of the little
borah, which would be held in about four days' time, at about ten or
twelve miles distance from the scene of the big borah.

At the place of the little borah a ring of grass is made instead of one
of earth. The tribes all travel together there, camp, and have a
corrobboree. The young women are sent to bed early, and the old women
stay until the time when the boys bade farewell to them at the big
borah, at which hour the boys are brought into the little borah and
allowed to say a last good-bye to the old women. Then they are taken
away by the men who have charge of them together. They stay together
for a short time, then probably separate, each man with his one boy
going in a different direction. The man keeps strict charge of the boy
for at least six months, during which time he may not even look at his
own mother. At the end of about six months he may come back to his
tribe, but the effect of his isolation is that he is too wild and
frightened to speak even to his mother, from whom he runs away if she
approaches him, until by degrees the strangeness wears off.

But at this borah of Byamee the tribes were not destined to meet the
boys at the little borah. Just as they were gathering up their goods
for a start, into the camp staggered Millindooloonubbah, the widow,
crying, "You all left me, widow that I was, with my large family of
children, to travel alone. How could the little feet of my children
keep up to you? Can my back bear more than one goolay? Have I more than
two arms and one back? Then how could I come swiftly with so many
children? Yet none of you stayed to help me. And as you went from each
water hole you drank all the water. When, tired and thirsty, I reached
a water hole and my children cried for a drink, what did I find to give
them? Mud, only mud. Then thirsty and worn, my children crying and
their mother helpless to comfort them; on we came to the next hole.
What did we see, as we strained our eyes to find water? Mud, only mud.
As we reached hole after hole and found only mud, one by one my
children laid down and died; died for want of a drink, which
Millindooloonubbah their mother could not give them."

As she spoke, swiftly went a woman to her with a wirree of water. "Too
late, too late," she said. "Why should a mother live when her children
are dead?" And she lay back with a groan. But as she felt the water
cool her parched lips and soften her swollen tongue, she made a final
effort,