oreheads, and white dabs on cheeks and chins.

And very careful are the mothers not to look at the full moon, nor let
their babies do so; an attack of thrush would be the result.

Bahloo, too, has a spiteful way of punishing a woman who has the
temerity to stare at him, by sending her the dreaded twins.

If babies do not sleep well their mothers get the red powdered stuff
like pine pollen, from the joints of the Bingahwingul, or needlebush
tree, and rub it on the babies' skulls and foreheads.

If the babies cry too much their mothers say evil spirits are in them,
and must be smoked out. They make a smoke fire of Budtha twigs and hold
the baby in the thick of the smoke. I have seen the mother of a fretful
child of three or four years even, apply the smoke anodyne.

Whenever the mother of a young child woke in the night, if well up in
her mother duties, she was supposed to warm her hands, and rub her
baby's joints so that the child might grow lissome and a good shape,
and she always saw that her baby's mouth was shut when the child was
asleep lest an evilly disposed person should slip in a disease or
evil-working spirit. For the same reason they will not let a baby lie
on its back unless they cover its head.

If a gilah flies over the camp crying out as it passes, it is a sure
sign of 'debbil debbil'; the child, to escape evil consequences, must
be turned on to its left side.

If a gooloo, or magpie, did the same, the child had to be laid flat on
her moobil--stomach: for the passing of a cawing crow, a child had to
be laid on the right side.

As these birds are not night birds, it is evident that they are evil
spirits abroad in bird form, hence the precautions. As soon as a baby
begins to crawl, the mother finds a centipede, half cooks it, takes it
from the fire, and catching hold of her child's hands beats them with
it, crooning as she does so:

'Gheerlayi ghilayer,
Wahl munnoomerhdayer,
Wahl mooroonbahgoo,
Yelgayerdayer deermuldayer,
Gheerlayi ghilayer.'

Which means:

'Kind be,
Do not steal,
Do not touch what to another belongs,
Leave all such alone,
Kind be.'

The accompaniment being a muffled click of a rolled-up tongue against
the roof of a mouth.

No child must touch the big feathers of a goomblegubbon, or bustard's
wings, nor any of its bones. At the age of about four, the mother takes
one of these wings and beats the child all over the shoulders and under
the arms with it