that if his wife had been more vigilant the boyl-yas might have been detected, and hence intended to spear her in the leg as a punishment for her imputed neglect.

As I have before stated the women prevented this outrage from having effect, and the two trembling girls, neither of whom could have been more than fifteen, fled into Perth, to take refuge in some European's house.

The native men and women, after their departure, indulged in the most unlimited abuse of boyl-yas in general, and of the Guildford boyl-yas in particular, against whom, according to the idea of the natives, they had very strong presumptive evidence from the circ.u.mstance of the cloak having been stolen by a Guildford man. It was still very doubtful what boyl-yas were the actual perpetrators of the crime, so they were contented with vowing to kill a great many of them in some direction or the other, as soon as anyone could detect that in which the suspected ones retired. This resolution having been formed the men went into Perth in order to see that no strange natives stole either of the young widows, whilst the women lay weeping over the dead body.

PREPARATIONS FOR THE FUNERAL. FORMATION OF THE GRAVE.

I accompanied the men into Perth, and in the course of an hour was summoned by the natives to witness the funeral ceremony. They had moved the body about half a mile from the spot where the man died; the women still leant over it, uttering the words, yang, yang, yang, and occasionally chanting a few sentences.

There were but few men present, as they were watching the widows in Perth. Yenna and Warrup, the brothers-in-law of Mulligo, were digging his grave, which as usual extended due east and west; the Perth boyl-ya, Weeban by name, who, being a relation of the deceased, could of course have had no hand in occasioning his death, superintended the operations.

They commenced by digging with their sticks and hands several holes in a straight line, and as deep as they could; they then united them, and threw out the earth from the bottom of the pit thus made; all the white sand was thrown carefully into two heaps, nearly in the form of a European grave, and these heaps were situated one at the head and the other at the foot of the hole they were digging, whilst the dirty-coloured sand was thrown into two other heaps, one on each side.

The grave was very narrow, only just wide enough to admit the body of the deceased. Old Weeban paid the greatest possible attention to see that the east and west direction of the grave was preserved, and if the least deviation from this line occurred in the heaps of sand, either at the head or foot, he made some of the natives rectify it by sweeping the sand into its proper form with boughs of trees.

<script>