belonged, or to which he was related, I may add a few instances of prohibition of certain food to certain persons.
In the Wotjobaluk tribe, boys are forbidden to eat of the kangaroo, or the padi-melon, or the young native companion. If they transgress these rules, they are told that they will fall sick, break out all over with eruptions, and perhaps die.
The man, until about forty, is under certain restrictions. If he eats the tail part of the emu or bustard, he will turn grey; he will be speared by some one if he eats of the black duck; will be killed by lightning if he eats the fresh-water turtle; for that reptile is connected with the thunder. To eat of the padi-melon would cause him to break out all over with sores. As to the turtle, it may be mentioned here that the Wotjobaluk think they can smell something after lightning which reminds them of the smell of the turtle.
In the Yualaroi tribe the old men have a great influence over the females and the young men as to the regulations of their food, preventing them from eating such food as emu and their eggs, wild turkey and eggs.[1]
Young men are not allowed in the Bigambul tribe to eat the female opossum, carpet-snake, honey taken out of certain trees, wild turkeys, certain fishes. These prohibitions are got over after they have been at the Bora, or, as the Bigambul call it, the Mue.[2]
If a young man or young woman of the Wakelbura tribe eats forbidden game such as emu, black-headed snake, porcupine, they will become sick, and probably pine away and die, uttering the sounds peculiar to the creature in question. It is believed that the spirit of the creature enters into them and kills them.[3]
Mr. M'Alpine, whom I have already mentioned, said that he had a Kurnai blackboy in his employ about 1856-57. The lad was strong and healthy, until one day Mr, M'Alpine found him ill. He explained that he had been doing what he ought not to have done, that he had "stolen some female 'possum," before he was permitted to eat it; that the old men had found him out, and that he
