Page:More Australian legendary tales.djvu/111

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The Youayah Mayamah
83

Wailing, she stooped to pick one up.

"The wirreenun tricked me," she said; "surely indeed no one will ever eat them, for they are turned into stone."

And so it was. Some were of plain grey stone, and some with a stripe of green on them, just as the frogs had been marked. Her daughters would be stone frogs for ever, as were the frogs that Birrahgnooloo and Cunnumbeillee had dug, and left for cooking before they took that fatal plunge into the Spring Cowrigul, whence the Kurreahs took them down the Narrin, and whither Byamee followed them after changing the food they had gathered into stones to mark the spot for ever. And there at the spring were the stone frogs still, as the mother knew, and now she saw their fellow in these the wirreenun had changed, these who had once been her girls but now were Youayah Mayamah.