n was put
down beside the grave, the daughter and other nearest women relations
stayed with it, the other women went away into the bush in one
direction, some of the men in another.

Old Hippi heaped up some Budtha twigs he had gathered, I noticed as we
came along; these he set fire to, and made a dense smoke which hung low
over the open grave and spread over the old graves.

Hippi smoked himself in this smoke. The women came back with arms full
of small branches of the sacred Dheal tree, these they laid beside the
grave, then sat down and broke them into small twigs; the old women had
twigs put through the bored hole in their noses.

The men came back with some pine saplings; two of these they laid at
the bottom of the grave, which was about five feet deep. On these pines
they spread strips of bark, then a thick bed of Dheal twigs; then a
woman handed a bag containing the belongings of the dead woman--boogurr
they were called--to the oldest male relative, who was standing in the
grave; he placed it as a pillow at one end. Then Hippi and the
daughter's husband took each an end of the coffin and lowered it into
the grave; the daughter cried loudly as they did so. Over the coffin
they laid a rug, and on the rug they placed Beemunny's yam stick. Hippi
signalled to the daughter, who then came with the other women close to
the edge of the grave. She sat at one end, looked over into the grave,
and called out: 'My mother! Oh, my mother! Come back to me, my mother!
My mother that I have been with always, why did you leave me?' Then she
wailed the death-wait, which the other women caught up. As the wail
died away, Hippi said:

'She has gone from us; never as she was will she return.
Never more as she once did will she chop honey.
Never more with her gunnai dig yams.
She has gone from us; never as she was to return.'

As he finished all the women wailed again, and loudest of all the
daughter. Then the old man in the grave said:

'Mussels there are in the creek and plenty,
But she who lies here will dig no more.
We shall fish as of old for cod-fish,
But she who lies here will beg no more oil,
Oil for her hair, she will want no more.'
Then again the women wailed.

Old Hippi said, as the other man, in a sort of recitative

'Never again will she use a fire.
Where she goes fires are not.
For she goes to the women, the dead women,
And women can make no fires.
Fruit is there in plenty and gras