Beliefs

Transcription - Page 22

5

looking down at us. Your boy went through and
said to me " I am only waiting here for you and
my father." One of the girls there said "How is my
mother?" I said why it looks like our Minna!"
Then I went through and saw a lot of people there."

This not only brings out the belief in our power of
the individual through sleep to leave the body
and to go elsewhere, but also the idea of the
[crossed out - Tharangalk-bek] - the sky country, where the
murup after death goes to. The ascent by the
cord and the entrance into the sky country
through a hole is also an unusual belief as for
all is done by the medicine men (see Chpter)

Returning again to Berak and the belief
in the ability of his Murup to leave the body
during sleep [crossed out - and] to wander abroad, I give by
a further instance which connects the old with
the new condition.

Nearly a quarter of a century ago he told me
that during his sleep his murup had gone
up the valley of Badger Creek, (a tributary of the Yarra river)
and that he had there found a quartz reef full of gold.
Although he had many times since searched the
place when awake the "Murup had never yet
been able to take him hard to the spot."

So firmly is the belief fixed in the mind that
in the latter end of [ letters crossed out] the year 1900 I heard
of him as being still [crossed out - th] looking for the reef.

[Left margin note bracketed to following paragraph]
Insert at A
p4

The Kurnai belief is much that of the Kulin.
I have heard two names applied to it, [crossed out - by this] the Brabra (p-)
Blimte-da-Nŭrk. Nŭrk is cloud. of the Krauatun 9p) the
sky was called [Bring-nurt?], "bring" being bone and nurt - cloud.

In speaking of the Birrark medicine men (p) I have
described them as [??] and the tribesmen's belief that they
ascended to the sky by means of the mrarts, [crossed out - that is] who
might be spoken of as ghosts. That the sky was regarded
as a solid covering is shown by the statement that the
Birrark went through a hole and that on the other side
he saw the mrarts dancing and singing.

As [crossed out - any the] in the case of Berak the