near Melbourne, a young man named Gib-ber-ook came behind her and cut off a lock of her hair; that she was sure he had buried it, and that it was rotting somewhere." "Her hair," she said, "was rotting somewhere, and her Marm-bu-la (kidney-fat) was wasting away, and when her hair had completely rotted, she would die." She stated further that her name had been lately cut on a tree by some wild black, and that that was another token of death.
Murran,[1] which signifies a leaf, was the name of the young woman; and Mr. Thomas says that he ascertained afterwards that the figures of leaves had been carved on a gum-tree, as described by the girl. She died. The sorcerers said that the spirit of a wild blackfellow had cut the figures of leaves on the gum-tree.[2]
The blacks believe that the spirits of the dead (Yambo kane) go about the earth and visit the camps of the blacks. Mr. Bulmer gives a somewhat amusing account of the way in which the spirits may be made useful. An old woman—a widow—got up one morning, and declared that her deceased husband had appeared to her in the night, and asked her when she was going to get married again. He told her that unless she got married to a certain man of the tribe whom he named he would visit her every night. She related her experiences at some length, but whether or not the sly old lady succeeded in obtaining the man she coveted is not recorded.
Marm-bu-la.
When an Aboriginal is alone and far distant from his encampments, he is liable to have his kidney-fat taken from him by the spirit of a wild black. The kidney-fat (Marm-bu-la) is taken away in some secret manner, and death is certain in the most of such cases, and scarcely to be avoided under the happiest circumstances.[3]
- ↑ Marron is the word for "leaf" in Bunce's vocabulary.
- ↑ An Australian black is always very unwilling to tell his real name, and there is no doubt that this reluctance is due to the fear that through his name he may be injured by sorcerers. Backhouse observed that the Tasmanians also disliked their names to be mentioned. "How the name," says Tylor, "is held to be part of the very being of the man who bears it, so that by it his personality may be carried away, and, so to speak, grafted elsewhere, appears in the way in which the sorcerer uses it as a means of putting the life of his victim into the image upon which he practices. Thus King James, in his 'Dæmonology,' says that 'the devil teacheth how to make pictures of wax or clay, that by roasting thereof, the persons that they bear the name of may be continually melted or dried away by continual sickness. A mediæval sermon speaks of baptizing a 'wax' to bewitch with; and in the eleventh century, certain Jews, it was believed, made a waxen image of Bishop Eberhard, set about with tapers, bribed a clerk to baptize it, and set fire to it on the Sabbath, the which image burning away at the middle, the bishop fell grievously sick and died." Tylor refers also to the belief of the Moslems that the "great name" of God is known only to prophets and apostles, who by pronouncing it can work miracles; and to the concealment of the name of the tutelary deity of Rome, which was enjoined in order that an enemy might not be afforded the opportunity of summoning the god, and tempting him by offers of a greater place to withdraw his protection from the city.
- ↑ The Idolatrous Nations of old offered the kidney-fat, and the fat that covered the loins, extracted from human victims, as a peculiarly acceptable gift to the gods; and the Jews used the same parts of animals typically.—(Leviticus, c. iii., verses 3 and 4.) The same custom prevailed with the ancient Greeks. Thus 'the fat of victims, which his friends bestow,' was indispensable.—(Virgil's Æneid, b. VI., lines 121, 122.)"—Remarks on the probable Origin and Antiquity of the Aboriginal Natives of New South Wales, by a Colonial Magistrate, 1846, p. 22.
