The Making of Medicine-Men
In the Tongaranka tribe the office of medicine-man passed from a man to his son. The eldest son was the successor to his father, but only practised the office at the death of the latter.
Among the Wiimbaio one man, being a Mekigar, could initiate another and make him a Mekigar in the following manner. They procured the body of a man, usually by digging one up. The bones were pounded up and chewed. One of my correspondents[1] saw one of these men being initiated in the office of Mekigar. He was plastered with human excrement, and carried about with him the humerus of a disinterred body wrapped round with twigs, and he kept gnawing it. These men are, at such times, brought to a state of frenzy, their eyes are bloodshot, and they behave like maniacs.
In the Mukjarawaint branch of the Wotjo nation the medicine-man was trained for the office. For instance, if it became known that a boy could see his mother's ghost (Nungim) sitting by her grave, a medicine-man would take him for the purpose of making him a Lanyingel, or medicine-man. Part of the process of making a boy a Lanyingel was to smoke him with the leaves of the native cherry (Exocarpus cupressiformis) and anoint him with red ochre and grease. These were public acts, but my native informants did not know what the real training was.
The Wotjobaluk believed that a man became a Bangal by being met by a supernatural being called by them Ngatya, who is said to live in hollows in the ground, in the mallee scrubs. They think that the Ngatya opens the man's side and inserts in it such things as quartz crystals, by which he obtains his power. From that time on he can, as they say, "pull things out of himself and others," such as quartz, wood, charcoal, etc., and also out of his arms something like feathers, which are considered to have healing properties. In the case quoted elsewhere, these feathers are spoken of in
- ↑ Dr. M'Kinlay.
