were over and the old wirreenuns said to the boys who
had not quailed, 'You are brave; you shall be boorahbayyi first and
afterwards yelgidyi, and carry the marks that all may know.'

Then they made on the shoulder of each boy a round hole with a pointed
stone; this hole they licked to feel no splinter of stone remained,
then filled it with powdered charcoal.

After this, leaving the boys there, the men went back to the Bunbul
ring. The bodies of the Boorah victims were cooked. Each man who had
been to five Boorahs ate a piece of this flesh, no others were allowed
even to see this done. Then the bones and what was left of the bodies
were put into the middle of the fire, and all traces of the victims so
destroyed.

The men then sang a song, saying that so must always be served those
who scoffed at sacred things; that the strength they had wasted should
go into other men who would use it better; while the spirits of the
victims should wander about until reincarnated if the Boorah spirit
gave them another chance. Perhaps he would only let them be
reincarnated in animals.

After another dance and chant round the yungawee, the men went and
brought the boys back again. They came with their hands on their
thighs, and their heads abased; each was taken to his allotted place
near the outer edge of the ring. There each Munthdeegun told his boy he
could sleep that night; he would go to sleep the boy he had been, to
wake in the morning a new man; his courage had now been tried, and in
the morning a new name and a sacred stone would be given to him. The
Gayandi would settle their names that night and tell the wirreenuns.

The next morning the boys were awakened by the Munthdeegun chanting and
dancing before them. They stopped in front of the first boy, called him
to rise by a new name; as he did so all the men clapped their thighs
and shouted

'Wah! wah! wah!'

Then an old wirreenun gave him a small white gubberah, which he was
bidden to keep concealed for ever from the uninitiated and the women,
and he must be ready to produce it whenever called upon to do so. The
result of failure would be fatal to him. With the loss of the stone his
life spirit would be weakened, and the strength of the Boorah spirit,
with which he was now endowed, be used against him instead of for him,
as would be the case as long as he kept the stone.

These stones seem somewhat in the way of 'Baetyli' of pagan antiquity,
which were of round form; t